Wigmore Hall
Brahms – Clarinet Sonata no.1
in F minor, op.120 no.1
Berg – Four Pieces for clarinet
and piano, op.5
Jörg Widmann – Fantasie, for solo clarinet
Schubert – Impromptu in C
minor, D 899/1
Widmann – Sonatina facile (UK premiere)
Schumann – Fantasiestücke, op.73
Jörg Widmann (clarinet)
Mitsuko Uchida (piano)
A wonderful concert! If I had
my doubts about the substance of the new Sonatina
facile for piano solo, by Jörg Widmann, it was entertaining enough, and
received a bravura performance from Mitsuko Uchida. A tribute to Mozart’s C
major Piano Sonata, KV 545, with identical movement markings, ‘Allegro’,
‘Andante’, and ‘Rondo’, it starts off in deconstructive fashion not dissimilar
to Schnittke’s (K)ein Sommernachtstraum.
Harmonies in the opening ‘Allegro’ at times sound not unlike Henze; I thought
of his own Mozart piano tribute, Cherubino.
The nineteenth century looms large too, throughout the piece: ‘nineteenth
century Mozart’, Beethoven (op.13?), Chopin, et al. As with his Con brio
Concert Overture, there is much that teases: is this quotation or allusion?
Does it matter? Whatever it is, though, it is certainly not facile in the sense applied to Mozart’s
work.
Otherwise, there was much to
intrigue, to enjoy, even to confound. The starkness of much of Uchida’s piano
playing in the first movement of the Brahms F minor Sonata guarded against any
conventional notion of autumnal mellowness. (I love that variety of Brahms as
much as the next listener, perhaps more, but it is not the only way.) Widmann’s
clarinet playing seemed to look even towards Birtwistle, certainly towards Berg
and Schoenberg. A sense of exhaustion and the impetus dialectically derived
from it brought Mendelssohn to mind at one point, so this was not simply Brahms
from a twentieth- or indeed twenty-first century standpoint. Intervals – and
then how does one not think of Webern – did a good deal of the work, just as
they should. I liked the uneasy, even sometimes effortful lyricism of the
second movement. The opening, neo-Mozartian – definitely not Mozartian without
the ‘neo’ – grace of the Allegretto
grazioso was soon undercut. Darkness was far from confined to the central
section. The finale was more volatile than one generally hears, and all the
better for it.
Berg’s Four Pieces followed
naturally – or better, with seeming inevitability. From the very first piece,
the similarity not only in motivic working but also in expressivity was
apparent: not always, of course, but often. There was certainly nothing
Brahmsian about those piano bell chimes, magical and menacing at once. Kinship
with Schoenberg’s op.19 (especially the second of those pieces) was especially
apparent in Uchida’s performance of the second piece, tendencies intensified in
the fourth, whilst Widmann’s – the clarinet’s – scampering wit in the third
evoked Pierrot lunaire. That
intensification in the fourth and final piece brought homes just what variety
there is to be experienced in unity, and vice
versa. ‘Cataclysmic’ would not be an exaggerated description of the piano
climax as heard here. And then, quite, lyrical witness…
Widmann’s solo Fantasie proved quite the tour de force. A multiphonic drone-like opening,
out of which Don Juan-like
ascending phrases issue forth, lodged itself long in the memory. All manner of
extended techniques, and more ‘traditional’ ones – jazzy glissandi, for
instance – contributed to a compelling narrative. Contours were traced by
Widmann as performer, insofar as one can distinguish the two, with high drama
and a sovereign command of musical line.
The C minor Impromptu with
which the second half opened began, perhaps echoing the Brahms, in stark
fashion, yet would ultimately prove far from unyielding. Nevertheless, such was
the granite-like implacability of Uchida’s performance, that I thought more of
a conductor such as Otto Klemperer than of pianists. For all the grandeur,
though, there was great intimacy too: such were revealed to be two sides of the
same coin. Schubert sounded contemporary, if anything rather more so than the
Widmann of the Sonatina facile.
Schumann’s Fantasiestücke opened as if with a reminiscence of an earlier
Brahms than the one we had heard here. Melody, harmony, even developmental
method evoked kinship. By the same token, there was something fresher here,
redolent of a stroll through German Romantic woods. The second piece was
fantastical – as the title would suggest! – in the best Schumann tradition.
There was nothing ‘late’ here, save perhaps for our perception. Sunny, yet not
without shadow, the third exhibited more than a hint of neo-Classicism,
suggesting connections with Widmann’s own work. The Andante from Mendelssohn’s early clarinet sonata in E-flat major
offered longing without exaggeration; connections with much of what we had
heard earlier were inescapable, but were never forced upon us.
