‘Ode to Joy’: Charlotte Symphony maestro’s final concert covers rousing Beethoven’s Ninth
The maestro’s final bows came Sunday afternoon at the end of “Ode to Joy,” a fitting conclusion to the 12-year career of Christopher Warren-Green as music director of the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra.
The choral that caps one of classical music’s most famous works, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, also could summarize Warren-Green’s time with the orchestra.
During his tenure, he broadened the repertoire, emphasized music education outreach in the community and worked to raise the company’s status as an international-class orchestra.
The 66-year-old is changing job titles, and will be conductor laureate and artistic adviser until his successor is named, potentially next year or in 2024.
Sunday’s matinee was the orchestra’s third and final concert of the weekend at Belk Theater.
Before it began, Resident Conductor Christopher Lees told the audience that Warren-Green had changed his life and the lives of nearly two dozen colleagues on the stage by giving them the opportunity to work with the orchestra.
When he introduced Warren-Green, the first of the day’s three standing ovations began.
Representing the musicians, horn player Robert Rydel presented Warren-Green with several gifts, including “one of North Carolina’s best whiskeys.” Following another ovation, Warren-Green lifted his baton. His final concert as maestro here had begun.
At the concert
Beethoven’s masterpiece debuted nearly two centuries ago, in May 1824.
In 2017, ahead of another Charlotte Orchestra performance of the work, the Observer’s Lawrence Toppman explained the Ninth Symphony’s significance this way: “It sings of hope after struggle, of mankind’s ability to rise above pain, of the value of universal brotherhood in a world that has seldom needed those messages so badly.”
The symphony concludes with “Ode to Joy,” set to a poem by Friedrich Schiller and accompanied Sunday by bass Jordan Bisch, tenor Sean Panikkar, mezzo-soprano Sarah Larsen, soprano Alicia Russell Tagert and the Charlotte Master Chorale directed by Kenney Potter.
Warren-Green punctuated the soaring finish by guiding the orchestra with flourishes of his left hand while vigorously wielding his baton in his right hand, and even lifted off his feet a little as the music swelled.
At the conclusion came five minutes of a standing ovation.
Warren-Green, garbed in a black mask and customary tuxedo with white tie and tails, took multiple bows, including with the main singers. He shook hands with some of the musicians, waved to the crowd and exited the stage.
‘Twelve years is long enough’
The symphony had plenty of time to prepare for Warren-Green’s departure: A year ago, he announced that this season that just ended, the orchestra’s 90th season, would be his last.
At the time, he told The Charlotte Observer that while the orchestra was in “fine fettle... Twelve years is long enough.” Warren-Green has been dividing his time between Charlotte and his native England, where he has served as music director for the London Chamber Orchestra since 1988.
His home in the English countryside is a 15th century thatched farmhouse in Norfolk, a county that also includes one of the royal residences of Queen Elizabeth II, Sandringham Estate. That’s an appropriate tie for a man who has conducted at royal weddings as well as a pair of birthday concerts for the queen.
And Warren-Green’s time leading Charlotte’s orchestra coincides with another important milestone — it’s his 50th anniversary as a professional musician.
An unexpected answer by the maestro
After the audience filed out of the theater Sunday, musicians and staff gathered in the mezzanine lobby, offering congratulations and posing for pictures with Warren-Green.
He didn’t feel sad now that his time as music director was over, he told the Observer. He was glad to stick around to help the orchestra find his successor.
Warren-Green also wanted to make another point.
“This is going to sound corny. But I love this orchestra, I love the people in it, even the ones that we had fights with. I probably love them even more.
“There aren’t many conductors that can honestly say, I absolutely love them. And that’s how I feel.”
When asked why he chose Beethoven’s Ninth for his final concert, Warren-Green, the man in charge of deciding what the company performs, offered a surprising response.
It wasn’t his idea. Orchestra President and CEO David Fisk asked if he would play it.
“Otherwise,” Warren-Green said, smiling, “I probably would’ve done some Mahler.”
One last thing. Orchestra-goers certainly haven’t seen the last of Warren-Green this year.
He’s already scheduled to return Dec. 2-4 to pick up the baton once more and lead the orchestra in the Knight Theater for Handel’s “Messiah.” Ode to joy, indeed.
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This story was originally published May 23, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
