Philharmonie
Schubert – Symphony no.4 in C
minor, D 417
Tchaikovsky – Symphony no.4 in
F minor, op.36
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
Riccardo Muti (conductor)
Riccardo Muti has long been a
fine Schubert conductor; his EMI set of the complete symphonies with the Vienna
Philharmonic has much to commend it, and certainly not just for the orchestra.
Whilst there was much to enjoy in this performance with the Berlin
Philharmonic, I could not help but feel, especially in the first movement of the Fourth Symphony, that
something was lacking, especially when compared with Daniel Barenboim’s recent performance of the first three symphonies with the
Staatskapelle Berlin. The opening certainly sounded splendid, its C minor
strongly suggesting a response to Haydn’s ‘Representation of Chaos’, even if
the subsequent path taken by the introduction proved more Mozartian. The rest
of the movement, especially the exposition proper, proved elegant, if a little
earthbound. There was something surprisingly static, even plodding, to Muti’s
approach, which suggested repetition over development.
The slow movement, slower than
is now fashionable and all the lovelier for it, fared much better. It offered
considerable cumulative sweep and a little more flexibility. The Berlin
woodwind’s playing proved enchanting indeed. A characterful jolt was offered by
the syncopations of the third movement, its trio treading fruitfully a fine
balance between the courtly and the unassuming. The finale came off best of
all, I think, with tension aplenty, but leggierezza
too. (I say ‘but’, yet do not really mean it, for the lightness was very
much part of that tension.) Here was all the formal dynamism, too, that I had
missed in the first movement. This is not Beethoven, and there is little point
in pretending it is; Schubert does go around the houses a bit here.
Nevertheless, the seriousness with which Muti and the orchestra pursued what in
some ways is a more difficult task spoke of integrity, of something
considerably more than the merely amiable.
That said, both – perhaps unexpectedly,
in Muti’s case, at least – sounded considerably more at home after the
interval, in Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. There was nothing predictable about
Muti’s reading, but nor was there any straining to be different for the sake of
it. The music, it seemed, had been thought and re-thought, allowing it in
performance to give the impression of speaking ‘for itself’. The first movement’s
opening fanfares were appropriately Fatal; thereafter, the music flowed much
more freely than it had in the equivalent movement of the Schubert. What particularly
struck me was the intimacy of so much, possessed of a true chamber quality such
as I have rarely, if ever, heard before. It was rather as if we were passing
between public and private, in a performance of Eugene Onegin or The Queen of
Spades. For the music danced too, as often it must. Just as important,
there was no manufacturing of ‘emotion’, applied to the music; sentiment rather
arose from the score ‘itself’.
In context, the second movement
evinced a certain kinship with its Schubertian counterpart – as well, of
course, as obvious difference. Woodwind solos, once again quite delectable, as
well as onward tread spoke of the former tendency, whilst balletic and ‘Slavic’
qualities were very much Tchaikovsky’s own. Muti left us in no doubt of the
music’s symphonic stature; I was
actually reminded of Klemperer at times, not a comparison I had especially
expected to draw. The scherzo offered many similar qualities, albeit in music
of very different character. If the Berlin strings were mightily impressive in
the pizzicato, that impressive quality was as musical as it was technical. The
woodwind section both grew out of and contrasted with that opening material,
and the combination of the two at the close proved quietly brilliant. There was
certainly nothing quiet concerning the brilliance of the finale. If it were at
times a little dogged, is that not partly the point? And, in any case, there
was much more to it than that; it could be seductive too, in its grace and
charm, all the more so again for having nothing in the way of emotional crudity
applied to it. Muti’s is not the only way to perform this work – no one’s is –
but it proved refreshing in its integrity.
