Grosser Saal, Mozarteum
String Divertimento in F
major, KV 138/125c
Idomeneo: Ballet Music, KV 367
Symphony no.41 in C major, ‘Jupiter’,
KV 551
Salzburg Mozarteum Orchestra
Václav Luks (conductor)
How difficult – I have not yet
lost my English bent for understatement – it is today to find a conductor
capable of directing a fine Mozart performance, or at least willing to do so.
Perhaps it was always so; not everyone was Colin Davis or Karl Böhm. The
perversities of the authenticke brigade, though, have done serious damage.
Here, the Mozarteum Orchestra sounded wonderful; when permitted to play, rather
than harried or micromanaged, there was much to enjoy. Alas, Václav Luks, who
appears very much to have an ‘early music’ background and ‘name’, permitted
that far too little.
The F major Divertimento, KV
138/125c, started most promisingly. Had
the rest of the performance proceeded similarly, that would have been a very
good thing indeed. A small string section (5.4.3.2.1), all standing save for
the cellos, offered a bright, cultivated sound, their playing cultivated and
quite without pedantry. The first movement’s roots in earlier music were
apparent, quite rightly, without over-emphasis, its structure clearly,
meaningfully presented. Luks, alas, made something of a meal of the Andante, its ease lost or at least
obscured. I could have done, moreover, without that slight astringency he
seemed determined to inflict upon the string. At its best, though, the movement
evinced a hushed intimacy that compelled one to listen. The finale fizzed with
energy. If it might have smiled a little more, counterpoint was admirably
clear. The playing itself was, as ever, excellent.
A larger, though still
relatively small, band of strings (8.6.5.4.3) was of course joined by wind and
drums for the Idomeneo ballet music.
Luks’s way with the music, announced immediately in the Chaconne, was unduly
aggressive. More damagingly, he seemed unable to communicate a longer line, proceeding
bar by bar, sometimes beat by beat. (O for Sir Colin from Munich!) Playing was
unfailingly alert; if only Luks had been able to relax a little, to let the
music speak ‘for itself’. The Pas seul was warmer, if often hard driven; its
corners were well handled, however, and there was no doubting its symphonic
nature. Why we had to endure ‘natural’ brass rasping, though, with a modern
orchestra, is anyone’s guess. The Passepied was well shaped, if on the fast
side, the Gavotte better still, not pushed too far. It was a great pity that
the transition to the finale emerged as an arbitrary collection of notes, and
that that Passacaille itself proved fierce and, again, quite unsmiling.
Messiaen’s charming observation that Mozart’s music ‘smiles’ may or may not be
trite; it is undoubtedly true, though, or should be.
The ‘authenticke’ brigade and
their camp followers seem unable to avoid ‘rhetorical’ gestures – usually an
attempt, conscious or otherwise, to conceal an inability to phrase – in the Jupiter Symphony, especially in its
outer movements. When allied to an apparent inability to establish a basic
pulse, the result tends, as here, towards dragging, irrespective of speed.
Trumpet and drum interventions were unfailingly, tediously underlined, as if
there were any need. Structure was generally clear enough, but formal dynamism
quite lacking. The recapitulation merely hectored. Once again, the playing
itself was excellent. The slow movement was less pulled around, flowing well
enough; it, bizarrely, sounded somewhat inconsequential: pleasant rather than
unpleasant, but if that is the best one can say concerning a conductor’s view…
The Minuet, needless to say, was taken fashionably, one beat to a bar, but was
otherwise played reasonably straight, and emerged all the better for it. Alas,
its Trio reverted to type, presumably as ‘contrast’. A weird hiatus prior to
the reprise of the Minuet did not help either. The finale was fierce, again,
rather than joyful, its counterpoint admirably clear. I could not help but
think how much better it would have been had the Salzburg players not been
saddled with a conductor whose sub-Bernstein podium antics were now really
beginning to grate, not least since they seemingly bore no relation to either
score or performance. I do not think I have heard the coda pass by with such
little wonder: quintuple invertible counterpoint is nothing, apparently, in
Luks’s world.
