It’s not every day that students get to take free trips downtown to hear the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO) perform at the Symphony Center. Last weekend, the three sections of MUSI 101, Intro to Western Art Music, did just that.
MUSI 101, a class I’m taking that fulfills the arts requirement in the Core, brings together students across the University, from people with zero musical experience to music majors. If UChicago’s aim is to teach us how to think, then the aim of this course is to teach us how to listen, and, more broadly, how to engage actively with the arts.
The course is more than a mere survey of music history: it’s a study of the experience of music. Much of class time is spent listening to pieces, reflecting on our emotional responses, and comparing different interpretations. We often pair contrasting styles of music to identify the unique qualities of each genre; for example, one week we listened to Renaissance motets and madrigals alongside Negro spirituals of the early 20th century, analyzing the similarities and differences between their religious and humanist elements.
MUSI 101 offers the rare opportunity not just to study music, but to live it—and live performances bring music to life in ways that no textbook or recording ever could. The course offers two options: one at the CSO and another at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. I had the privilege of attending the former on October 18. Led by rising star Klaus Mäkelä, the 29-year-old music director designate of both the CSO and Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw, two of the world’s most prestigious orchestras, the program featured an all-Berlioz program, including Harold in Italy, a “symphony with solo viola” with soloist Antoine Tamestit, and the iconic Symphonie fantastique.
What the two pieces share is their programmatic nature—that is, they are meant to tell a story. Symphonie fantastique, for example, famously follows the life of a man who, driven mad by unrequited love, descends into obsession, ultimately poisoning himself to the point of hallucination, where he envisions his own execution. Similarly, Harold in Italy is inspired by Lord Byron’s narrative poem, “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” with the viola representing the titular character’s journey.
When the orchestra began playing the opening notes of Harold in Italy, however, there was no violist to be seen. For a few minutes, I wondered whether Tamestit had missed his cue, or if there had been some mistake. I soon realized, however, that this wasn’t accidental but rather a creative decision by the musicians. About three minutes into the piece, Tamestit walked onto the stage, not taking the customary position beside the conductor but instead standing near the back, next to the harp. As the performance unfolded, he moved about the stage, at times next to the podium, other times in between the orchestra musicians. Towards the end of the final movement, Tamestit, along with two other string players, retreated once again to the back of the stage for a quartet passage.
Innovative choreography aside, Tamestit’s playing was undoubtedly the highlight of the performance. One could feel that he was telling a story in every phrase as he shifted between playfulness and tension, lyricism and drama, while bringing out the viola’s deep and colorful sound. Most impressive was his control: he never got lost in the power of the music, yet when the moment called for intensity and force, he delivered it decisively. He interacted closely with the orchestra, often joining tutti passages—another unconventional move—and even reacting in visible shock to Berlioz’s louder moments, such as the sudden outburst at the start of the fourth movement.
First-year Edward Ward, a student in MUSI 101 who attended the concert, said, “It was the best viola playing I’ve ever heard, and the narrative nature of the piece really came across.”
Tamestit closed with a wonderful solo encore of Bach’s Cello Suite No. 1 in G major. The tempo was a tad brisk for my taste, but, then again, what’s the point of a solo encore if not to showcase some technical fireworks?
At intermission, students shared their thoughts on the imaginative movements of the performance. Some found it exciting and engaging; others felt it distracting from the music. Personally, I appreciated that many of Tamestit’s movements seemed in tune with the music, as if he were physically acting out Harold’s journey, rather than just conveying it through his instrument. At the same time, the relocation of orchestra musicians seemed a bit too much: their movements disconnected me from the music, and I was honestly more concerned that they might have broken a string than anything else.
In the second half of the concert, we were treated to yet another powerful showcase of musical storytelling: Symphonie fantastique, the tale of an artist overcome by unrequited love. Berlioz’s own program notes, included in the concert program, detail the vivid narrative behind the movements, each one following a distinct chapter in the protagonist’s life, from passion to delirium to death. In class the following week, many students remarked that it was helpful to follow along with the program to get a better sense of what the music was trying to convey.
The symphony is more than a punchy tale about heartbreak; it offers a deep dive into the psychology of suffering and a soundtrack to the profound emotions of love, loss, and sickness. What makes the Symphonie fantastique truly epic, however, are the lessons it imparts upon the listener. Berlioz doesn’t beautify or glorify the artist’s suffering—if anything, he warns us against the intoxicating and at times destructive nature of love.
Mäkelä offered a fresh and exciting perspective to the classic piece, filled with energy and dramatic power. You could feel the subtle melancholy of the waltz during the second movement and the sheer brilliance of the cataclysmic finale in the last, as if you were in the mind of the symphony’s tragic protagonist.
At the same time, the youthfulness of his interpretation sometimes came at the expense of balance and consistency. An important component of any great interpretation is knowing when to hold back—understanding not just when to bring out the full power of the orchestra, but also when to let the music breathe. More loudness often has the counterintuitive effect of making the music less impactful: if every brass tutti is a fortissimo, the actual climaxes stand out far less and therefore become less meaningful. A conductor must always see the symphony from a bird’s-eye view, with the entire musical arc in mind, otherwise the music runs the risk of sounding more like a series of immediate thrills rather than a complete story. Even the softest passages of the first movement must be performed with the ending in mind—that’s how one achieves true balance and narrative cohesion.
Mäkelä’s technical ability on the podium is undeniable, and he has clearly established a special rapport with the orchestra, who advocated for his appointment as music director. What will elevate him from just a good conductor to the likes of his predecessor, Riccardo Muti, will be the refinement of his interpretations.
For many students, this was their first time attending a concert. And if our in-class reflections were any indication, the CSO’s performance was as good an introduction to classical music as one could hope for. Mäkelä, Tamestit, and the orchestra were in perfect harmony throughout the evening, capturing our attention from beginning to end, after which they earned a well-deserved standing ovation.
“It was wonderful that so many of us were able to share in the fun of live concert music, and then talk about it together in class,” Ward said. “That meant a lot to me.”
Experiences like these remind us why the arts, especially music, are so important to education. Beyond entertainment, great masterpieces like this concert offer insight into reality through storytelling, and, by engaging with them, we develop a heightened understanding of humanity and the world around us.
