Isn’t it Romantic? The Discovery Ensemble revealed just how spacious the concept of Romanticism can be in its “Three Faces of Romanticism’’ concert at Sanders Theatre on Thursday evening. Composed over a span of nearly 70 years between 1850 and 1917, the three works by Robert Schumann, Richard Wagner, and Franz Schreker did share a certain emotional immediacy and warmth. But in other ways they were as dissimilar as Charles Dickens and James Joyce.
Courtney Lewis, the founding music director of Discovery Ensemble, led his poised orchestra of young musicians in exuberant, fresh, and for the most part polished performances of Schumann’s Symphony No. 3 (“Rhenish), Wagner’s “Siegfried Idyll,’’ and Schreker’s Chamber Symphony. His conducting style is brisk, precise, direct. This was a young man’s Romanticism, colored by hopeful confidence rather than nostalgic regret.
Of the three works, the most intriguing was Schreker’s rarely heard Chamber Symphony. Here, the chamber orchestra is joined by harp, celesta, piano, and harmonium (a reed organ without pipes), a combination that produces a shimmering, vibrating sonic landscape. Constructed in free sonata form in a style similar to the symphonies of Schreker’s contemporary Alexander Scriabin, the orchestration subdivides larger instrumental sections into a multilayered texture. Gleams of neo-classical sunlight also poke through the romantic haze, reminding us of Prokofiev’s “Classical Symphony,’’ composed in the same fateful year of 1917. We can behold the transition from Romanticism to a leaner, more ironic aesthetic.
The orchestra rose to the score’s challenges with distinction and grace. Alexander Zhu on harmonium, Andrew Zhou on celesta, Aaron Likness on piano and Maria Rindello Parker on harp provided the necessary touch of fanciful mystery. Lewis kept the episodic score moving, without rushing.
In Wagner’s lush and sensual “Siegfried Idyll,’’ Lewis reined in his players and resisted the temptation to descend into bathos. He drew the music along slowly and deliberately, and elicited outstanding playing in solo passages, especially from David Vaughan and Sarah Sutherland on horn.
Lewis’s reading of Schumann’s “Rhenish’’ Symphony stressed the heroic and rhythmic aspects; the first movement felt overwrought, too highly punctuated and raucous, especially given this hall’s bright acoustics. The folksy third movement could have used more whimsy, but Lewis nicely illuminated the religious awe of the fourth movement. And his four-square approach to the finale pointed to the sturdy classical foundations on which Schumann built his early brand of Romanticism.
Harlow Robinson can be reached at harlo@mindspring.com. 
