More than any other art form, music can be a salve that heals the soul in times of need and offers a glimpse of a brighter tomorrow.  In a Martin Luther King Day concert filled with symbolism, the Chicago Sinfonietta gave its Orchestra Hall audience both of those things (and more) in an outstanding performance of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony, the composer’s ode to freedom and to the brotherhood of humanity.
 
Music Director Paul Freeman opened the concert with a moment of silent prayer for the victims of the earthquake in Haiti.  It was a surreal experience being in a completely silent concert hall full of people as they meditated on the scope of this natural disaster.  This atmosphere of reflection continued directly into Fauré’s Op. 50 Pavane, as the Sinfonietta’s strings unobtrusively introduced this stately, reserved music with delicate pizzicato playing.  As they traded back and forth with the winds, the piece grew in size and emotional intensity, but never strayed far from its pedestrian gait.
 
After that contemplative beginning, members of the Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, soprano Jonita Lattimore and contralto Gwendolyn Brown joined the Sinfonietta for Four Negro Spirituals for Orchestra, arranged by a composer who has a long-standing relationship with Freeman and the Sinfonietta through their recordings, Hale Smith.  From the uplifting “Let Us Break Bread Together,” through the mournful second movement that featured a pair of solo dancers (“Jesus, Lay Your Head in the Window”), to the energy-laden and crowd-pleasing finale, “Witness,” the dancers added an expressive element to the music that mostly illuminated rather than distracted.  The four movements were well-played and magnificently sung by Lattimore and Brown, who were to reappear for the 'main event' in the second half of the concert.
 
It’s a well-worn cliché that music is a universal language, but it definitely is true that one of the things that distinguishes history’s greatest, most timeless music is its relevance and immediacy for listeners regardless of its context and time period.  Beethoven’s 9th symphony, as just one example, seems to fit just as well in a concert honoring our greatest civil rights leader as it did when Leonard Bernstein conducted it in Germany following the fall of the Berlin Wall.
 
Faced with one of the most tremendous creations in all of music, it’s a brave soul that takes the podium to lead the full ensemble, quartet of soloists, and choir- in Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, no less.  Kazem Abdullah, a rising star in the conducting world who had his premiere with the Metropolitan Opera last year, stepped up to the plate admirably.  Abdullah demonstrated an intimate familiarity with the 9th, propelling the orchestra forward with an energy that seemed partly fueled by nervous adrenaline at the opening and by a more controlled youthful exuberance later on.  Northwestern University’s Symphonic Choir sounded appropriately massive, and the four singers- Jonita Lattimore, Gwendolyn Brown, Richard Drews and Bruce Hall- matched the tremendous forces behind them with authority.  The Sinfonietta rose to the occasion, a united force that set an admirable example of the harmony and cohesiveness that this work extols.