Minnesota Orchestra's High Notes

As if the Minnesota Orchestra under Osmo Vänskä hasn’t received enough accolades, the improvements just keep on coming. To begin with, the orchestra recently unveiled its much-discussed expansion plan for Orchestra Hall, a $40 million project scheduled for completion in 2013.

The upgrade is overdue. When Orchestra Hall was originally built in 1974, the vast majority of resources were put into the auditorium and its crackling acoustics. “[The hall] had outstanding results and a life expectancy of 200 years,” says Michael Henson, Minnesota Orchestra president and CEO. “Our goal with this expansion is to create spaces that marry up to the very high quality of what happens on stage and remove the barriers to enjoyment.”

The redesign will double the lobby space and add two exterior terraces along with a glassy, multi-use “City Room” that opens onto Peavey Plaza.

Some acoustical challenges may also be addressed during the renovation. “This stage is complicated to play on—it’s hard to hear each other,” explains music director Osmo Vänskä. “In the best halls in the world, we can play much more by ear rather than eye. Here, if the brass and percussion play with their ears, they are behind.” After the renovation, says Vänskä, “We will play better and sound better.”

He may be right: The orchestra’s concert at Carnegie Hall in March earned a coveted quotable from The New Yorker’s Alex Ross, who wrote, “The Minnesota Orchestra sounded, to my ears, like the greatest orchestra in the world.”

To hear what all the fuss is about, check out the season finale featuring Bruckner’s Symphony No. 7 and Beethoven’s “Emperor Concerto” with 30-year-old Russian pianist Yevgeny Sudbin, who will soon record all of Beethoven’s piano concertos with the orchestra. June 3–6. Orchestra Hall, 1111 Nicollet Mall, Mpls., 612-371-5656, minnesotaorchestra.org