Ensemble Intercontemporain offer a profound affirmation of life

It was a visibly shaken Matthias Pintscher who took the stage at the Library of Congress on Friday evening, only hours after the savage terrorist attacks that had swept across Paris. Asking for a minute of silence, Pintscher and his Paris-based Ensemble Intercontemporain bowed their heads, then launched into a program of music that, in its dazzling expressiveness and intensity of feeling, felt like a tribute to the victims -- and a profound, unbending affirmation of life.