Lehigh Philharmonic Delights with Holiday Concert

Baker Hall at Zoellner Arts Center was nearly filled on Friday night to hear a selection of holiday favorites from the Philharmonic Orchestra.

The "Winter Magic," program, which will be repeated tonight at 8 p.m., featured the violin of world class concertmaster Christopher Collins Lee and a unique visual interpretation of Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker Suite," prepared by Lehigh and Moravian College adjunct professor Linda Ganus and Eugene Albulescu, the orchestra's conductor.

Albulescu publicly thanked the orchestra for its hard work and short rehearsal schedule, following November's impressive performance, featuring Gustav Mahler's demanding "Titan" symphony.

This concert was somewhat lighter fare, featuring Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky's famed holiday favorite and Edvard Grieg's "Peer Gynt Suite No. 1," with well-known melodies that are oft repeated in popular culture, but not always recognized for their origin.

The concert opened with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's "Concerto No. 3 in G major for Violin and Orchestra." Mozart expert Collins Lee was the featured soloist. He often lectures on the composer's life and times, using a 1680 Cremonese violin that once belonged to Mozart's father and teacher, Leopold.

After playing Mozart, who wrote for smaller string-dominated orchestras, the philharmonic nearly doubled in size for "Peer Gynt," as woodwinds, brass and percussion players joined the concert stage.

Albulescu noted that three of the four of Grieg piece's movements are "extremely well-known" and "extremely happy for the season."

Before the orchestra launched into "Nutcracker," after the intermission, Albulescu mused on the popularity of the toy soldier nutcracker as a Christmas season toy.

"I grew up in a country where they did not sell a lot of shelled nuts," said Albulescu, who spent his early years in Romania. "I think it was a good way to get kids eager to crack nuts. I spent a lot of time cracking nuts during the holidays."

The conductor humorously noted that there was no room on the stage to perform a ballet, before describing the visual interpretation prepared by he and his partner Ganus.

"If you look at the stars long enough, you start seeing things," noting the origin of constellations. Different people may notice different things if they connect the dots. A musician may see instruments, he said. A child may see something else entirely.

As the philharmonic played, a projection screen showed an animated tale of a nutcracker that emerged from the night sky, fell to earth and spent the holiday season with a little girl who first saw him.

At the conclusion of a standing ovation from the delighted audience, Albulescu thanked the orchestra and addressed the crowd once more.

"I'll confess that I had a lot of sleepless nights putting this together," he said. "We never actually had a run through."

If not for the admission, the audience would never  have known.

In the program, Albulescu calls the orchestra a "hybrid." Though its primary mission is educational, it is made up of college students, professors from a variety of disciplines, serious high school musicians and some local professionals.

At $18 a ticket, it is not an inexpensive night out, however, it may be the most professional sounding orchestra in Pennsylvania that does not call Philadelphia or Pittsburgh home.