Royal Albert Hall
Beethoven – Egmont, op.84: Overture
Brett Dean – Electric Preludes
Stravinsky – Oedipus Rex
Oedipus – Allan Clayton
Jocasta – Hilary Summers
Creon – Juha Uusitalo
Tiresias – Brindley Sherratt
Messenger – Duncan Rock
Shepherd – Samuel Boden
Speaker – Rory Kinnear
I admit that I came to this
concert mostly with the second half in mind. It was a more than pleasant surprise,
then, also to find a good deal more to enjoy before the interval than I had
expected. It is not, of course, that I do not think the world of the Egmont Overture, but I have increasingly
become weary of the state of present-day orchestral Beethoven performance.
(Oddly, the problems bedevilling symphonic Beethoven seem less apparent or at
least far less widespread in solo and chamber music.) Sakari Oramo’s account
with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, then, came as a breath of fresh air. The introduction
was full of suspense and foreboding, unfolding at a tempo that simply sounded ‘right’
(which is not, of course, to say that another could not). Already there was a
proper sense of the mystery of Beethovenian development. The transition to the
main Allegro was well handled, and
throughout there was a good sense of formal dynamism. Characterful woodwind and
forthright brass (admittedly, not always ideally precise) added a great deal.
The ‘Victory Symphony’ at the end – I know that it is not actually entitled as
such here – was perhaps a touch harried, but if a shortcoming, it was one that
was readily forgiven. This was a real Beethoven performance.
Brett Dean’s Electric Preludes, for electric violin
and orchestral strings, received its first Proms performance, Francesco D’Orazio
joining the orchestra. In six ‘character pieces’, some of them continuous, Dean’s
work explores, in his words, ‘the intersection between high instrumental
virtuosity of a “classical” nature on the one hand and sound-worlds that are
only possible with electronics on the other, all commented upon by an
essentially “unplugged” string chamber orchestra’. As a summary, that seemed to
me to tally very well with what I heard. The first movement, ‘Abandoned
Playground’ is scurrying, at times almost filmic in quality and ‘atmosphere’,
though perhaps a little repetitive. Despite its inspiration by indigenous
painting from around Papunya, in Australia’s Northern Territory, the second
movement sounded – at least, impressionistically, to me – more ‘abstract’,
though perhaps matters would be different if one knew the art. The short ‘Peripetea’ that follows, fast and
highly rhythmical, had a sense, both as work and performance, of providing what
it says, a dramatic turning-point. A slow movement, ‘The Beyond of Mirrors’,
seemed more fully to emphasise electronic sounds, and yet at the same time to
engage in ‘traditional’ violin and string fantasy. So too, in another mood, did
the following ‘Perpetuum mobile’, which put me in mind almost of electric
Prokofiev (the finale to the Second Violin Concerto). Its lengthy cadenza
seemed perhaps to outstay its welcome, but there could be no gainsaying, here or
elsewhere, D’Orazio’s command of technique, idiom, and expression. Likewise,
the BBC SO sounded reinvigorated under its new Principal Conductor. The final ‘Berceuse’
traces an unhurried path from a dark, almost growling opening to quiet ecstasy –
or so it sounded here in what seemed to me an excellent performance.
There followed an equally
excellent performance of Oedipus Rex,
in which the singularity of this ‘opera-oratorio’ announced itself as only it
can, whether through form, language, or that oppressive atmosphere engendered
by the pervasive minor third and its implications. The orchestra and Oramo
continued to be on fine form, now joined by soloists, men’s voices from both
the BBC Singers and the BBC Symphony Chorus, and Rory Kinnear, a splendid
narrator throughout, declamatory without a hint of the excessive ‘ac-tor-li-ness’
which often comes into play here. Stravinsky’s opening chorus was splendidly
attacked by chorus and orchestra alike, truly plunging us into the drama. Motor
rhythms and ostinato made one all the more aware than usual of Poulenc’s
blatant plagiarism in Dialogues des
Carmélites (not that Stravinsky, given his record, need have disapproved).
The aggression of neo-Classicism was as apparent in Oedipus’s ensuing claim of
deliverance as in, say, the Octet; there is nothing placid about this æsthetic.
I especially liked the clearly questioning choral ‘Quid fakiendum, Oedipus, ut
liberemur?’ There soon followed what for me was the only real blot on the
performance, the dry, wooden solo from Juha Uusitalo’s Creon, not helped by a
pronounced vocal wobble. An intriguing, quasi-liturgical sense of versicle and
response between ensuing chorus and Oedipus (‘Solve, solve, solve!’ ‘Pollikeor
divinabo!’ etc.) swiftly compensated. Brindley Sherratt’s Tiresias sounded ‘old’
in character but without detriment to his fine musical delivery, precise and
clear of tone, declamatory yet most definitely ‘sung’. The oddness of
Stravinsky’s tenor writing constantly forced itself upon one’s attention, at
least as much here as in, say, The Flood,
but Allan Clayton coped – indeed, more than coped – very well.
The second act brings the
extraordinary entrance of Jocasta. I mean it as no disrespect to the rest of
the cast when I say that Hilary Summers truly stole the show with her
unmistakeable contralto, somehow wonderfully archaic in a Mediterranean sense.
Stylistically, she sounded just right, ‘operatic’ in Stravinsky’s utterly
personal way (all the more so, the more ‘impersonal’ he might try to be). Oramo’s
urgent yet spacious pacing seemed well-nigh ideal here, whilst choral imprecations
of Fate hammered home their ritualistic point. Jocasta being joined by Oedipus,
we heard what registered wonderfully as both parody and instantiation of the
operatic duet. Indeed, it was a strength of the performance as a whole that
issues of genre seemed, in unforced fashion, to come so strongly to the fore.
Duncan Rock’s arrival as Messenger had one wishing he might have sung Creon
too: his was a thoughtful, expressive performance, as was that of Samuel Boden
as Shepherd, whose sappy tenor dealt so well with the vocal awkwardness of
Stravinsky’s writing as almost to
vanquish it. (It should not be entirely vanquished, of course, since it is a
crucial part of the work and its ‘expressive’ – to use a loaded word in any
Stravinskian context – power.) The weird jauntiness of the chorus, ‘Mulier in
vestibulo’ led inexorably, as in performance it must, to the stone death of ‘Tibi
valedico, Oedipus, tibi valedico’. Oramo and his forces had much to be proud of
in this concert.
