In another reality, Thursday evening’s Boston Symphony Orchestra concert might have felt like a celebration of something more than the legacy of composer Duke Ellington. Yes, it would have been a commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Ellington’s death in 1974 – but there would have been further resonances too, especially here in blue Massachusetts, had this salute to a unique, proud, and indefatigably optimistic Black American composer coincided with the historic election of a Black American woman to the nation’s highest office. Some audience members may have been joyful, reveling in the promise of the “New World A-Coming”; others maybe not so euphoric, but still relieved.
However, that isn’t the reality we live in, and Thursday’s program, led by BSO youth and family concerts conductor Thomas Wilkins, felt like many other things. Sometimes the music offered perspective from the past; sometimes it offered consolation; sometimes encouragement to keep dancing through the darkness. This one was never going to be just another Thursday night at Symphony Hall, was it?
The Ellington program zeroed in on orchestral music from the later half of his life, the oldest piece being the 1943 piano-orchestra rhapsody “New World A-Coming” and the latest “Three Black Kings,” which was completed after the composer’s death by his son Mercer. The title is a play on words, paying homage to two biblical kings as well as Martin Luther King Jr., whom Ellington deeply admired. The first section, “King of the Magi,” moved with urgency, driven by pounding congas. The oboe solo that kicked off the good-time swing of “King Solomon” sounded like it would have been more at home on an alto saxophone, but “Martin Luther King” carried its torch steadily and surely.
Next was “Night Creature,” from 1955, a vibrant triptych depicting Ellington’s impressions of New York nightlife through the lens of the animal kingdom. The colors were bright and cartoonish; one could easily imagine a “Fantasia”-animation on top of it. A battery of guest saxophonists filled out the soundscape with wild squawks and virtuosic solos. The pianist was also not the BSO’s usual player, and hearing his right hand skitter along atop the left hand’s plodding bass line, it was clear he was fluent in the Ellington idiom as well.
Ending the first half, “New World A-Coming” also conveyed the bustle and buzz of city life, and pianist Gerald Clayton’s extended solo passages were marvelously fluid; a pensive wander around the keyboard transitioned to a chugging groove as easily and naturally as the sun rising. BSO clarinetist William R. Hudgins unleashed a spectacular solo as well that seemed to descend from the heavens, or at the very least a fire escape; never mind that he was seated on the floor. Wilkins theatrically dusted the piano keys to encourage Clayton to play an encore, and the pianist turned out a mesmerizing improvisation on Ellington’s song “Don’t You Know I Care?”
After intermission, the Duke Ellington Tribute Singers (an ensemble seemingly formed just for this concert) joined the orchestra for selections from Ellington’s Sacred Concerts, which he once called “the most important thing I have ever done.” During this piece, the BSO itself was unambiguously on backing-band duty to the singers and guest instrumentalists, who got the lion’s share of spotlight in the arrangements by Charles Floyd, who conducts the Pops’s Gospel Night each year. But with the excellence those guests offered, particularly tenor saxophonist Bob Bowlby and trombonist Angel Subero, the trade was fair enough.
Donnell LaRoque Patterson paired a huge stage presence with a high, ethereal tenor voice in “Ain’t Nobody Nowhere Without God,” and soprano Amy Onyonyi’s “Heaven” dazzled with a perfect mix of innocence, worldliness, and exquisite high notes. The Tribute Singers each had their own handheld microphones, and the sound mix during the ensemble numbers was noticeably patchy initially, but it seemed smoother by the final two selections, which featured the regal alto Renese King as soloist.
“Majesty of God,” the final number, was particularly arresting. Ellington wrote it near the end of his life, and it bounced along jauntily before a striking chromatic statement from the piano changed its course, and more surprises abounded. A shimmering sequence of high scatting from King above the chorus whirled into a fast waltz, which turned into a fanfare, as the singers intoned: “The beginning is love, and only God knows when.”
BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
At Symphony Hall Nov. 7. Repeats Nov. 9, 8 p.m. 617-266-1200, www.bso.org
A.Z. Madonna can be reached at az.madonna@globe.com. Follow her @knitandlisten.