Review: ‘Mitchell Had the Pasadena Symphony Playing at Their Finest’

Brett Mitchell leads the Pasadena Symphony in his inaugural performances as Music Director at the Ambassador Auditorium on October 26, 2024. (Photo by Karen Tapia)

PASADENA — Culture Spot LA has published a review of Brett Mitchell’s inaugural program as Music Director of the Pasadena Symphony:

At 2 and 8 p.m. at the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, the Pasadena Symphony gave its inaugural concert of the 2024/25 season under the direction of its new music director, Brett Mitchell. The program featured New Beginnings by Altadena composer Peter Boyer, the Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35 by Eric Wolfgang Korngold with violinist Akiko Suwanai, and the Symphony No. 1 in D Major (“Titan”) by Gustav Mahler. The Pasadena Symphony…showed why they are one of the top regional orchestras in the Southland.

The first piece on the program, New Beginnings, by local composer Peter Boyer was, as Music Director Mitchell stated in his comments, extremely apropos. Not only was this the inaugural concert by the PSO in their 2024/25 season, but it was the first being led by newly appointed Music Director Mitchell. So, it was new beginnings all around. New Beginnings is an uplifting single-movement work with hints of John Williams that utilizes a large orchestra and makes the most of the brass sections. It contains rhythmic sequences that are hard not to tap your foot to, and it was the perfect work to introduce the new season and the new conductor. 

And, speaking of film scores, the first half of the concert concluded with the equally uplifting and melodic violin concerto by Korngold. Korngold, who was a child prodigy in his native Vienna, Austria, eventually came to Los Angeles where he composed film scores in addition to classical music. The Violin Concerto contains melodies from four of his film scores woven together in a beautiful and thrilling late romantic work for violin and orchestra. Suwanai more than handled the difficult solo part. Her playing was understated but both technically and tonally top-notch. Mitchell did a fine job of accompanying her while never letting the orchestra overwhelm. 

The concert concluded with Mahler’s First Symphony, which is subtitled “The Titan.” However, many of Mahler’s subsequent symphonies were actually more titan if by that we mean large-scale and lengthy. This symphony really shows off all the sections of the orchestra, but especially the horn section. The PSO horns were more than up to the task and really knocked the ball out of the park. Mitchell showed why he was selected as the PSO’s new music director. He very capably served up an exciting rendition of the Mahler First and had the orchestra playing at their finest.

To read the complete review, please click here.