THE MICHIGAN DAILY Page Five Wednesday, May 7, 1.975 Horowitz, May Festival pro vide stirring finale for 74-75 season By DAVID BLOMQUIST The last half of this past term's University Musical Society- program was one of the most exciting sched- ules in recent years, featuring such internationally prominent artists as Andre Previn, Seiji Ozawa, and Mstislav Rostropovich. But two special events at the end of last month- pianist Vladimir Horowitz's first University recital after nearly 20 years of semi-retirement, and the 82nd Philadelphia Orchestra May Festival - provided a highly unusual and even more thrilling finish for the Society's 1974-75 season. HOROWITZ'S RARE concert appearance illustrated a .consummate individual artist at work-a performer able to perfectly integrate mechanics and technique into a sweeping array of musical expression. The Phila- delphia Orchestra, on the other hand, demonstarted the tremendous professionalism and sheer versatility that only a superior musical organization can develop and maintain. The Horowitz recital, held April 20 in Hill Auditor- ilm, represented the first live experience for most of the audience of the master's deeply emotional yet pre- cisey restrained piano style, after a decade of ex- posure to nothing but a few scattered recordings. It was an aurally rich afternoon that we shall not soon forget. In Robert Schumann's Kinderscenen ("Scenes from Childhood"), for example, Horowitz skillfully balanced sentiment and technical control to yield a powerful per- formance of a deceivingly simple collection of piano studies from the Romantic period. The distinctive Horowitz touch-a unique ability to mix a light, clear melodic line with a firm, definite counterpoint-turned these student pianist's compositions into miniature sketches of a warm past that we all have experienced but have long since forgotten. TH4T SUBTLE touch was equally visible in a com- pletely contrasting work, the fifth sonata of Alexander Scriabin. Working at ease amidst extremely demanding passages, Horowitz evoked a mystic, occult-like atmos- phere that ended in a dazzling shower of notes up the keyboard. Horowitz seemed to experience some difficulty, how- ever, in executing a new approach to Chopin's ballade in G minor, a feverish work which he recorded on a CBS television special several years ago. He had carefully warned critics at a press confer- ence the day before the concert that he was not "an assembly-line pianist," and that we could probably expect a slightly different performance of each work on the program than that on the recordings with which we were familiar. By slowing down the pace somewhat from his earlier performances of the ballade, -Horowitz was able to delineate more closely Chopin's careful attention to harmonic detail. Yet some of the wild, frenzied spirit inspired in the 1968 interpretation was apparently somewhat dissipated in the process. While the overall stormy mood of the ballade remained intact, the total Vladimir mood created was not as frighteningly striking. BUT MYSTERY and frenzy returned to Hill again en masse several days later when Eugene Ormandy and the 'Philadelphia Orchestra came to town April 30 for their annual springtime visit. After a brief orches- tral chorale tribute to Thor Johnson, the former May Festival conductor who died in January, Ormandy opened the series with one of the more exotic and color- ful selections in the symphonic literature: Gustav Mah- ler's Symphony No. 1 in D major. Backed by superb performances from the lower strings, Ormandy guided the Philadelphia through a suitably perky rendition of the intensely challenging Mahler score, filled with hundreds of different sound images ranging from delicate solo-like lines to massive ensembles. A generally weak contribution from the horn section provided the only questionable moments. And then, after intermission, caine some shocking news (delivered most apologetically by Musical Society director Gail Rector): the 75-year-old Ormandy, plagued by a virus infection, felt too weak to continue the concert. His assistant, William Smith, would finish the program. SMITH'S execution of Gershwin's An American in Horowitz Paris and the classic Firebird Suite by Stravinsky was not exactly notable, but it was successful-and under the circumstances, with both conductor and orchestra caught unprepared, even that represented a consider- able achievementt. Using an ongoing series of hand signals, Smith and the orchestra managed to keep together through both the Gershwin and Stravinsky works - compositions of incredible complexity - despite a few dropped beats and some missed notes here 'and there. It was a re- freshing exercise in orchestral flexibility( if it was not the perfect concert performance. Ormandy returned to the podium Thursday night, directing piano soloist Rudolf Serkin. Aides reported that he was completely rested and "feeling very chip- per."' In all, both presentations represented the state of the concert at its finest. In Horowitz, we heard a ven- erable-.genius of the piano deliver a memorable after- noon overflowing with style and savoir-faire. And with the Philadelphia, we saw an outstanding concert group suffer the sudden loss of its legendary music director and emerge from the evening with head unbowed. Both instances again remind one of the subtle, but most dis- tinct, difference between the mere performer and the true artist.