A night at the symphony is the most sought-after concert ticket in town this week. But while conductor Marin Alsop and her Baltimore orchestra will be on stage, they're not exactly the main draw.
That would be Trey Anastasio, the guitarist and vocalist best known as the frontman of Phish, which enjoys a devoted fan base not seen since the Grateful Dead. On Thursday, Anastasio will perform the East Coast premiere of Time Turns Elastic, a 30-minute piece that blends electric guitar and vocal solos into a rich orchestral fabric. The concert sold out three days after tickets went on sale.
Anastasio joins a small but growing list of rock musicians inspired to expand their artistic reach from arenas and downtown clubs to symphony halls. But where some others - Elvis Costello, with his stylistically diverse ballet score Il sogno, for example - have attempted to write something outside their normal musical language, the Phish-erman's ambitious work is unmistakably in his own voice, but expanded symphonically.
"Trey's a really interesting guy, a very thoughtful, big-picture kind of person," says Baltimore Symphony Orchestra music director Alsop. "Everything he's done is authentic, and so is this piece. When you think about others who have done things like this - Mark O'Connor, Paul McCartney, Billy Joel - I think they really aspire to write long-form music, to get big ideas across. It's not like they wake up one day going, 'I want to have a symphony orchestra back me up.' It comes from a very sincere place."
The BSO's willingness to put on nontraditional concerts comes from a sincere place, too - a concern with developing new audiences.
"We don't sit around thinking about how we can trick people into liking classical music," Alsop says. "We're all into experimenting with things, but not wildly and not every day. The goal is to try to create an experience that is special for people. If one person comes back to a classical concert, that's great."
The bottom line for Alsop: "It's all music. It's not like offering a completely different product line."
Like the BSO, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra and Minnesota Orchestra, among others, have been particularly noted for collaborating with rock stars. In addition to Costello, the BSO's rocker roster includes Ben Folds and The Decemberists. Last summer, the orchestra premiered a symphonic treatment of Grateful Dead songs and performed a Led Zeppelin tribute; in July, the BSO will take the stage with a Queen tribute band.
