Milton Court
Beethoven:
Six
Ecossaises, WoO 83
An
die ferne Geliebte, op.98
In
questa tomba obscura, WoO
133
Gerald
Barry: Jabberwocky
Beethoven:
Quintet in E-flat major,
op.16
Allan Clayton (tenor)
Alex Wide (horn)
Timothy Rundle (oboe)
Joy Farrall (clarinet)
Sarah Burnett (bassoon)
Thomas Adès (piano)
As a whole, this concert proved a
curious affair. It probably made more sense in the context of Thomas Adès’s series
of Beethoven and Barry concerts with the Britten Sinfonia. The idea of a night
off from the symphonic Beethoven to turn to chamber works was, in principle, a
good one, but the sole Gerald Barry piece here seemed oddly out of place – and not
in a productive, provocative way. Even the Beethoven pieces did not really seem
to fit together especially well. A lovely performance of the op.16 Quintet
nevertheless made the evening worthwhile.
The first half, however, put
one in mind of that proverbial, clichéd curate’s egg. Adès walked onto the
stage and apologetically informed us that two works had been added to the
programme. Nothing wrong with that, although Beethoven hardly requires apology.
The first was his Six Ecossaises, WoO
83, which many of us will recall from childhood piano lessons. Adès’s
performance proved a curious mixture of the reticent – as though he would
rather be playing the dances at home – and the heavy-handed. It became more
flexible, to good effect, as it went on. Ultimately, though, little was made of
these charming miniatures, whether individually or as a whole.
An
die ferne Geliebte
followed, Adès continuing to show a good deal of reticence, for most of the
time very much the ‘accompanist’. Allan Clayton offered a sincere, verbally
attentive performance until the final song, in which he sounded curiously harsh
of tone, even hectoring. Still, there was a good deal to savour, for instance a
true hint of sadness at the close of the fifth stanza of ‘Es kehret der Maien’.
Adès seemed to come into his own as the cycle progressed. If he still came
across as shadowing the singer at the beginning of ‘Leichte Segler in den Höhen’,
his shaping of a minor-mode phrase at the end of the third stanza – ‘Klagt ihr,
Vöglein, meine Qual’, offered just the sort of touching insight I had hoped he
would bring to the music of a composer with whom he is not so obviously
associated. The transition to the next song, ‘Diese Wolken in den Höhen’ was
also skilfully handled.
The second additional
work was In questa tomba
oscura, WoO 133, Beethoven’s setting of a poem by Giuseppe Carpani, amongst
other things an early biographer of Haydn (and royalist spy!) This proved a
duly haunting performance of a song whose text has a man visit the grave of his
beloved, albeit from the standpoint of the latter, who reproaches her lover for
not having thought more of her whilst she was alive. Perhaps again Adès might
have brought out the piano part more strongly. Beethoven’s harmonies
nevertheless told – and there is much to be said for understatement. Clayton
clearly relished its challenges, heightening without overstating its curious
drama.
‘Curious’ is certainly a word
to be applied to Lewis Carroll, and to Gerald Barry, let alone to their
combination in Jabberwocky,
commissioned and premiered by Britten Sinfonia in 2012. The idea of performing
its nonsense words in French and German translation is typically brilliant –
and makes just as much (non)sense as the original. Clayton’s declamatory
performance perhaps inevitably put one in mind of Barry’s brilliant operatic
comedy, The Importance of Being Earnest.
Alex Wide’s bizarre horn flourishes added another level to the studiously
inexplicable entertainment unfolded. The song – should one call it a ‘song’? –
seemed, almost in spite of itself, to grow, even to develop. And then it was
over.
Additional wind players joined the
ensemble after the interval for Beethoven’s Quintet for piano and wind
instruments, op.16. It was the sheer gorgeousness of their sonorities that
struck me first – and Beethoven at his most Mozartian (or, his tragedy,
post-Mozartian). Balance with the piano here sounded much improved; there was
greater impetus to the performance too. This is music that needs plenty of
space, a grandeur of scale if you will, as well as chamber intimacy; it
received both. The second movement was again well paced, its post-Mozartian
sadnesses again given space to breathe, yet also to progress. Here, Adès could prove
a little indulgent, his solo rubati occasionally
puzzling; in concert, however, everything delighted. The hunting finale again
summoned up Mozart’s ghost – as opposed to Haydn’s ebullience. Yet, quite
rightly, not all was subtlety, not all was interiority. That balance and others
were finely judged, in a performance of almost tiggerish enthusiasm.
