The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's triumphal appearance at Tokyo's Suntory Hall last weekend, Japan's equivalent of Carnegie Hall, established it as a world-class ensemble before one of the world's most discriminating audiences.
By all accounts it was a climactic event in a whirlwind series of performances that has captured the imagination of audiences across East Asia and lifted their estimation of our hometown orchestra to dizzying heights.
The Sun's Stephen Wigler described the BSO's Tokyo concert last Friday under Music Director David Zinman as "perhaps the greatest concert in their history together" and a defining moment that marked a "quantum leap" to a new level of artistic and technical accomplishment. "It made believers out of Suntory's usually staid, skeptical audience," Mr. Wigler reported.
Thus when the orchestra marks the end of its phenomenally successful month-long tour of Asia this Friday with its arrival at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, it will be accorded a welcome fit for the return of a conquering hero.
The musicians will be feted in celebratory fashion as soon as they step off the plane. Next day they'll join the annual Thanksgiving Day parade aboard a float designed especially for the occasion. After that they'll be treated to lunch at Stoufer's Harborplace hotel. And then, mercifully, they'll take a few days off for a well-earned rest.
But not for long. On Nov. 28, the BSO returns to Meyerhoff Hall for its annual "Thank You" concert for BSO donors. The program will include many of the highlights of its Asian tour, including Stravinsky's "Firebird Suite," Copeland's "El Salon Mexico" and Beethoven's Seventh Symphony.
These are heady times for the BSO, whose extraordinary music-making has been overshadowed for far too long by the glitter of better-known American orchestras. In Asia, where Western classical music is revered by young and old alike, the BSO showed it could compete with the best. Its triumph there put Baltimore on the map, musically speaking, as surely as a championship season by the Orioles would have among baseball fans.
The Tokyo concert will be broadcast throughout Japan next month and on Maryland Public Television Nov. 25 and 27. Marylanders surely will want to tune in when these historic performances are broadcast here to root for our winning home team.