On the whole, this BSO Opening Night was a welcome overview Leonard Bernstein’s larger output and of his chameleon-like versatility as a composer.

Andris Nelsons conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra on Opening Night. Photo: Michael Blanchard.

By Jonathan Blumhofer

Leonard Bernstein’s 100th birthday falls at the end of next August and the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s (BSO) all-Bernstein season opener on Friday night at Symphony Hall officially kicked off a worldwide, two-season celebration of the composer’s life and music. It turned out to be a timely and welcome program – part froth, part depth, lots of personality – if, in some ways, a bit frustrating.

Bernstein and the BSO had a long, sometimes contentious, relationship. He cut his teeth with the orchestra in the ‘40s, studying with Koussevitzky at Tanglewood and leading several high-profile concerts during the decade (the world premiere of the Turangalila Symphony, the first American performance of Peter Grimes, etc.). Passed over as Koussevitzky’s successor, he went southwest: Boston’s loss ultimately became New York’s – and the world’s – gain. But he kept up his ties with the BSO, mainly at Tanglewood, where he appeared almost annually from 1970 until his death twenty years later (the last time Bernstein led the BSO at Symphony Hall was in 1972).

Still, for all that history, the BSO’s Bernstein ties aren’t always much played up.

As far as his music goes, maybe they shouldn’t be. Outside of Pops’ and Tanglewood performances of his pieces (those, mostly excerpts from the musicals), his concert works have been infrequently represented at Symphony Hall. The only conductor to tackle a considerable dose of Bernstein’s serious music with the BSO is his one-time protégé, Seiji Ozawa and, since Ozawa’s departure in 2002, there’ve been but two major Bernstein scores played on any of the orchestra’s subscription series (the Serenade, with Joshua Bell, in 2012 and a screening of West Side Story with live orchestral accompaniment in 2014).

The upcoming centennial offers a chance to balance the record a little bit, though it’s off to a slow start. A “year-long tribute” is how it may be advertised, but it’s curiously short on Bernstein’s actual music: the three orchestral scores heard on Friday will be followed by two of Bernstein’s three symphonies in March, and that’s it. No Songfest (at least not in full), no Mass, no concert performances of any of the shows – or, for that matter, any of the other orchestral pieces of his the BSO hasn’t played since, say, 1987 (Facsimile) or 1988 (an excerpt from Fancy Free) or longer.

Maybe we can just chalk this up to nerves. Music director Andris Nelsons, in some warm, personal comments to the audience on Friday, admitted to his own jitters about leading the music of such an iconic American composer with his hometown band. That’s understandable though, in the event, not entirely warranted. As a conductor, Nelsons shares more than a few traits with Bernstein (most notably the physicality of his conducting gestures). For better or worse, he’s, thus far, less of an interpretive interventionist, but he often brings a white-hot intensity to performances of his prime repertoire that’s reminiscent of Bernstein leading his.

Friday’s audience got a taste of that in the concert’s second piece, the 1981 nocturne Halil, for flute, strings, and percussion. A shadowy score written in memory of an Israeli flautist killed during the Yom Kippur War in 1973, it offers a sophisticated blend of serialism and tonality; sumptuous lyricism and splintered motivic activity; and moments of psychological theater (a piccolo and alto flute, hidden within the ensemble, echo the soloist from time to time).

Nelsons and the BSO were totally in their element, navigating the music’s shifting scenes and textures with color and understanding. Elizabeth Rowe, the second BSO principal flute to take on the piece (Doriot Anthony Dwyer played it with Bernstein at Tanglewood in 1981 and recorded it some twenty years ago), made deft work of the acrobatic solo part. She was particularly impressive in the long, percussion-accompanied cadenza that makes up Halil’s middle third, tossing off its fragmented arpeggios, shrieks, and quarter tones with verve and aplomb.

Not quite as brilliant was Friday’s reading of Bernstein’s Divertimento, a witty 1980 score written for the BSO’s own centennial that year. A set of eight miniatures, it’s a piece that oozes charm and packs more than a few inside jokes: allusions to Tchaikovsky, a snatch of Beethoven, a tongue-in-cheek 12-tone episode, and so forth.

On Friday, parts of it sounded under-rehearsed (cracked notes and loose ensemble playing in the opening “Sennets and Tuckets”) or simply out of character (both the “Waltz” and “Mazurka” were rushed). Things came together by the end – the “Blues” movement was terrific and the last half of the closing march (called “The BSO Forever”) had lots of swagger – but the whole score wasn’t quite as tightly synched as it could have been.

The Symphonic Dances from “West Side Story” that closed the evening were also a bit uneven. Nelsons really drew out the music’s dark, jazzy energy (the “Prologue,” “Mambo,” and “Fugue” were all vibrant) and teased out some of its playfulness, too (the “Maria” cha-cha). But other movements dragged: “Somewhere” and “I Have a Love” came across as a bit too weighty and Mahlerian.

In between Halil and West Side Story came a selection of Bernstein songs. The first set, featuring “A Julia de Burgos” from Songfest, the “Piccola Serenata,” and “A Little Bit in Love” from Wonderful Town, showcased soprano Julia Bullock (making her BSO debut). And, my, did she impress, singing with pristine diction, clarion tone, and a total understanding of the individual character of each song. The same qualities marked her performance of “It Must Be So” (from Candide).

Bullock shared the stage with Frederica von Stade, the evening’s host, who, aside from some obligatory praise for the orchestra and the hall, offered anecdotes of working with Bernstein and sang a couple of songs. If her voice isn’t the instrument it once was, she’s still got charisma to burn, as was demonstrated in the “Old Lady’s Tango” from Candide (in which she was joined by members of the Tanglewood Festival Chorus). She and Bullock closed the night’s vocal portion with a touching duet of “Neverland” (from the score to Peter Pan).

On the whole, then, this Opening Night was a welcome overview Bernstein’s larger output and of his chameleon-like versatility as a composer. But it was also a reminder that there’s lots of great music for the BSO to play that it either ignores or just doesn’t get around to nearly as much as it should. Does this mark the start of Bernstein/American music revival from the BSO? Probably not, but, in this centennial year, why not hope for such a thing? Bernstein, himself, was nothing if not an optimist.

Jonathan Blumhofer is a composer and violist who has been active in the greater Boston area since 2004. His music has received numerous awards and been performed by various ensembles, including the American Composers Orchestra, Kiev Philharmonic, Camerata Chicago, Xanthos Ensemble, and Juventas New Music Group. Since receiving his doctorate from Boston University in 2010, Jon has taught at Clark University, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and online for the University of Phoenix, in addition to writing music criticism for the Worcester Telegram & Gazette.