Philharmonie
Mozart:
Piano Concerto no.27 in
B-flat major, KV 595
Walton:
Viola Concerto
Kodály:
Suite: Háry János
Mitsuko Uchida (piano)
Amihai Grosz (viola)
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
Simon Rattle (conductor)
Try as I might, I could not
work out the idea behind the programming of this concert. In practice, it
brought us the Berlin Philharmonic – and Simon Rattle – at their best after the
interval, in works by Walton and Kodály, whereas far and away the best music
came before that interval. Not that there was anything wrong with the orchestra’s
playing, or indeed with Rattle’s conducting, in Mozart’s final piano concerto,
but there was something of a sense of compromise, as if orchestra and conductor
– arguably soloist too – were pulling slightly in different directions. There
was none, or very little, of the mannerism that has often so disfigured Rattle’s
conducting of Classical music; that, after all, is hardly Mitsuko Uchida’s
style. But a very small orchestra – only eight first violins – sounded a little
plain of string tone, with the true orchestral delights coming from a fabulous
woodwind section. The first movement lacked the autumnal quality puritans tell
us we – and it – should eschew, but nor was it especially vernal; indeed, even
Uchida’s playing, although excellent, had a degree of neutrality to it. That
worked rather well in the development section, when her passagework sounded
entwined around ravishing oboe and bassoon solos. Indeed, the orchestra had
sounded enlivened as soon as she entered. And Uchida’s was a distinguished
performance overall, as one would have expected. The slow movement was
beautifully shaped, never unduly moulded. It spoke and sang with simplicity,
however secondary. Here, Uchida continued to ornament her lines, but far more
so than earlier on: ever tasteful, indeed ever delightful. The finale was
finely articulated from all concerned, Uchida’s command of line especially
noteworthy. There was much to commend, much to enjoy; comparisons can wait
until another day, or indefinitely.
The Berlin Philharmonic sounded
like a different orchestra after the interval; of course one would not expect
Mozart to sound like Walton, or vice
versa, but it was more than that. Richly Romantic, there was no denying this
sound’s ‘fit’ to the repertoire. (Interestingly, and to my mind highly
surprisingly, Karl Böhm had conducted its Berlin Philharmonic premiere in 1958,
with William Primrose, whilst the 1961-2 revision, heard here, received its
first – and until now, only – performance from the orchestra in 1969 from
Giusto Cappone and John Barbirolli). Just two weeks earlier, we had heard Máté
Szűcs in the Bartók Viola Concerto; now it was the turn of the orchestra’s other principal
viola, Amihai Grosz. If the Bartók is far from my favourite piece by
that composer, comparison with Walton’s concerto, in whichever version, does
the latter no favours. If, once again, I found myself far from convinced by a
work that has a tendency to sound like bits of film music stuck together, then
it was not for want of trying from Grosz, the orchestra, or Rattle. The vaguely
jazzy sections and those that sound somewhat like Prokofiev are perhaps the most
convincing parts of the first movement; they certainly sounded splendid in
themselves here. Grosz’s double-stopping, moreover, was to die for.
Stravinskian rhythmic precision made its mark in the second movement. All concerned
made a great effort to unify the work in its finale. Grosz’s lyricism here –
and not just his – made a gorgeous sound indeed. His Reger encore, however – I am
not sure offhand from which of the Suites it came – was very much more to my
taste. It was lovely to see Rattle sneak in at the back of the stage and sit at
the piano to hear it too.
I tried too with Kodály’s Háry Janos Suite. Perhaps trying was the
problem, for it is fun enough in its way, if perhaps a little laboured in the fifth movement. The Prelude is in many ways
impressive – and certainly proved so in performance, lower strings offering
more than a hint of Bluebeard Bartók
(in which I had heard them earlier this year). There are worse models, far worse models! The festive quality
to the Vienna Musical Clock movement was relished. And violist Naoko Shimizu
played her opening to the third movement, the ‘Song’, with a beauty of tone
that, in context, hinted at a link, however, strained, with Walton. It is
always fun – well, nearly always – to hear the cimbalom too, and we most
certainly did on this occasion, if rather less imaginatively (writing, not
performance) than I had earlier this week in Jörg Widmann’s Zweites Labyrinth. The
Berlin brass’s performance was truly outstanding in ‘The Battle and Defeat of
Napoleon’, and so on. It was an enjoyable performance in itself; quite what its connection with Walton or Mozart might have been remained obscure.
