Pierre Boulez
Saal
Wagner:
Siegfried-Idyll
Liszt:
Malédiction, S 121
Valentin
Silvestrov: Serenade, for string orchestra
Prokofiev:
Symphony no.1 in D major,
op.25, ‘Classical’
Yury Shadrin (piano)
Staatskapelle Berlin
Oksana Lyniv (conductor)
Something of a mixed bag, this,
in terms of programming and interpretation, but there was no doubting either
the excellence of the Staatskapelle Berlin or the technical ability of Oksana
Lyniv to secure what she wanted from the players, right down to a diminuendo on
the final chord of the Siegfried-Idyll.
Lyniv seemed least at home in this piece, although Wagner lies at the heart of
the orchestra’s daily endeavours. Its opening moulded to the point of
mannerism, the work’s melos, as
Wagner would have put it, often felt suffocated, however warm and beautiful the
playing. Too often, Lyniv’s interpretative stance amounted to pushing forward
and then pulling back, whether within a phrase or paragraph; it was flexible,
yes, without the bumpiness and rigidity lesser hands bring to Wagner, but never
sounded quite at ease. Extremes of tempo sounded applied to the music rather
than arising from within. Still, there were plenty of moments to savour: the
sheer beauty of violin trills, blend and character from the wind, richness of
cello tone, and so forth.
Yury Shadrin joined the
orchestra’s strings, now greater in number, for Liszt’s so-called ‘Malédiction’:
more properly the Concerto for piano and strings in E minor, on which Liszt
worked throughout the 1830s. In a few preceding words, Shadrin wisely
counselled the audience not to approach this curious work from the standpoint
of the composer’s later (numbered) piano concertos: masterpieces, of course,
and yet masterpieces still denied by Liszt’s cultured despisers. I welcomed the
opportunity to hear the work for the first time in concert, though I cannot
help but wonder what some in the audience would have made of it. Hearing it, as
Shadrin suggested, as the music of a composer making his way in the world was
surely the best course of listening. He and Lyniv offered admirable clarity and
structural understanding in a gestural performance of a daringly experimental
work that convinces more at some times than others. Muscular virtuosity here is
a sine qua non; so too, however, is exquisite
sensitivity, the intimacy of chamber music: readily heard, for instance, in the
piano’s shadowing of the cellos in a strange, recitative-like section, on which
so much subsequently depends. If, ultimately, the work as it comes down to us
might benefit from an editor, that too is part of its charm. A starkly non-,
even anti-Romantic Mendelssohn ‘Spring Song’ followed as an encore, oddly
provoking laughter from some in the audience.
String orchestra, minus piano,
returned to the stage after the interval for Valentin Silvestrov’s Serenade. Lyniv clearly believed in this
1978 score, leading what sounded to me a performance as understanding as it was
committed; once again, motivic working and broader structure were brought
clearly, vividly to life. For me, its slow, gloomy – and then not so gloomy – neo-Romanticism
long overstayed its welcome. If you like lengthy series – certainly not in the
Schoenbergian sense! – of repeated string chords, this may have been your sort
of thing. I found myself waiting for something to happen that never did.
Ultimately, it sounded as though it was waiting for its c.1995 Channel 4 television drama to which it might act as a
vaguely ‘atmospheric’ accompaniment.
Prokofiev burst onto the scene with much-needed relief from his Classical Symphony. If the first movement was not free of occasional mannerism – a sudden pianissimo that seemed to shout, ‘hear me’ – then that worked perfectly well as idiomatic archness. As precise as it was bubbling with charm, the movement’s formalism was relished, enabling the listener to do so too. Lyniv’s moulding of the second movement again proved in keeping with material and style. Relinquishing the baton here, as she had for the Siegfried-Idyll, led to an inordinately balletic display onstage, which tempted me to shut my eyes. If visually distracting, though, it was not musically so. The minuet went faster than often we hear: not necessarily the worse for it, so long as it is considered straightforwardly jolly rather than subtly grotesque. For the finale, another very fast tempo worked well, breathlessness, for once, no bad thing in the revelation of Prokofiev’s singular brand of neoclassicism. Orchestral playing proved as colourful and as well-drilled as one could have wished for.
Prokofiev burst onto the scene with much-needed relief from his Classical Symphony. If the first movement was not free of occasional mannerism – a sudden pianissimo that seemed to shout, ‘hear me’ – then that worked perfectly well as idiomatic archness. As precise as it was bubbling with charm, the movement’s formalism was relished, enabling the listener to do so too. Lyniv’s moulding of the second movement again proved in keeping with material and style. Relinquishing the baton here, as she had for the Siegfried-Idyll, led to an inordinately balletic display onstage, which tempted me to shut my eyes. If visually distracting, though, it was not musically so. The minuet went faster than often we hear: not necessarily the worse for it, so long as it is considered straightforwardly jolly rather than subtly grotesque. For the finale, another very fast tempo worked well, breathlessness, for once, no bad thing in the revelation of Prokofiev’s singular brand of neoclassicism. Orchestral playing proved as colourful and as well-drilled as one could have wished for.
