In like a lion, out like a lamb

"In like a lion, out like a lamb" usually describes the month of March, but Boston's winter of 2015 has pushed that transformation into April. The record-breaking snowfall is finally disappearing, and crocuses have popped up only this first April weekend. The lion/lamb simile also applies to Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, describing this week's opening work, then expanding to the first half of the concert, then the concert as a whole, and finally broadening to the arc of the conductor's first season as music director.

The concert started with an orchestral scream. Looking down from the top balcony, I could see a giant crescendo mark drawn across the first page of the conductor's score:

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The Passacaglia from Dmitri Shostakovich's opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk is one of four interludes that allow the orchestra to amplify the emotional trajectory of the story. The anti-heroine has just poisoned her father-in-law, triggering her spiraling descent. The initial adrenaline rush can find no exit; the music keeps gnashing over a repeating baseline until finally collapsing with a whimper > .

Impressive, overwhelming, foursquare: these are the words that usually come to mind when I think of Ludwig van Beethoven. Imagine my delight when soloist Christian Tetzlaff joined the BSO in Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D major. The work is downright ... well ... pretty. This has to be the most lyrical and delicate orchestral piece that Beethoven ever wrote. The poignancy of his plucked strings in the slow movement rivals French composers of 75 years later. Christian Tetzlaff played his own 3-page cadenza, which includes a passage for timpani accompaniment. Just plain fun.

The soloist treated us to an encore on Thursday's night, the Gavotte en rondeau from Bach's Violin Partita no. 3 in E major. It danced. I smiled.

The second half of the concert brought Shostakovich's Symphony no. 10 in E minor. Impressive, overwhelming, definitely not foursquare. What struck me most was the textures that Andris Nelsons got out of the orchestra. Yes, the second movement was a thumping rumpus, but elsewhere there were extended bassoon solos, a clarinet duet, flute and piccolo features. The quiet passages were softer and more detailed than I have heard this season, and Nelsons sheered off sudden outbursts with silences as powerful as the attacks.

For the first half of the season Nelsons seemed content to let the band rip, to test their lungs. The BSO is quite capable of a tremendous noise. Last week's Mahler was stunning, but there was a marked advancement this week: finesse, transparency, balance. Andris Nelsons has taken measure of the musicians, and now he is showing them to their best advantage. The BSO will repeat this Beethoven and Shostakovich program in a few weeks at New York's Carnegie Hall. It will be a distinguished calling card for the orchestra and its new music director.