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Smillie's PICKS Smillie in The Nutcracker By Thomson Smillie Illustration by Bart Galloway Rare Verdi Tis will be an epochal event that defnes a year in the arts, as in "Te year Kentucky Opera did Simon Boccanegra." Great Verdi operas have been the backbone of the opera's repertoire since its inception in 1952, including a massive seven-year survey of the greats, from La Traviata to Aida to Falstaf in the 1980s and '90s. But this production of Simon Boccanegra, one of Verdi's most elusive works, is a company and regional premiere. Te plot is a tad complicated, but be grateful that it is simplicity itself compared with Il Trovatore, widely regarded as opera's dopiest with its plot of mistaken identities. Simon Boccanegra's title character wrestles with complex political issues, but it is his relationship with a beloved daughter that gives the work its emotional core. Te cast is mainly company debutants, and oddly enough, all are singing their roles for the frst time, a refection of the rarity of performances of this great work. Verdi was at the height of his creative powers when he wrote Boccanegra in the 1850s, the same decade that produced his three great pops: La Traviata, Rigoletto and Il Trovatore. Big tunes, bigger choruses — the red meat of Italian opera. 8 p.m. Friday, Nov. 15, at the Brown Teatre, followed by a 2 p.m. matinee two days later. 15 2 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 11.13 Something eXceptional Te Music eX Series at the University of Louisville promises some excitement. One of the featured artists in November is Israeli pianist Dror Biran, whom some of us frst encountered a few months back when he stepped in at a Louisville Orchestra concert to give a sizzling rendition of Tchaikovsky's "Piano Concerto No. 1," played with such immense energy that he made the old warhorse sound newly minted. A fellow concert pianist, the Bulgarian Zahari Metchkov, will join Biran for a program at 3 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 3, at U of L's Margaret Comstock Concert Hall. Te afternoon will include "Hymn to a Great City" by Arvo Pärt, maybe the best-regarded composer around these days. Next up will be good holiday fodder with "Te Nutcracker Suite." Te recital ends with something truly intriguing. Te 19th-century violinist Paganini wrote a famous tune, and the 20th-century piano virtuoso Rachmaninov turned that into the even more popular "Variations on a Teme of Paganini." Now we learn that the Polish composer Lutoslawski wrote variations on Rachmaninov's variations. Call it "Variations on Variations on a Teme of Rachmaninov on Paganini." Or something like that. Conducting electricity Te notion of dueling conductors, batons drawn and carving the air in furious competition, may sound like the stuf of the Marx Brothers' A Night at the Opera, but the young Brazilian Marcelo Lehninger and the American Teddy Abrams each performed programs designed to show that he is the best man to lead the Louisville Orchestra when Jorge Mester retires in 2016. I heard both September concerts, and the men were contrasts in style. Pages can be written about the techniques and skills of these men, but most Louisville music lovers agree that the power of personality to attract a new audience counts every bit as much. Lehninger led with a Haydn symphony — pure, cool and classical. It was evident, as he caressed the music and inspired some lovely string tone, that he had a superb ear, a clear vision and the persuasive power to elicit that vision from the players. He is a short, compact fellow who moves with balletic elegance on the podium. His metronome-like right hand delivered a secure beat, and the left shaped the melodies gracefully. He did a noisy second piece to establish his modern-music credentials and ended with a sumptuous performance of Dvorak's pastoral-sounding eighth symphony. Wonderful playing, especially from the cellos, traditionally the weakest section of the orchestra. A warm ovation rewarded him. Abrams is more outgoing. He started his program with a fne Samuel Barber essay and immediately demonstrated a kind of gangly athleticism, fully attuned to the music. Abrams has the ability to shape the music with his whole body (both he and Lehninger do, actually) and is a master of conveying the overall intent of the score through his choreography onstage. His second pick was also a Haydn symphony. Dull stuf, usually, but here visually and aurally enhanced by his choosing to play harpsichord in the ensemble and lead from the keyboard. His concert ended with the most exciting, yet fnely nuanced, performance of Tchaikovsky's ffth symphony in my experience. He made love to the glorious tunes, swaying and waltzing, then chose apparently suicidal tempi and drove the orchestra to keep up. At moments I thought I had never heard the Louisville Orchestra play with such glorious sound and fury. To Abrams went the roaring standing ovation. Tose among the audience who should know about these things divided themselves into an older, more staid faction who liked Lehninger's cool elegance and those (like me) who were lifted out of their seats by Abrams' energy. All of the great turnaround jobs in recent orchestra history happened when a young conductor of charisma and style charmed a city's music lovers: most recently Gustavo Dudamel in Los Angeles, but before that Michael Tilson Tomas in San Francisco and Leonard Slatkin in St. Louis. Neither Lehninger nor Abrams will remain on the market long. Musical mnemonics It is a common enough practice among music students to have a few (usually rude) words in the form of a jingle to remind them how a classical piece starts. Te scurrying opening rhythm to Mozart's "Symphony No. 40" is captured by "Oh-my-God-oh-my-God, this is MoZART!" Te trouble is that once you get the words in your head, it can ruin the piece for life. I was made aware of this at the recent orchestra performance of Tchaikovsky's brilliant but repetitive ffth symphony. It opens with a slow, deeply serious theme. Te accepted mnemonic: "Who's got the key to the s---house?" Not too ofensive frst time out. But as the tune is played maybe 100 times over the course of the symphony — sometimes soulfully, sometimes lyrically, and fnally with thundering brass, fortissimo, in a way that suggests a mounting crisis — the efect induces anxiety.