Joshua Bell and the premiere of “City of Light” bring a capacity audience to its feet

By Frank Housh

Warm summer evenings gave way a cool, cloudy night as Buffalo music lovers filed into Kleinhans Music Hall for the opening of the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra’s 90th Season (Sept. 28, 2024). BPO Music Director JoAnn Falletta enjoyed two standing ovations before a single note was played following BPO Chairman of the Board Scott Stenclik’s remarks honoring the institution’s 90th birthday and Falletta’s 25th anniversary as music director.

Check out the Buffalo Hive photo gallery from opening night

A quarter-century ago, JoAnn Falletta broke a decrepit, outdated glass ceiling when she became the first woman to lead a major American orchestra. She has since been followed by Marin Alsop in Baltimore (2005), Natalie Stutzmann in Atlanta (2022) and Xian Zhang in Seattle (2025).

In an era of bankrupt orchestras and dwindling audiences, Falletta has kept Kleinhans Music Hall filled and helped bring the BPO into fiscal solvency with innovative programming, a rigorous work ethic and a deep love of music. Indeed, Stenclik announced from the stage that the BPO musicians union just signed a 3-year contract extension; the BPO continues to thrive under Falletta’s baton.

Any successful woman has to be twice as good and work twice as hard as the men around her. For a quarter century Buffalo has enjoyed the manifest benefits of elevating a talented woman to a key position and I respectfully suggest we remember that when we elect a new president in 36 days.

The concert began with the debut performance of Daron Hagen’s “City of Light,” commissioned to celebrate the BPO’s twin milestones. Described in the program as a “tone poem inspired by the thrum of electric energy and the thrill of illumination,” the work began with an elegiac theme featuring fluttering woodwinds and shimmering strings.

Each section of the Orchestra in the 16-minute piece had its moment; a snare drum with low brass provided counterpoint to the opening theme, and the use of dynamic pulse and key changes (modulations) at critical moments brought depth and complexity into a powerful, original work.

“City of Light” is just one of several new compositions the BPO has performed this year, including January 2024’s Altered Landscape by Jimmy López Bellido and Behzad Ranbaran’s “Saratoga Overture,” performed in May. While there is, of course, nothing wrong with performing the great composers, including contemporary works has injected creative oxygen into the BPO and thus avoided making Kleinhans a musical museum.

Joshua Bell first performed with the BPO in 1985 and the acclaimed violinist was greeted with with a standing ovation as he took the stage to perform Henryk Wieniawski’s Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D minor, (Op.22). The composition itself relegates the orchestra to an accompanist role highlighting a demanding, dramatic violin part that includes complex techniques such as upbow staccato, chromatic glissandi, double stops and artificial harmonics.

Just as Buffalonians have come to expect Josh Allen vaulting hapless linebackers and dropping 60-yard passes into the arms of receivers surrounded by defenders, Bell’s musical pyrotechnics were delightful but unsurprising; his encore performance of “Yankee Doodle” sounded like three violin virtuosos after a few drinks.

The concert included a performance of Stravinsky’s 1919 Suite from “The Firebird” ballet and its familiar “Infernal Dance of King Koschei.” A couple of missed section entrances did little to diminish the power of one of the 20th Century’s greatest pieces.

The BPO’s new season promises great things. I have little doubt it will deliver them.

Frank Housh is The Buffalo Hive’s Managing Editor.