This past Sunday afternoon, the newly transformed David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center pulsed with the energy of the Roaring Twenties. But this was no costume party of musical nostalgia. The American Symphony Orchestra, under the inspired baton of Leon Botstein, offered something far more nourishing: a sweeping, intelligent, and emotionally resonant exploration of rarely performed masterworks in a program aptly titled Tapping into the Twenties.Here's a sample of the concert: View this post on Instagram A post shared by American Symphony Orchestra (@americansymphony)This concert was more than a performance—it was a reclamation. It was a sonic time capsule cracked open to reveal truths about modernity, identity, and innovation. The music unfurled like a collection of innovative and creative hallmarks of the ASO's psyche—each work from a different angle in the fractured mirror of the interwar period.Leon Botstein's Vision: The Genius of the UnfamiliarLong before the downbeat, the audience was treated to conductor Leon Botstein's signature Conductor's Notes Q&A session at 2 p.m. With his characteristic blend of scholarly rigor and avuncular wit, Botstein transformed a pre-concert chat into an essential act of musical excavation. He painted the concert's historical canvas vividly—linking the chaos and creativity of the 1920s to the expressive urgency heard in the evening's works.His passion for resurrecting unjustly forgotten music is not merely a mission; it's a moral imperative. Through Botstein's lens, the 1920s emerge not as a single genre or style but as a collision of divergent energies—futurism, jazz, machine-age industrialism, mysticism, and cultural hybridism.A concert of enigmatic works performed with alacrity emerged, threading between formal disruption and lyrical soul. Leon Botstein. Photo by Matt DineJohn Alden Carpenter's Skyscrapers: The Urban Ballet in Full SwingOpening the concert, Skyscrapers: A Ballet of Modern American Life by John Alden Carpenter proved a stunning curtain-raiser. Premiered in 1926, this music is part Copland, part Chaplin—yet unmistakably Carpenter, the industrialist, laying out America's new mythos in steel, speed, and syncopation. Unfinished portrait of John Alden Carpenter (1921). Public Domain via Wikipedia CommonsThe American Symphony Orchestra gave this work the technicolor treatment it demands. The percussion was crisp and driving, echoing the mechanized rhythms of a newly electrified nation. Strings shimmered with restraint, then soared with Broadway gusto. Carpenter's bifurcated portrait of Work and Play came alive in this performance—with factory clangor morphing seamlessly into ragtime playfulness.Glistening soundscapes of programmatic landscapes emerged—urban life rendered in orchestral brushstrokes. Concertmaster Cyrus Beroukhim imbued the violin solos with elegance and wit, anchoring the shifting moods with remarkable poise.Schulhoff's Jazz Concerto and Orion Weiss's Dazzling PerformanceEnter Erwin Schulhoff, the Czech-born avant-gardist who danced with Dadaism, jazz, and tragedy. His Concerto for Piano and Small Orchestra, Op. 43 is a brash, soulful, and structurally audacious work that thumbs its nose at bourgeois tradition while inviting jazz into the concert hall with revolutionary fervor. Composer Ervín Schulhoff (1894–1942) and dancer Milča Mayerová (1901-1977), ca 1931. Anonymous/Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia CommonsPianist Orion Weiss was incandescent. From the concerto's gauzy opening to the syncopated, biting Allegro alla Jazz, he summoned the ghost of George Antheil with the lyricism of Debussy and the rhythmic swagger of Fats Waller—Weiss's flawless pianistic technique allowed for no barriers between the score and its expressive potential. Orion Weiss, Piano. Photo by Lisa Marie Mazzucco.The ASO's chamber-sized forces responded with timbral clarity and rhythmic tension. Weiss's cadenza was a spiritual séance, channeling the melancholy of a continent on the brink. It wasn't just entertainment—it was history made audible.Weiss offered Schulhoff's 1929 Sentimental Melody as a radiant encore, a brief yet poignant slice of irony and tenderness that offered a final wink from a decade caught between dreams and disillusionment.Arcana: The Thunder of Edgard VarèseEdgard Varèse once claimed, "Music is organized sound." His 1927 behemoth Arcana takes that principle to the edge of apocalypse.From the opening percussion blasts to the massive climactic dissonances, the American Symphony Orchestra sculpted Varèse's "sound masses" like sonic architecture. The anger and dissonance of Varèse's work rose from the pit like some Promethean creature—half-machine, half-prophet.The expanded percussion section was mesmerizing for its thunder and its sensitivity to dynamic range. Botstein masterfully balanced the tumult. The textures never devolved into noise but danced between chaos and coherence on the razor's edge.Where Schoenberg intellectualized dissonance through serialism, Varèse weaponized it—blurring the line between rhythm and roar. Portrait of Edgar Varèse (1924) by John Sloan. Public Domain via Wikimedia CommonsWilliam Grant Still's Afro-American Symphony: A Heartfelt BenedictionTo conclude the afternoon, Botstein turned to William Grant Still—the first African American composer to have a symphony performed by a major orchestra. His Afro-American Symphony remains a singular achievement: an elegant fusion of classical symphonic form and African American idioms.The orchestra's rendering was radiant and deeply affectionate. The first movement's blues theme was warm and lyrical, while the second embraced spirituals with hushed reverence. The third burst with ragtime energy, and the finale—dignified and hymn-like—brought tears to eyes and cheers to lips.It was the sound of a people, a history, and a hope—music of remembrance and resistance.A Space Reborn: David Geffen Hall's Acoustic RenaissanceThe newly renovated David Geffen Hall is no mere facelift but an acoustic rebirth. The warmth and detail of the hall's sonic profile now rival Europe's best. Every pizzicato, every timpani roll emerged crystalline and immediate.Its design now invites not only sound but spirit. From the comfortable seating to the golden, undulating walls, the venue wraps you in its arms. It is the perfect setting for a program as kaleidoscopic and historically vital as Tapping into the Twenties.Program Notes and Thematic Programming: A Masterclass in MusicologySpecial praise belongs to the program note authors, Colin Roust and Sebastian Danila, who provided essential context with clarity and insight. Their writing bridged the academic and the accessible, enhancing the audience's journey.This thoughtful contextualization is part of the American Symphony Orchestra's DNA. Their programs are never mere concerts. They are seminars, narratives, and conversations with history. Musicians L-R: William Grant Still, L. Wolfe Gilbert, W. C. Handy, Frank Drye, and Andy Razaf in Los Angeles, Calif., circa 1954. Los Angeles Daily News, CC BY 4.0 , via Wikimedia CommonsWhy the Twenties Still Matter: The Legacy of InnovationTapping into the Twenties revealed—through Carpenter's urban vitality, Schulhoff's radical hybridity, Varèse's structural revolution, and Still's cultural synthesis—that the 1920s were not only roaring. They were reckoning.As the 19th century's romanticism yielded to serialist codes and mechanized futures, some composers found a third path: expressive freedom fused with cultural consciousness. Schulhoff and Carpenter sidestepped Schoenberg's tone rows with jazz and groove. Varèse exploded musical structures altogether. Still dignified the American vernacular.Much like Kandinsky's forays into abstraction, these composers sought spiritual meaning in color and form. They chased modern truths through sound—fragmented, ecstatic, restless, but always human. American Symphony Orchestra. Courtesy americansymphony.orgA Final Note of ThanksThis concert was a triumph of vision, musicianship, and soul. The American Symphony Orchestra continues to illuminate the overlooked corners of musical history with rare conviction. Leon Botstein remains a national treasure. And David Geffen Hall has never sounded better.We left the hall with hearts stirred, minds awakened, and more profound gratitude for the power of rediscovery.Tapping into the Twenties: The ASO and Forgotten Marvels at David Geffen HallAmerican Symphony Orchestra1330 Avenue of the AmericasSuite 23A, New York, NY 10019212.868.9276For information and tickets, email [email protected], or click HERE.Readers may also enjoy Brooklyn Chamber Orchestra’s Immersive Journey and American Classical Orchestra: J. S. Bach’s St. John Passion. RELATED https://youtu.be/ex0KII1mwnk?si=xDcLVGELW4d6BafX Read the full article