The Chicago Symphony gives Tüür’s accordion concerto a long-overdue US premiere
Seenandheard International
United States Various: Ksenija Sidorova (accordion), Chicago Symphony Orchestra / Paavo Järvi (conductor). Orchestra Hall, Chicago, 2.4.2026. (ZC)
Brahms – Variations on a Theme by Haydn
Erkki-Sven Tüür – Prophecy
Sibelius – Symphony No.2 in D major
The Chicago Symphony is often described as a product of the great German and Viennese tradition. That reputation has been earned, but this concert suggested the CSO’s story is more complex and interesting than that tight refrain.
The program opened with Brahms’s Variations on a Theme by Haydn and closed with Sibelius’s Symphony No.2. Sandwiched between them was the U.S. premiere of Prophecy, Erkki-Sven Tüür’s accordion concerto, nearly two decades after the work was first performed in 2007. It should be noted that in 1904 under Theodore Thomas, the CSO gave the U.S. premiere of Sibelius’s Second Symphony. The CSO has been doing this kind of work longer than people sometimes remember.
Erkki-Sven Tüür is not a household name in concert halls, though he perhaps should be. Born in Estonia in 1959, he came to composition through an unusual door: Tüür led the progressive rock group In Spe in the late-Soviet period before pivoting to the classical world. The rock influence survives in his orchestral writing as rhythmic energy, kinetic momentum and an appetite for raw textural contrast, even as it has been absorbed into a larger formal method built on continuous transformation.
Prophecy unfolds in four connected movements that move from a cosmic and formative opening through pulsing activity and inward reflection, all culminating in a rambunctious finale. It is not easy music, but it is gripping and rewards sustained attention.
The concerto’s most unusual feature was its soloist, Ksenija Sidorova. The accordion is an instrument one almost never sees at the front of a major orchestra. It was certainly a first for me. Sidorova has spoken about the accordion’s chameleon-like qualities and its ability to suggest the timbre of other instruments. What struck me, however, was not its mimicry but its otherness. The colors it produced felt more alien than familiar: sometimes brittle, sometimes carnival-dark and occasionally tender in surprising ways. The instrument’s sound palette is unlike anything else in the concert hall, and in Sidorova’s hands it becomes a prism for shifting moods.
The second-movement cadenza which leads into the slow third movement was revelatory. Sidorova held the hall in a kind of meditative stillness, an effect I would not have predicted from an accordion. The finale then erupted in the opposite direction, its churning forward drive resembling something out of a steampunk fantasy. The first movement, meanwhile, had an almost Sibelian quality, with phrases and fragments accumulating and coalescing into something larger before dissolving again.
It takes exceptional personal presence to carry an unfamiliar piece on an unfamiliar instrument and make an audience lean in. Sidorova has that presence in abundance. Paavo Järvi, who has championed the piece alongside Sidorova, conducted with evident commitment. He treated the score as a serious addition to the repertory. Prophecy may not have been the most immediately pleasurable work on the program, but it was arguably the most important and, in its way, the most memorable.
Järvi is an established Sibelian, and the Symphony No.2 delivered much of what one expects from both conductor and orchestra: a performance both elemental and purposeful in equal parts. Järvi is less interested in pastoral mood painting or lingering over Finnish landscapes. That atmosphere was present when he wanted it – the first movement’s ambiguous opening, the introspective weight of the second – but it always served forward momentum.
What struck me most was the string sound. Järvi drew from the CSO strings a physical depth and solidity that gave the entire performance a strong central core. The brass were formidable, but perhaps overly prominent in parts, placing them on top of the orchestra too much at times rather than within it. But as the symphony progressed, that impression softened. The bracing quality of the CSO brass is simply a fact of life, and here it served Sibelius well.
This was the sort of performance one expects from a great orchestra when conductor and musicians lean fully into their collective strengths. It wasn’t a revelatory reimagining of the symphony, but it was an authoritative account and expertly delivered.
Brahms’s Variations on a Theme by Haydn felt, at first glance, like an odd fit on a program otherwise given over to Nordic atmospheres and Estonian modernism. The last time I heard this work live, it was played by an array of community orchestras at Benaroya Hall’s tenth anniversary in Seattle – a very different context. Here it served to show off Järvi’s range. The performance took a few measures to find its footing but, once it did, Järvi and the musicians gave each variation a clear profile and sense of direction. The piece ultimately showed the conductor’s versatility and offered a kind of classical grounding before the evening moved into less charted territory.
Zach Carstensen
Featured Image: Erkki-Sven Tüür, Ksenija Sidorova and Paavo Järvi at the conclusion of Prophecy © Todd Rosenberg
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