Note: Free Times editor Dan Cook is in New York City as part of an NEA fellowship program in arts journalism. Below is a review of the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Bernard Haitink on Wednesday, Oct.21.

Haitink’s Mahler Shows Strength, Contradictions of Today’s Classical World

From opera glasses to baseball caps, glamorous dresses to short black skirts, the cultural contradictions of today’s classical world were on full display on Wednesday night at Avery Fisher Hall. Whatever it was that drew the wide audience to see Bernard Haitink lead the London Symphony Orchestra — social habit, love of Mahler or just a vague sense that this was an event worth attending — the nearly packed hall served as a powerful visual antidote to the oft-heard notion that classical music is dead.

Who knew that Mahler had such street cred?

The proof that at least a small portion of the audience was comprised of classical newbies was clear: They clapped between two movements. As annoying as that can be, it is also a welcome signal that the sometimes-insular world of the concert hall is capable of expanding as well as contracting.

As I suspect was the case with some of the audience, my own experiences with Mahler have been limited. Generally, I have been inclined to chalk him up as a towering but dated artifact of Romantic excess. (Symphony of a Thousand? Really?) Haitink destroyed that inclination, calling forth a masterful performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 in G Major that was remarkable for its clarity, balance, precision and, ultimately, its sustained and coherent vision. Exuding a steady but understated authority, Haitink delivered precise, simple gestures in which every outstretched palm, upward motion of the hand and downward beat of the baton spoke clearly to the orchestra and was followed as if handed down on a stone tablet.

Mahler’s Fourth Symphony leaves behind some of the brooding Romanticism for which Mahler is known for a decidedly livelier and lighter approach, even incorporating a sleigh bell in its opening passage. But it is by no means a simple or insubstantial work, and its lightness does not persist throughout. Rather, it is a masterpiece of varied textures, expressive dynamics and rich tonal colors.

The revelation for me came in the third movement. Up until that point, I had admired much about the performance — the crisp, robust brass and winds, the impeccable sense of phrasing and dynamic balance — but I had also been yearning for more. I sensed that opportunities were being lost: Phrases that could have been brought out more clearly or slowed down or emphasis were instead floating away before they’d had a chance to live up to their full potential.

But sometime shortly after the inexorable build of a crescendo led by brass and timpani, it hit me that Haitink had a lot more than a steady hand to offer. I realized that every single phrase that I’d wished had been treated differently was one Haitink had treated that way for a reason: He was building slowly, following a larger architecture, focused on more majestic moments to come.

By the time I was engulfed in the fourth movement, it didn’t matter to me that the balance between the orchestra and soprano Miah Persson was not as perfect as had been the case in the first three instrumental movements. By that time, Haitink had more than won me over. And when he held the orchestra in repose for several seconds at the symphony’s conclusion, it seemed as if he was a musical god capable of suspending time, if only for an extended moment.

He isn’t, of course: He’s a human being, one who turned 80 in March.

Classical music isn’t dying, but it is full of contradictions. One of them is that young people came to see an 80-year-old man conduct a 108-year-old piece of music.

Haitink certainly isn’t the future, and Mahler might not be, either. But on Wednesday night at Avery Fisher Hall, they both staked out their cultural ground in the present. The many questions about where classical music is going remain on the table. But after a performance like this, they are questions for another time.