Saturday 24 December 2016
Thursday 22 December 2016
Two million visitors!
This
seems quite incredible: 2 million visitors* since I began
writing here in 2007. Doubtless some of were mistakes, some were spammers,
etc.; a few would have been yours truly before I learned how to stop myself
being counted. That must still leave a good number from others, from you –
without whom this would be a still stranger form of madness. Thank you all for
your loyalty, support, and in many cases friendship. This has been a truly
horrendous year, heralded by the death of the man who gave this site its name,
Pierre Boulez, the very conscience of New Music. Let us hope that music and thinking
about music will continue to offer us some sort of solace and provocation. We
shall need it.
But no gloom just for a minute: thank you! Please listen...
* I am informed I should have said 'page views', which actually seems a reasonable correction (not least since that is what the sign actually says!) You see how clueless I am about such things...
Esfahani - Bach, 21 December 2016
Wigmore Hall
Goldberg
Variations, BWV 988
Mahan Esfahani (harpsichord)
What could be more capable of lightening our darkness on the longest night of the darkest year most of us have
ever known, perhaps even of defending us from some of its perils and dangers, than
the music of Johann Sebastian Bach? Mahan Esfahani’s searching exploration of the
fathomless Goldberg Variations – one of
the few Bach keyboard works of which I stood so much in awe and trepidation that
I never dared touch, let alone learn it – certainly did a great deal to offer
solace and nourishment, intellectual and spiritual.
The Aria, flexible, though
never for the sake of mere flexibility, imparted a fine sense of a storyteller,
a narrator: ‘Once upon a time’, or ‘Es war einmal’. Already, by the second variation,
we heard the truth of Bach’s plan as outlined by Esfahani in his excellent
programme note, by turns scholarly and winningly speculative. The first of ten
groups of variations – genre-piece, virtuous piece, canon – was clearly upon
us, even if we had not yet heard that first canon at the unison. One of the
many strengths of the performance was that that truth related equally to the
work and to its interpretation: not in a bald, formalistic sense, but so as to
liberate the musical imagination. Indeed, the Canone all’Unisono might have been subtitled ‘The Joy of Canon’; for
no one, not even Haydn, does joy better than Bach. (Just think, if you doubt me,
of the opening of the Gloria and Sanctus to the Mass in B minor.)
As the variations unfolded, we
heard lines intertwine, as if they were solo singers in a cantata, or a pair of
oboes or other obbligato instruments. Such connection occasionally had me
speculate about ‘meaning’, but not for too long, lest I miss the ‘purely’
musical drama. Formal, rather than expressive kinship, with Scarlatti’s
keyboard music came to mind too. More than once, I thought of the earlier,
apparently less complex world – relatively speaking – of the Brandenburg Concertos, and indeed of the
later world of Max Reger’s transcriptions of those works. Sometimes, especially
at moments like those, I could have sworn I heard a third hand; I did not see
it though.
Dance rhythms enabled
connections, then: across and beyond the keyboard repertoire. They played an
equally important role structurally, delineating the narrative – and narrative
was very much a strength here, I think – of the performance. So too, though,
did the canonical writing. The Canone
alla quarta spoke with a perfection worthy of Mozart, or perhaps better,
suggested why Bach’s music, although not necessarily this very work, proved so
transformative for the later composer.
And those harmonies! This is
not ‘just’ counterpoint, as if the opposition ever made any sense whatsoever in
Bach, or indeed in most great music… Mozart would surely have relished, just as
Esfahani did, the turns to the minor mode, to his special key of G minor, and the
chromaticism unleashed. The ‘black pearl’, as we shall always know it,
post-Landowska, seemed to renew its mysteries before us. Registration, tempo,
rubato, no one component, nor indeed their combination, seemed quite enough,
splendidly navigated though all those interpretative challenges were, to
explain the alchemy not only heard but experienced. (We must, as the soloist
told us, be active, not passive, as listeners, just as we must be active to
transform the world around us.) A labyrinthine Bach who looked to Berg, a ‘Bach
The Progressive’ in an almost Schoenbergian sense, a ‘Bach The Subjective’ in
an Adornian yet not-Adornian sense: all those and more recomposed the work
before our ears. This heightened, ‘special’ quality was not only apt but
necessary.
Relief thereafter ran through Esfahani’s
fingers – and our hearing of them. Yet soon, a quality of proliferation, reminding
me how much Boulez revered Bach, took on its own, not always relieving life.
There was an almost Brahmsian satisfaction to the ‘Quodlibet’; its good nature
suggested a different musical future, that of Haydn’s sonata forms, which might
initially seem to have eclipsed Bach’s music, but not for long. The return of the
Aria, though, was, quite rightly, both return and nothing of the sort. It
framed, like the return of our tale to the world of the storyteller himself; it
was the same, and yet different. There was here, in Bach’s music, I think, both
a glint and a tear in the eye. ‘Die Zeit,’ as a distinguished lady once
said in not entirely dissimilar mood, ‘die ist ein sonderbar Ding.’
Monday 19 December 2016
Znaider/LSO - Mozart and Tchaikovsky, 18 December 2016
Barbican Hall
Mozart – Violin Concerto no.1
in B-flat major, KV 207
Mozart – Violin Concerto no.4
in D major, KV 218
Tchaikovsky – Symphony no.4 in
F minor, op.36
Nikolaj Znaider (violin/conductor)
London Symphony Orchestra
Nikolaj Znaider and the LSO
will be giving three concerts of Mozart (violin concertos) and Tchaikovsky
(symphonies), of which this was the first. A recording of the concertos is in
the offing; it was to have been conducted by that supreme Mozartian, Sir Colin
Davis, but will now be directed by Znaider himself. I say ‘directed’, but
Znaider was for the most part content to leave the LSO, here very much chamber
size, to play without interference. There was, to both concerto performances, a
fine sense of collegiality, of chamber music, Znaider certainly the soloist in
the sense of having the solo line, but in no sense assuming any position of
superiority. Occasionally, I felt the music’s darker emotions a little undersold,
notably in the slow movement of the Fourth Violin Concerto, but for Apollonian
Mozart, this would today be difficult to beat.
The first movement of KV 207
brought spruce, variegated playing from all concerned. Znaider’s conception
drew one in rather than striving to impress. (What does he have to prove,
anyway?) The bass line offered a firm foundation and occasional, winning
nudges. Phrases were well-shaped without sounding moulded: I could imagine Sir
Colin smiling benignly on the performance. Lightness of touch certainly did not
preclude depth of feeling here. Every scale, moreover, perhaps especially in
the orchestral strings, was full of life, no mere figure. The Adagio was taken relatively swift, and
was light on its feet too, but not, I think, too much. There was much beneath
the beguiling surface, that surface boasting wind chords from Elysium itself.
What can sometimes sound rather slight material in the finale was simply
treated musically, with no attempt, thank God, to do something to it. This movement emerged
effortlessly as a cousin, an equal to Mozart’s symphonies of a similar vintage.
It was characterful, all the more so for not being in hock to someone else’s
character.
The Fourth opened just as
fresh, if anything more so. Znaider and the LSO are clearly not in the business
of offering generalised Mozart, for this performance was alert to the work’s
specific character, its increased sophistication. Slight agogic accents made
their point very well, quite without mannerism. The rapport the soloist had
with other front desks would have been palpable, even if one had not seen the
visual signs. (Violins and violas were, by the way, all standing, not a
practice I can imagine Davis having adopted.) The slow movement, as previously
mentioned, was certainly Andante,
certainly cantabile, but lacked
something in the way of Mozartian shadow. The finale, though, showed playing
alert to Mozart’s rhetoric, without permitting ‘mere’ rhetoric to dominate.
Hints of Gallic, courtly complication were welcome, the drones very much part
of that world rather than an opposing force. Le Petit Trianon, perhaps, or Il re pastore?
Znaider’s good relationship
with the orchestra was just as apparent in Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony, which
he conducted again from memory. It would be difficult to say that there was
anything out of the ordinary with respect to interpretation, but he and they
offered a brilliantly played ‘central’ performance, which only occasionally
stood in need of a firmer helping hand. The LSO brass offered harshness of
opening Fate, to be assuaged (a little, at least) by the warmth of string
response. I liked the general solidity to the performance, which was not to say
that it was inflexible, far from it. Some, however, may well have preferred
something more mercurial. Znaider’s ability to find plenty of space for the
music, to remain faithful to its spirit and letter, nonetheless made a welcome
change for me. And what a glorious full orchestral sound it was, even if the
Barbican’s acoustic reminded us poignantly of London’s desperate need, now
denied by our political masters, for a new hall.
Depth of string tone, not
always a strength of London orchestras, was again a great advantage in the
second movement, as was woodwind colour. Kinship with ballet was apparent,
without collapsing the symphony into something which it is not. There was some
magical, hushed playing to be heard too, full of suspense, maybe even tentative
hope. Predictably splendid pizzicato was to be heard in the third movement: not
splendid for its own sake, though, for it was always directed, and kept on
commendably tight (not too tight) rein by Znaider. The music actually sounded
strikingly modern, which in many ways it is: consider Stravinsky’s love for
Tchaikovsky. There was an equally splendid piquancy from the LSO woodwind,
pointing towards Petrushka, the brass
not irrelevant here either. It was Eugene
Onegin, however, that came most strongly to mind, another kinship seemingly
acknowledged and enjoyed.
Taken attacca, the opening of the finale brought a smile to my face, but
not for long, for there remained darker forces at play. There was something,
quite rightly, ambiguous about the rejoicing we heard – not unlike Tchaikovsky’s
own conception, quoted in the programme: ‘If within yourself you find no reason
for joy, look at others. Get out among the people … find happiness in the joys
of others.’ Onegin was now in Petersburg. What was certainly not in doubt was the magnificence of the
LSO’s playing – and not just when extrovert.
Sunday 18 December 2016
Zurück vom Ring! 2016 tally for opera etc.
No further operatic plans for 2016, so here is my tally for the year. The 'etc.' indicates that I have included not only concert performances but other borderline cases, including music theatre. Beat Furrer's 'sound theatre' piece, FAMA, arguably does not belong here at all, but never mind; I thought it would be good to include it. It seems we have a pretty clear winner for the year (always helped by a visit to Bayreuth). The Deutsche Oper's Strauss-Wochen helped Richard the Second share joint second place with Mozart. An especial delight for me is to see Gluck placed so high; more to the point, it has been a privilege to have heard four Gluck performances this year.
As in previous years, I have only allowed one score per composer per event, so Il trittico counts for one, but so does Il tabarro. In the case of Stephen Oliver's 'completion' of L'oca del Cairo, he shares the honours with Mozart.
Wagner 16
Mozart, Strauss 8
Puccini 5
Gluck, Janáček 4
Humperdinck, Tchaikovsky 2
Kim Ashton, Thomas
Adès, Thomas Arne, Gerald Barry, Beethoven, Berg, Bizet, Britten, Chabrier, Peter Maxwell Davies, Debussy,
Dvořák, Enescu, Beat Furrer, Handel, Hindemith, Mascagni, Stephen
McNeff, Stuart McRae, Martinů, Mussorgsky, Offenbach, Stephen Oliver, Purcell, Rameau,
Reimann, Rimsky-Korsakov, Rossini, Mark Simpson, Weill 1
Click here, for the sake of comparison, with results from 2013-2015.
Concerts and an overall tally will have to wait until the very end of the year.
Der Rosenkavalier, Royal Opera, 17 December 2016
Royal Opera House
Images: © ROH. By Catherine Ashmore |
Die Feldmarschallin, Fürstin Werdenberg –
Renée Fleming
Der Baron Ochs auf Lerchenau – Matthew
RoseOctavian – Alice Coote
Herr von Faninal – Jochen Schmeckenbecker
Sophie – Sophie Bevan
Jungfer Marianne Leitmetzerin, Noble Widow – Miranda Keys
Valzacchi – Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke
Annina – Helene Schneidermann
Police Inspector – Scott Conner
The Marschallin’s Major-domo – Samuel Sakker
Faninal’s Major-domo – Thomas Atkins
Italian Singer – Giorgio Berrugi
Milliner – Kiera Lyness
Innkeeper – Alasdair Elliott
Notary – Jeremy White
Animal Seller – Luke Price
Doctor – Andrew H. Sinclair
Boots – Jonathan Fisher
Noble Orphans – Katy Batho, Deborah Peake-Jones, Andrea Hazell
Marschallin’s Lackeys/Waiters – Andrew H. Sinclair, Lee Hickenbottom, Dominic Barrand, Bryan Secombe
Mohammed – James Wintergrove
Leopold – Atli Gunnarsson
Hairdresser – Robert Curtis
Baron Ochs’s Retinue – Thomas Barnard, Dominic Barrand, Nigel Cliffe, Jonathan Fisher, Paul Parfitt, Bryan Secombe
Musicians – Andrew Macnair, Andrew O’Connor, Luke Price, Alexander Wall
Coachmen – Thomas Barnard, Nigel Cliffe, Jonathan Coad, Christopher Lackner
Dancers, Actors, Child Singers
Robert
Carsen (director)
Paul
Steinberg (set designs)Brigitte Reiffenstuel (costumes)
Robert Carsen and Peter van Praet (lighting)
Philippe Giraudeau (choreography)
Royal Opera Chorus (chorus master: William Spaulding)
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Andris Nelsons (conductor)
If
Der Rosenkavalier subtly counsels us
against nostalgia, walking us through our own constructionism and that of
others, layering further experience and memory, real, imagined, or more likely,
somewhere in between, this new Royal Opera production unwittingly offered something
of a countervailing argument. As we are now so wearily aware, the United
Kingdom’s cultural inferiority and isolation are likely only to increase over the
coming months, nay years, of Maying. Very few will care; of them, many will
decamp to what was once quaintly known as ‘the Continent’; others will not
unreasonably seek a degree of refuge in other, actually better times. Only the
truly ignorant, of culture and of history, would hold out any hope for this
miserable island’s prospects, having ‘taken back control’. Likewise, for all
the gloss we saw, far less often heard, on stage, only those ignorant of
operatic life ‘abroad’, and indeed in earlier years here in London, would fail
to feel, at best, regret.
Trailed
unofficially as Renée Fleming’s farewell to the Covent Garden stage, the
production suggested that it was not before time. Fleming has never been much
of an actress, although she retains an undeniable presence. (Big, expensive
costumes doubtless help, especially in the third act, but it is not just that.)
There were, to be fair, moments in which she danced along to the (somewhat
fitful) waltzes in the first act, but otherwise, there was little beyond
generalised and sometimes downright inappropriate facial gestures. Her
inability not only to project but even to sustain her lines, hardly helped by perversely
dragging tempi from Andris Nelsons whenever she set foot on stage, made for a
sad experience indeed, however much the fans may have oohed and aahed at her
wardrobe.
The Marschallin (Renée Fleming), Sophie (Sophie Bevan) |
Nelsons
was at least as much at fault. He has conducted the opera before, but it often
did not sound like it, the performance suggestive of a superior run-through,
even sight-reading. Having opened in strangely aggressive fashion, he ground
the first act to a halt. Once the Marschallin’s retinue had been dispersed, the
remainder felt like an act, and a tedious one at that, to itself. Whether he
were responding to Fleming, or somehow trying to highlight her aurally, I do
not know; it certainly did not work. Too often, phrases were simply left
hanging, even disintegrating. If the second act and earlier sections of the
third – infernal cuts notwithstanding – marked a great improvement,
listlessness was again the order of the day, as we drew ever so gradually to a
close. Time was – yes, I know stopping the clocks will not help us – when the
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House could sound not unlike one of its great ‘Continental’
cousins. Perhaps it still can, under, say, Semyon Bychkov. However, it is now well-nigh
impossible to ignore the long musical decline of the house since the departure
of Bernard Haitink. There were a good few moments of glorious sheen, but there
was a good deal of scrappiness too. Viennese idiom, such as it was, too often sounded
forced. Go to Dresden, to Berlin, to Munich, even, on a good day, to Vienna, go
indeed to many a smaller German theatre, to hear what this score and others can
sound like. And listen to a conductor such as Christian
Thielemann, almost always at his best in Strauss, to hear how infinite
flexibility can, indeed must, be married to a sense of the whole; or listen to
the great conductors of the past, to Karajan, to Krauss, to Kempe, to the
Kleibers, perhaps even, if feeling truly adventurous, progressing to a
conductor whose name did not begin with ‘K’.
What
of the rest of the cast? Alice Coote’s Octavian was a bit of a loose cannon
(with apologies to the extravagant World War One recreations chez Faninal). At her best, she offered
a spirited, rich-toned performance; at other times, there was a distinct lack
of focus. Whether the relative lack of refinement dramatically were Coote’s or director,
Robert Carsen’s idea, it was not, I am afraid, a good one. Matthew Rose’s Ochs
was much better: less the boorish oaf, more the slightly, but only slightly,
past-his-sell-by-date country cousin, who could still summon up a soupçon of
charm when he made the effort. Sophie Bevan’s Sophie was very much in line with
(welcome) contemporary fashion: her own woman, with agency, no mere annoyance. Her
vocal performance was not bettered and rarely approached by others on stage. All,
however, should be thanked for their excellent diction; Hofmannsthal’s words
could always be clearly discerned. (That goes for Fleming too.)
Ochs (Matthew Rose) |
Jochen
Schmeckenbecher’s Faninal seemed oddly subdued, at least vocally; I wondered
whether he would have been happier in a smaller house. It was a pity to hear coarseness
creeping into Giorgio Berrugi’s rendition of the Italian Singer’s aria, but the
many, many ‘smaller’ roles were generally well taken, Perhaps the most noteworthy
for me were Helene Schneidermann’s cleverly scheming Annina, Alasdair Elliott’s outrageous Innkeeper
as transvestite Master/Mistress of Ceremonies, and Scott Conner’s calm,
confident Police Commissioner. (One might well understand why the Marschallin
departed with him rather than with Faninal, although I am not sure that it made
a great deal of dramatic sense here.)
Carsen’s
production is a frustration, and not only because it runs dangerously close to
his earlier staging, for the Salzburg Festival, although divergences often intrigue;
such layering of reception is surely not inappropriate for such a work.
However, the first and second acts seem – not in a knowing way – to rely too
much on former glories, coming across as attempts to make a former, sharper
production look different. (Did those I heard loudly praising Carsen know his
earlier production? I have my doubts.) Designs from Paul Steinberg and Brigitte
Reiffenstuel, however impressive in themselves, are made to do too much of the
work. The note of ambiguity concerning where, or rather when, we are during the
second act, is, however, an excellent touch. Are we gearing up for war,
uniforms and indeed the aforementioned weaponry ever-present? Or, are we to
understand from the field medical assistance afforded Ochs, that we are now in
its midst? The trench movements of Ochs’s retinue (on leave?) certainly suggest
so. Alternatively, might this be an imagined future from the Marschallin’s
comfortable 1911?
The
third act sets its impressive seal on such ruminations, or at least the first
half of it does. Initially, it too seems as though it might follow earlier
Carsen too closely, but wisely, no attempt is made to replicate the
extraordinary Salzburg visual spectacle of multiple brothel rooms (nor, indeed,
the horse). We seem to have moved, or imagined ourselves, into the 1920s, to a
world in which sexual ‘decadence’ and ‘depravity’ (for those of a ‘Brexit’
disposition, in any case) run riot, whilst still recognisably, increasingly so, a projection from where we began (and indeed may still 'be'). Octavian’s, or rather Mariandel’s, forwardness, is
perhaps the most intriguing development. Where she ‘should’ be a (relatively)
innocent victim, here this ‘virgin’ promises to take Ochs to places he may
never have dreamed of, or at least would rather not have done. The already
fascinating sexual politics of the opera take another twist, such as would
surely have shocked the straitlaced Benjamin Britten, who apparently disapproved
of its ‘lesbianism’ (!)
Alas,
the rest of the act, whether knowingly or otherwise, simply offers relative
withdrawal, as it were. A large stage and a large bed are its focus, Octavian
and Sophie rather unnecessarily beginning to further their acquaintance. The parallel created with the opening scene need surely not be presented with quite such heavy-handedness.At the
very close, it seems as though we shall truly return to Salzburg, where a
gunshot frighteningly heralded the coming of war. (That production stayed where
it was, rather than peering into the future, as Carsen does here.) The
reappearance of cannons, seemingly pointed at a drunken Mohammed, suggest
something similar, but instead they misfire (perhaps an all too telling metaphor),
soldiers falling bathetically to the ground themselves, and the liveried
servant continues along its way. I think I can discern a point being made here,
but it is not made very clearly.
Mohammed (James Wintergrove) |
Another
baffling aspect relates to, what seems to be a kleindeutsch rather than an Austrian setting. (The message of the paintings
we see, visual art so often a Carsen device, is ambiguous.) I am afraid I found
myself baffled by visual references to the ‘other’ Kaiserreich and its successor republic. The antics of the tavern
seem very much of Weimar. Even the Grecian frieze of the Faninal mansion looks
more Berlin than Vienna. (To my, perhaps vulgar eyes, it does not look so very nouveau riche, more akin to a Wilhelmine
museum room.) Is a point being made about Strauss’s native Bavaria, perhaps
even Strauss himself, having made the ‘wrong’ choice? If so, it remains
obscure. There is, all considered, simply too much that is either too obscure
or too obvious, suggestive, rightly or wrongly, of an unwelcome degree of
directorial haste.
In
many respects, then, this proved a missed opportunity, laced with tantalising
hints of how much better things might have been – might still be, if only they/we
were to get our act together. It could have been far worse; perhaps it might
improve during the run; and yet… It was, one might say, a ‘soft Brexit’ Rosenkavalier, albeit with hints of our Poundland
Fürstin Resi’s ‘red,
white, and blue’ variety. Note to directors: do not, under any
circumstances, accept my Konzept.
It will neither end nor even start well.
Saturday 17 December 2016
Piemontesi - Mozart, 15 December 2016
Wigmore Hall
Piano Sonata no.5 in G major, KV 283/189h
Piano Sonata no.15 in F major, KV 533 & 494
Francesco Piemontesi (piano)
Piano Sonata no.4 in E-flat
major, KV 282/189g
Piano Sonata no.12 in F major,
KV 332/300kPiano Sonata no.5 in G major, KV 283/189h
Piano Sonata no.15 in F major, KV 533 & 494
Francesco Piemontesi (piano)
I shall deal with the first ‘half’
– that is, the E-flat major Sonata and the first movement of KV 332/300k – quickly, since, thanks to a stray
electronic device, it was not really possible to assess, or indeed to enjoy,
Francesco Piemontesi’s performances. (It is not something on which I wish to
dwell, but I could hardly write about the concert and not mention it.) The
first movement of KV 282/189g went
relatively undisturbed. It sang as a true Adagio,
imbued with a sense of the luminous, even numinous; this was, we rightly felt,
special music, conveyed with (mostly) chaste passion. Harmonic surprises told without
exaggeration. The first Minuet had a spring in its step, the second contrasting
of its own nature, the subtlest of rubato aiding its way. Alas, the closing Allegro’s performance seemed compelling,
but it became almost impossible to tell. There was certainly just as varied a
palette of articulation and dynamics. Lively, and characterful, the F major
Sonata, KV 332/300k, sounded as if it
had come straight from the world of opera
buffa, albeit with a few more seria
moments. I was struck anew by the extraordinary concision of the development
section, but already a high-pitched noise was rendering the performance
unlistenable, and, more to the point, the pianist visibly disconcerted. Despite
a gestural plea from him and a second verbal request from the Director, John
Gilhooly, to check hearing aids, our own and those around us, interference
continued. It was decided to bring forward the interval: a pity, but undoubtedly
the right thing to do in the circumstances.
The second ‘half’ opened in an
atmosphere of increasing relief (in more than one sense). The slow movement of
the F major Sonata, with which it began, flowed nicely; more ‘Classical’ than ‘Romantic’
in conception, without underselling its seductive beauties. Piemontesi very
much had the measure of Mozart’s string-like writing in certain of the
left-hand passages. The composer’s written-in ‘ornamentation’ proved
melodically generative in itself. Allegro
assai is Mozart’s marking for the finale – how I struggled with this, many
moons ago, for my Grade 8! – and Allegro
assai it was, in a highly yet not excessively rhetorical reading. It was
recognisably of a similar operatic world to the first and second movements.
We returned, then, to the
earlier Mozart, to the G major Sonata, KV 283/189h. Overflowing with melody, the first movement benefited greatly
from due attention to the twin gestural and structural roles of motivic
offshoots of those melodies. A fruitful tension between twin beauties, pristine
and more complex, performed a similar role in the ensuing Andante. Likewise in the finale. Perhaps it is not an entirely
successful work, at least when judged by the standards of the fully mature
composer, but even its problems fascinate, ensnare, especially in a performance
such as this. Piemontesi’s suggestions of the orchestral tutti were well judged, as was the sense, once again, of opera seria (Lucio Silla, perhaps?)
The second of the F major
Sonatas we heard received perhaps the finest performance of all. In the first
movement, its Bachian lessons learned, loved, absorbed into a tonal and
dramatic universe as all-encompassing as that of Shakespeare, we heard a
command of line such that primacy of melody could both be reinstated and,
vis-à-vis the harmony beneath, subtly questioned. Balance was the thing in the
counterpoint, just as it should be. I initially found the Andante a little on the cool side, although there was no doubting
its poise, nor its clarity. Greater volubility came with the development’s
minor mode – how could it not? – and its extreme chromaticism, such frightening
intensification making retrospective sense of what I had first doubted. The
recapitulation’s flirtations with the future, Webern in particular, were
relished as further development, for there was no doubting the profundity of
either work or performance. After such Mahlerian intensity, the rondo finale
necessarily struck a very different note. (The split Köchel numbering reflects
its earlier composition, as a stand-alone piece, albeit in need of considerable
revision for inclusion here.) It was definitely alla breve, its particular lightness of touch neither denied nor
underlined, although the mysteries of its episodes ensured that victory was not
too easily won; the music, rightly, retained its sense of enigma.
Wednesday 14 December 2016
Britten Sinfonia - Webern, Uduman, and Schoenberg, 14 December 2016
Wigmore Hall
Webern – Four Pieces for violin
and piano, op.7
Sohrab Uduman – “Dann klingt es auf…” (London premiere)
Schoenberg, arr. Steuermann – Verklärte Nacht, op.4
Thomas Gould (violin)
Caroline Dearnley (cello)
Diana Ketler (piano)
Lunchtime concerts present an
attendance problem. Had my teaching (though certainly not my university!) term
not come to an end, I should most likely not have been able to hear this Wigmore
Hall concert. That would have been a great pity, since it offered just the
right sort of reinvigoration I needed for the afternoon. Whatever the reasons,
it was sad to see so small an audience, but no matter: the box office has
nothing to do with artistic concerns. Schoenberg, of all composers, knew that
very well, when founding his Verein für
musikalische Privataufführungen. I shall draw a veil over his prohibition
on critics; or rather, I shall deflect it, trusting that I qualify as a
Schoenberg scholar too…
It was with Eduard Steuermann’s
arrangement of what, sadly, remains perhaps the composer’s most popular work, Verklärte Nacht, that the concert
closed. Here, the opening was given to piano (Diana Ketler), cello (Caroline
Dearnley) responding as if that were how we always heard it, violin (Thomas
Gould) likewise. D minor sounded all the more obsessive, somehow, in this
re-scoring, as if a Brahmsian pedal-point were being further underlined. (Maybe
it is the strength of the piano bass?) Richly Romantic tone was offered from
all, especially the strings. The narrative form of Richard Dehmel’s poem seemed
especially to the fore, structurally determinative, not just pictorial, in a
reading that was highly dramatic, highly rhetorical. Gurrelieder, quite rightly, did not seem so very far away. Too sectional? No, I do not think so;
there is more than one way to perform the work, and motivic integrity was never
in doubt. Moreover, Schoenberg’s harmonies always seemed, again rightly, on the
verge of vertical and horizontal disintegration: Tristan and late Brahms working together as well as in conflict. Occasionally,
the arrangement brought, perhaps paradoxically, congestion at climaxes. On the
whole, though, I was struck by how little I missed the original. The new
instrumentation sometimes brought, to my ears, an almost Gallic (or perhaps
Flemish!) air. The piano could suggest shimmering strings surprisingly well; in
the bass, it offered something new, but no less welcome. I was especially
intrigued by the ability of both Gould and Dearnley to give what were,
originally, first violin/first cello and second violin/second cello parts
different ‘voices’. The closing section, save for a few bars which probably
defy transcription, sounded duly fulfilled, even transfigured.
Another of Schoenberg’s pupils
opened the concert. Gould and Ketler gave a spellbinding performance of Webern’s
Op.7 Pieces. Violin harmonic, answered by piano chord, somehow incited a melody
somewhere between languor and sadness, yet ever-changing. In reality,
especially in this first piece, any description of either work or performance
would pertain at best for one note or one interval. A passionate, late Romantic
response came in the second: Brahms ultra-distilled. Such an array of colour
was to be heard. Later playfulness eventually – ‘eventually’ is relative, in
Webern! – returned us, sonata-like, to the ardent quality of that earlier
material, although it was not, of course, a ‘mere’ return. The violin opening
to the third seemed to point us towards Nono, the piano clearly joining up the
notes; however much Stockhausen may have learned from Webern, there was a great
deal he did not learn, or did not want to. A nineteenth-century inheritance sounded
stronger still in the fourth and final piece, suggestive of a sonata finale. Indeed,
it is no exaggeration to say, that at its close, I felt as though I had heard a
work far longer, at least equivalent to a sonata by Brahms.
In between Webern and
Schoenberg-Steuermann came not quite the premiere of Sohrab Uduman’s “Dann klingt es auf…”, for that had
taken place in Norwich on 9 December, but its first London performance. The
title comes from a Hildegard Jone poem, used in Webern’s exquisite Second
Cantata. (Now when shall we hear a performance of that in London, or indeed
anywhere else?) ‘Shimmering colours’, suggested by the title, looked both
forwards and backwards. In context, at least, the opening had something of a sense
of a much ‘busier’ version of the opening of Webern’s set of pieces. There was,
throughout, a true sense of three voices, interacting in all manner of ways;
indeed, the transformation of such interaction – Uduman refers to ‘fusion and
disentangling of the contrasting timbres of the piano and strings’ – seemed to
lie at its heart. So too, however, did some sense of narrative, even if it
could not be put into words (and why should it be?) Sections within its
ten-minute span seemed not unlike those we should hear in the Schoenberg. A
sudden slowing, without letting up of tension, suggested something akin to a
slow movement, in a Liszt-Schoenberg tradition (movement within a movement); or
perhaps that was just my idiosyncratic way of making sense of a new work.
Material was still being developed, it seemed, from what had gone before, and would
continue to be; transformation, another Lisztian concept, seemed a not entirely
inappropriate way of considering what may well have been quite a Romantic
journey from darkness to light. The piece was played with all the confidence,
none of the staleness, of a repertory stalwart. Three cheers, once again, to
the ever-enterprising Britten Sinfonia!
The Winter’s Tale, The Hermes Experiment, 13 December 2016
Cockpit
Theatre, Marylebone
Leontes – William McGeough
Hermione – Sadie Parsons Polixenes, First Gentleman – Robert Willoughby
Paulina – Louisa Hollway
Mamillius, Camillo, Antigonus, Officer, Second Gentleman – Christopher Adams
Perdita/Soprano – Héloïse Werner
Florizel – Stephen Williams (clarinets)
Anne Denholm (harp)
Marianne Schofield (double bass)
Kim Ashton (composer)
Nina Brazier (director)Sophie Mosberger (designs)
Damian Robertson (lighting)
Hanna Grzeskiewicz and Héloïse Werner (co-producers)
Much of the most interesting
art of our time seems to ask questions of us rather than to answer them. Sociologically,
there are doubtless many reasons for that, many of them blindingly obvious if
we pause to consider the world around us. (And who amongst us is not doing that
at the moment?!) That is certainly my experience of most recent worthwhile
opera (theatre, more broadly) staging. Our lot, whether we like it or no, is
metatheatrical, and a good deal of other meta-things too. On the whole, I like
it; I certainly value it.
In that spirit, this new ‘musical
reimagining’ of The Winter’s Tale
from The Hermes Experiment asked questions of itself and of us, not least
concerning genre. I had been expecting an opera of some sort; that was certainly
not what I got. We heard an hour’s worth of Shakespeare’s text, very well
delivered, well acted too, with music. Rarely were words and music opposed,
although sometimes they were. There were elements of song, but more often,
boundaries between words, music, and gesture (I always seem to fall back upon
Wagner at some point), between actors and musicians, between most components
present or believed to be present, were questioned, blurred, negated, perhaps
even, dare I suggest it, transcended.
Polixenes (Robert Willoughby) |
Adaptations have long been part
of Shakespearean reception; there would be little reception to speak of without
them. Garrick’s Florizel and Perdita
is an obvious example here; (semi-)opera-lovers will immediately think of
Purcell’s Fairy Queen. There was no
pastoral, but so what? No one was claiming this to be a performance of the ‘original’;
insofar as I thought of what this ‘was’, or perhaps better of where I might
locate it, somewhere between a version with incidental music and a (mostly
spoken) cantata-cum-music-theatre-piece might have come closer than many
attempts. But I did not really spend my time trying to locate what I saw and
heard. I took it, I hope, for what it was, and enjoyed it, my Shakespearean appetite
whetted rather than sated. When contrasted with the bizarre Glyndebourne-Royal
Opera House Macbeth opera, I know which I found more
involving, by a country mile.
Kim Ashton’s name was given as
composer, but not in the traditional top billing, for this seems to have been a
genuinely collaborative effort. I was put in mind of Schoenberg’s futuristic
vision of studios at musical work: ironic, given his emphatic self-understanding
– ours too, surely – as Teutonic, Romantic ‘genius’. Here, however, there was
nothing ironic, nor falsely modest. As Ashton himself explained in the
programme, ‘My position as ‘composer’ of the piece is precarious: while my name appears
at the top of the score (a compilation of instructions, including only sparse
musical notes), the music is as much by The Hermes Experiment as it is by me,
since most of what you will hear is being improvised live, according to musical
shapes and behaviours agreed in advance.’ That would only work, at least in the
sense that it did here, with excellent preparation, for which director, Nina
Brazier should, I presume take a good deal of credit too, likewise everyone
else involved.
Hermione (Sadie Parsons) and Perdita (Héloïse Werner) |
For
instance, again to quote Ashton, ‘The “folk song”,’ which certainly had that
air, ‘in the second half is a case in point – particularly since it is the
first tonal piece I have ‘composed’ in about 15 years!’ (As Schoenberg
admitted, there were still good tunes to be written in C major, although this
was not, if I remember correctly, in C.) ‘When someone suggested that a folk
song would suit one scene well, the soprano Héloïse [Werner] sketched out its
opening melody; I then fleshed this out into a rough whole; finally Héloïse,
Anne [Denholm] (who plays it later on the Harp) and I all tweaked it here and
there until I no longer remember who was originally responsible for which note.’
The darkness of the bass clarinet and its interjections made their points, not
necessarily translatable into words; so too, did the harmonic – and melodic –
resonances of the double bass.
Similarly,
actors came close to music – do they not always, in Shakespeare? – and in some
cases, definitely crossed any such a boundary. The inability to handle
Shakespeare’s verse – there are many ways, of course, but there are also
failures – is the bane of many a contemporary Shakespeare performance. Not
here, for all conveyed both its beauty and its meaning, Robert Willoughby
perhaps my favourite in the former respect. William McGeough offered a subtle portrait of wounded
masculinity as Leontes, Sadie Parsons an intriguing voice (Hermione) whom we wanted to believe, and whom we knew we were correct to believe, but who could yet sow some of that doubt experienced by Leontes. I could go on, but it was a company effort, symbolised
perhaps, by Héloïse Werner’s wordless soprano – a voice from beyond in more
than one sense, I think – becoming Perdita. Likewise, instrumentalists (the
other members of the Hermes Experiment all outstanding) were called on not only
to employ extended techniques but also, music-theatre-style, to participate in
the ‘dramatic’ action.
Hermione |
There was, then, a particular,
one-off sense of enchantment to the night’s proceedings. I shall not say ‘more,
please’, since that would seem rather against the spirit of what was seen and
heard; I was, though, delighted to have been there.
Saturday 10 December 2016
Levit - Beethoven, 6 December 2016
Wigmore Hall
Piano Sonata no.17 in D minor,
op.31 no.2, ‘The Tempest’
Piano Sonata no.11 in B-flat
major, op.22Piano Sonata no.3 in C major, op.2 no.3
Piano Sonata no.8 in C minor, op.13, ‘Pathétique’
Igor Levit (piano)
You could probably write this
yourselves now: well, the essential thrust, with a good few purple adjectives
tastefully discarded. Contrarians would find something ‘different’ to say for
the sake of it, but 2016 has had quite enough of contrarians, thank you.
Suffice it to say that this was another outstanding Beethoven recital from Igor
Levit, with a good few challenges to any preconceptions, whether concerning
work or pianist, not least in the comparatively neglected op.22 Sonata.
The Tempest, though, opened in surprising fashion too. It always sounds
exploratory, or at least always should. I am always put in mind – I think I
have probably quoted this before – of Carl Dahlhaus’s Nineteenth-Century Music contrast with a melody from Les Huguenots:
By the criteria of Italo-French
music, Beethoven’s movement does not have the slightest claim to a musical idea
worthy of the name. What his work is based on is not a thematic — much less
melodic — ‘inspiration’ so much as a formal concept: the arpeggiated triad …
The opening, seemingly an introduction, can be viewed in retrospect as an
exposition. … If one extreme of music is the melodic ‘inspiration’ [to
exemplify which, he quotes that Meyerbeer
melody], limited to a few measures and with the form functioning merely as
an arrangement, the other would seem to be the almost disembodied formal
process emerging from a void.
So it
mysteriously did here, a world created before our ears, ex nihilo, with that creation ongoing, continual. Telling rubato,
almost improvisatory in quality, was of course anything but arbitrary, ever
grounded in Beethoven’s harmony. Levit’s playing was wondrously clear, without
the slightest loss to ‘atmosphere’. (Think, perhaps, of Boulez’s conducting. If
you do not know his Beethoven Fifth, greatly admired by Sviatoslav Richter
amongst others, do rectify that omission!) Rhetoric formed structure, and all
the while that arpeggio, those arpeggios acted as Prospero (perhaps Caliban too
on occasion?) Recitative took us into the world of late Beethoven, every note
impregnated with meaning, seeming almost to prepare for, as well as to contrast
with, the post-Mozartian arioso of the slow movement. Relished, even adored,
quite rightly, creation of melody was hard work, yet not without fancy, even
fantasy. It was almost, at times, a Bagatelle writ-large, and not necessarily
an early one. This, I thought, was an undeniably modernist Beethoven, after which,
will-o’-the-wisp Romanticism came with the finale as another welcome contrast;
so too, did a vehemence that seemed to hint at Chopin and Liszt. Beethoven
sounded possessed, increasingly so, with all his trademark obstinacy. The end
was almost a void: perhaps a return, yet not quite.
The B-flat
Sonata, op.22, opened in dazzling, insistent fashion, with an air of detachment
I found unsettling. It is an odd piece, but I am not sure I have heard it sound
– let alone thought of it – quite so odd before. Haydn on acid? How, though,
I wish I could play a single bar of the left-hand part like that! The first-movement
development was mysterious, the recapitulation quite the agōn. I was quite unsure what to make of the whole, but am sure
that I shall never think of it quite the same way again. The slow movement sang
with all the joy and regret of a valiant attempt to recapture the lost world of
Mozart – until, that is, it did something different, when once again I felt a
whole world of nineteenth-century music stretching out before me. It was increasingly
ecstatic, as those two tendencies combined, interwove, all with unbroken line.
The minuet was more capricious than one often hears, full of (ambiguous)
character, its trio more furious, almost frighteningly so. The (faux-)naïveté
of the finale’s post-Mozartian stance was itself played with, rendering the
movement all the more mysterious. Contrast, when it came, registered with
properly Beethovenian shock, almost as if I had never heard it before. Was
there reconciliation? Almost, but not quite: if we are honest, modernity,
Beethoven’s as well as ours, no longer permits that.
Almost
nonchalant, whimsical even, the opening of the C major Sonata, op.2 no.3,
announced its debt to Haydn, before announcing its Beethovenian ingratitude:
such sforzandi! A little Mozartian
glee completed the trinity, with Mozart also clearly the progenitor of the
minor-mode material. The particular variety of humanism was of course Beethoven’s
– and his interpreter’s – own, even at this early stage. Ripe lyricism was
relished; harmonic muscles were flexed, a whole tonal universe lying in front
of us. This was unquestionably a young man’s music, yet the development gave a
taste of things to come, not least rhythmically. Harmonic direction was
confirmed here, intensified in the recapitulation. Likewise humour. I was
struck by the Schubertian (I suppose I should say ‘proto-Schubertian’)
characteristics, melodic and harmonic, of the slow movement, characteristics I
do not think I had noticed before. Much, of course, is a common debt to Mozart,
but even so… And then, once again, echt-Beethovenian
shock: shock in sublimity and humanity. We heard a strikingly mature variety of
Beethovenian gruff humour in the scherzo, wryness too. The piano articulation
so necessary to convey that was almost, yet not quite, a joy in itself. The
finale was not dissimilar, yet possessed of its own particular ‘character’ – an
idea to which I returned again and again, throughout the recital. The music
responded to Mozart, yes, but was never to be mistaken for another’s writing.
Imagining the music under one’s own fingers, however incompetent, it ‘felt’
like Beethoven. It was wonderfully playful, and playful in its sense of wonder.
How to make
the Pathétique sound new? Not by
doing things to it, but by playing it
with burning belief. (The same goes, I might add, for listening to it, reading
it, thinking about it.) The music was sculpted with a fine sense of musical
drama, Michelangelesque, even: Il
penseroso? After which, the exposition ‘proper’ – but is it? – came as
release, albeit intensification too. The development sounded, felt, as if
another rocket, its tonality ensuring the flames were of a different hue. It
was a miracle, or so it seemed, how quickly we returned: such is art. And the
recapitulation proved, quite rightly, to be a second development. The slow
movement was imbued with simple songfulness, or so it seemed, for nothing is
ever quite so simple as that, whatever Winckelmann might have had us believe
about the Greeks. A heightened sense of the special quality to this material
reminded us why it has long been so loved. Music is often, if not always,
celebrated for a good reason. The finale blew in like an icy wind, which never
failed to take us by surprise, however much we might thought we ‘knew’ it. C
minor was always going to win, but there were other worlds to survey, even to
enjoy. The brusqueness of the conclusion, neither too much nor too little, was
spot on. Onwards, then, and upwards…
Thursday 8 December 2016
Cavalleria rusticana/Sancta Susanna, Opéra national de Paris, 3 December 2016
Opéra Bastille
Images: Julien Benhamou /OnP |
Santuzza – Elina Garanča
Turiddu – Yonghoon LeeLucia – Elena Zaremba
Alfio – Vitaliy Bilyy
Lola – Antoinette Dennefeld
Susanna – Anna Caterina
Antonacci
Klementia – Renée MorlocOld Nun – Sylvie Brunet-Grupposo
Maid – Katharina Crespo
Knight – Jeff Esperanza
Mario Martone (director)
Sergio Tramonti (set designs)Ursula Patzak (costumes)
Pasquale Mari (lighting)
Daniela Schiavone (assistant director, Cavalleria rusticana)
Raffaella Giordana (choreography, Sancta Susanna)
Chorus of the Opéra national de Paris (chorus master: José Luis Basso)
Orchestra of the Opéra national de Paris
Carlo Rizzi (conductor)
Two operas: one rather better
known to the operatic public, but neither to me personally. I tried (perhaps
that was the problem?) with Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana, yet felt rather nonplussed. There was nothing
especially to ‘mind’, but the work left little impression beyond its strange
pacing (dragging almost interminably, then abruptly concluding, or at least
finishing). Somehow, it came across both as crude and bland. I heard dashes of
undigested Wagner, devoid of context, washed up amongst mildly Verdian debris. Every
so often, Mascagni seemed to aspire towards Puccini, yet barely left the
starting block, falling time and time again on mere cliché, and failing to
achieve anything of interest melodically, harmonically, orchestrally.
Characterisation seemed minimal, the drama, such as it was, situational. As for
the story, such as it was, would it not have embarrassed a 1980s television
mini-series? I had been curious to discover what the fuss was all about; in a
sense, I am all the more curious now, since I really did not ‘get it’. ‘Some of
my best friends’, but not, alas, me…
If Mascagni’s opera would have
seemed more suited to a ten or fifteen minutes scena, Hindemith’s Sancta
Susanna left me wanting more: always a good sign. The final part of his
Expressionist triptych (Mörder, Hoffnung
der Frauen, and Das Nusch-Nuschi
come first), it is much more my sort of thing, I suppose. Musically, it comes
perhaps as close to ‘atonal’ Schoenberg as Hindemith would ever do: more than
once, I was put in mind of Die glückliche
Hand, even Bluebeard’s Castle, especially in terms of orchestral
colour, but perhaps harmonically too. Subject matter – a convent riven by
sexual frenzy and demonic possession – has certain points of contact with Erwartung, perhaps, and more generally
with other contemporaneous musical explorations (mostly, of course by men) of
female sexuality, but more obviously with Prokofiev’s later Fiery Angel. Hindemith certainly has no
aspirations to the so-called athematicism of Erwartung, though, quasi-autonomous musical form already gesturing,
from within its Expressionist cloak, to the Neue
Sachlichkeit future.
What do the two works have in
common? Very little, I think, although I suppose one might make some generic ‘religious’
claim. Mario Montane, perhaps mistakenly, made little or no effort to link
them. An awkward five minutes or so (following curtain calls!) in between,
house lights still off, did not help, audience members not unreasonably
uncertain what to do (apart, that is, from some Hindemith foes who made a dash
for it). It was not entirely clear to me whether the Cross seen in his Sicilian
Church was supposed to be in some sense the same as that witnessed so
strikingly in Sergio Tramonti’s design for the crypt or other underworld
beneath the convent. At first, Montane’s Cavalleria
rusticana seems highly conventional, but there is a greater degree of
abstraction than one might first guess, much done with comparatively little, rescuing
the work somewhat from its vulgar realism. A definite emphasis upon the
menacing power of the village crowd, seated in judgement, is welcome too. (I
thought of Peter Grimes.) The fun is
really had to be had, though, in Sancta
Susanna. The action initially takes place in a ‘window’, securely embedded,
or so it seems, within a larger structure, which begins to fall to pieces – as,
well, Susanna’s defences do. Nightmarish giant crucifixes, a huge insect (made
up of a highly skilled movement team, well choreographed by Raffaella Giordana),
and the past and present of nuns writhing on the Cross, tread with delicious
ambiguity the line between sympathy and Gothic horror.
The orchestra of the Paris
Opéra sounded sumptuous, with a splendid sheen but plenty of depth in the Hindemith
too. Carlo Rizzi seemed perhaps more at home in Mascagni; I should not have
minded a little more formal delineation in the Hindemith. Nevertheless, his
exploration of orchestral colour there was greatly to be welcomed, and the
climactic moments were viscerally exciting. Choral singing and blocking were
well handled throughout.
Elina Garanča sang beautifully
as Santuzza in the Mascagni, line impeccable, although there was a certain
coldness to her performance that perhaps militated against the possibility of
much emotional involvement. Yonghoon Lee’s excellent Turiddu was quite the
peacock, also quite the mummy’s boy: just, I presume, as he should have been. Dramatic
toing and froing between Anna Caterina Antonacci, every inch the queen of her
stage, and Renée Morloc was gripping, reminding us that there is much to be
pieced together from Hindemith’s vocal lines, not nearly so fragmentary as they
might initially seem. Controlled frenzy was the order of the day, but never too
controlled. All other parts were well taken. If only, though, Sancta Susanna had been presented with a
more appropriate companion piece or pieces, though, whether Hindemith’s own or
something more tellingly related or contrasted. Next time…
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