Jansen/COE/Haitink - Brahms, 29 November 2013

Grote Zaal, Concertgebouw

Violin Concerto in D major, op.77

Symphony no.2 in D major, op.73

Janine Jansen (violin)

Chamber Orchestra of Europe

Bernard Haitink (conductor)

 

Two of Brahms’s greatest works in very fine performances in the Concertgebouw: a perfect choice for one of the hall’s 125^th anniversary ‘jubilee concerts’. Without being oppressively nationalistic – the Chamber Orchestra of Europe is, after all, by its very nature anything but – it could reasonably be seen as a matter of Dutch pride too: hall, conductor, and soloist representing the very best of the Netherlands’ cultural life.

 

Bernard Haitink, Janine Jansen, and the COE certainly made for a fine team in the Violin Concerto. There was little loss in what might have been thought the ‘restriction’ of chamber-size Brahms. For one thing, the orchestra throughout played with great fullness of sound and no preposterous scaling down, let alone elimination, of vibrato. That is, the size of orchestra – Meiningen or otherwise – was not the point; this was simply a manifestation of great musicianship. A translucency one would associate with the orchestra’s founder, Claudio Abbado, remained, but there were few occasions when anyone would reasonably have protested at a lack of body. The hushed moments, for instance, following Jansen’s exemplary account of the first movement cadenza, truly drew one in to listen with great intent, but that was not at the cost of due vehemence – minor mode passages in particular – elsewhere. Haitink’s command of the music’s ebb and flow, above all its harmonic rhythm, was enough to make a Schenkerian out of the most hardened Schoenbergian. Not that there was no sense of developing variation, either here or in the two following movements, but the work emerged as a ‘classic’ in a newly-minted yet time-honoured sense rather than a harbinger of what the twentieth century would bring. Jansen’s intonation was well-nigh perfect throughout, her tone perfectly centred, and her dynamic palette impressively varied without there being a sense of undue exaggeration. So much did her performance seem to emerge out of the capabilities of her instrument – and of course her artistry – that this seemed to be a concerto ‘for’ rather than ‘against’ the violin. The slow movement was songful, glorious in its evocation of Mozartian Harmoniemusik; it was not only the principal oboe who deserved special mention; so did the entire section, a veritable collection of serenaders. Jansen’s interaction with them was as first among equals rather than star soloist, expertly guided with a light yet firm touch by Haitink. The finale emerged with an utterly convincing balance between ‘Hungarian’ virtuosity – never for its own sake – and ‘German’ Urlinie. I could not find fault with a single aspect of this performance; nor should I wish to try.

 

The Second Symphony received almost as fine a performance, my sole reservation concerning the finale. Once again the COE’s playing was beyond praise, even though here there were times when one might have wished for a larger band. (Not so many of them, though, I have to admit.) All-too-easy summations of this as the ‘sunniest’ of Brahms’s works sounded as irrelevant as they are. Deeper undercurrents, again founded in Haitink’s harmonic understanding, were given their due: again permitted to emerge with an art that concealed art, apparently ‘natural’, rather than underlined. Indeed, the weight of the first movement registered to an extent such as one rarely hears, the exposition repeat fundamental to the musical conception rather than a formalistic nod. There are arguments either way, of course; the question is what works in any particular case. The special character of the inner movements was keenly observed. Once again, Brahms’s Viennese predecessors came to mind, and more importantly to the heart’s perception. Mozart and Schubert, rather than the first movement’s Beethoven, were very much present: benevolent, inspiring ghosts. The finale, however, I could not quite come to terms with. It was fast, indeed faster than I can ever recall hearing. Crotchets per minute are neither here nor there, but Haitink, as in some of his recent Beethoven, seemed intent on driving too hard. I can understand the desire to rid Brahms of ‘autumnal’ clichés, just as much as those of ‘summer’, but this music does not lose its true excitement if it is given time to breathe. There was much to admire, and the playing of the COE continued to impress greatly, but it did not – to me at least – seem a reading quite in the spirit of what had gone before.

Capuçons/COE/Haitink - Brahms, 27 November 2013

Grote Zaal, Concertgebouw

Concerto for violin and cello in A minor, op.102

Symphony no.1 in C minor, op.68

Renaud Capuçon (violin)

Gautier Capuçon (cello)

Chamber Orchestra of Europe

Bernard Haitink (conductor)

 

Nothing anyone says will prepare a newcomer for the acoustic of the Concertgebouw. This was my first visit, and I hope it will be the first of many. (There will certainly be at least one more, a second Brahms concert.) I shall not try to describe the sound, suffice to say that it must be the warmest, most rounded I have heard, with the possible exception of the very different Musikverein. Such things come to naught without musical excellence, of course, but once again a visit abroad, or even out of London, makes one realise how unfortunate we are in terms of orchestral-size concert halls.

 

It was a chamber orchestra we heard on this occasion, not a small chamber orchestra, but one of what I should think of as Mozartian proportions, with a string section extending down from twelve first violins to four double basses. (Not, I hasten to add, that Mozart cannot sound wonderful with a larger orchestra!) Before hearing this concert, I should have been something of a sceptic concerning chamber-orchestral Brahms. Doubtless the warmth of the acoustic played its part, but so did the crack players of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. There was not a single occasion during the Double Concerto when I wished for a larger orchestra, much as I should have loved to hear the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra on home territory. (Next time, maybe!) I have heard wonderful things about the COE’s recent, quite intensive collaboration with Bernard Haitink, but again, one has to hear these things for oneself. Joined by the Capuçon brothers, there was here a sense of that celebrated line from Die Meistersinger, perhaps as close as Brahms and Wagner ever came: ‘Es klang so alt und war doch so neu!’ Haitink imparted the wisdom of an old Meister, of course, and yet there was nothing remotely stuffy, pedantic, or set in its ways, to his interpretation. The COE sounded just as invigorated as he did, lifting itself to something different from an orthodox symphony orchestra, but equally different, or perhaps more so, from the small-scale nature of what has come to be thought of as chamber-orchestral playing, the twin intimacy and intensity that seem to be taken as read from an Abbado-founded orchestra being equally present even many years on. And the violinist and cellist brought both youthful vitality and a true sense of old-world style. Truly, then, this appeared to offer the best of all possible worlds.

 

Gautier Capuçon’s opening phrase resounded with a depth that set the scene for the rest of the performance. This was actually the only occasion on which I heard a little intonational slip, but it mattered not a jot, Beckmessers will be alarmed to note. Naturally it was Gautier who made the greater impression at first, simply on account of Brahms’s writing, but the sweetness of Renaud’s violin tone was soon an equal wonder to savour; likewise his perfectly judged portamenti. Rubato and tempo variations, both in the first movement and later on, were never confused; Haitink knew what he was doing, never exaggerated, but let the music speak for itself, an illusion (Wahn) perhaps, but when a latter-day Sachs is conducting, all the better for it. The grand scale of that first movement made its point in a personal yet not idiosyncratic manner. It was not granitic; if anything, it seemed to have the mark of a master Wagnerian upon it. Haitink’s perhaps surprisingly Romantic view of Brahms was not that of, say, his great Amsterdam predecessor, Willem Mengelberg. It was marked rather by a freshness – many thanks here to the superlative COE woodwind – that took inspiration from Mendelssohn and Schumann, without reducing Brahms to the status, as it were, of a late early Romantic.

 

The slow movement was heard as if a song sung in a single breath. Again Schumann and Mendelssohn sprang to mind. All sorts of duets, trios, quartets, etc. were to be heard, as the soloists conversed with their orchestral counterparts. I could not help but think of Così fan tutte. Indeed, it was possible to imagine Fiordiligi and Dorabella playing games as they chose – what an impossible task! – between the blond player and his dark brother. The finale seemed ‘right’ in every respect. It had the character of a finale: perhaps an obvious point, yet it is hardly to be taken for granted. Not for the first time, we heard the shadow, productive rather than forbidding, of Beethoven – and not least in the combinations of harmony, rhythm, and colour, again especially with respect to the woodwind. This was musical, not artificial, excitement, every participant seeming to draw out the best from everyone else. A truly outstanding performance, the best I have ever heard of this work.  

 

Had it not been for that performance, I doubt that I should have had any qualms whatsoever about that of the First Symphony. Any reasonable person would not, and this was by any standards again a masterly reading. Of the four Brahms symphonies, this one took the longest for me to ‘get’: not in the sense of arrogantly assuming to understand it, but for me not simply to be bemused by it. Some people – more than you might expect – would claim that the fault lay with the composer; cue turning round Brahms’s notorious reference to ‘boa constrictors’ and the form of Bruckner’s symphonies. They would be wrong. It was doubtless partly a matter of my own immaturity, but also, I think, a matter of waiting for the right performance to come along, since this symphony suffers especially with respect to conductors who do not comprehend its tightly-knit organisation. (It stands at least as close as the Fourth to Schoenberg, indeed, if anything, closer.) Hearing within close succession Daniel Barenboim conduct the work with the Staatskapelle Berlin and then Furtwängler on record marked my eureka moment a good few years ago.

 

Haitink’s account with the COE was only the second I have heard that made sense of the work, the first having been Barenboim’s. That in itself ought to be commendation enough. And indeed it possessed many of the virtues of the concerto performance. Throughout there was a strong sense of line – strong enough, indeed, that I wondered what the problem could ever have been held to be with the work. The first movement’s introduction led as naturally as could be into the exposition proper; tension never sagged. Brahms’s two inner movements evoked both kinship and difference – and, most importantly of all, progression, as did the four movements as a whole. The woodwind section proved as verdant as previously. And if there were a few occasions when I felt a pang of regret that there were not more strings, this Mozartian complement worked wonders and never sounded in the slightest bit stretched, their tone in general as glowing as the acoustic – insofar as one could make such a distinction. The conductor’s refusal, or better disinclination, to linger in the Andante sostenuto was no sign of brusqueness, nor of unwillingness to yield; but it brought the music closer to a Schumannesque intermezzo than one often hears, a reading perhaps especially valid for a chamber orchestra. Schubert was heard to be just as much Brahms’s progenitor – that Harmoniemusik! – as Bruckner’s in the third movement. Haitink’s unwavering yet subtly flexible sense of line guided the twists and turns of the finale. ‘That’ theme was lovingly, faithfully, yet individually connected to Beethoven, and there was triumph in the final arrival.

 

And yet… I retained a lingering doubt, alongside wholehearted admiration for Haitink’s sureness of touch. Had it perhaps sounded a little too easy, too comprehensible? Barenboim, I seemed to remember, had exulted in the very difficulty of Brahms; his reading had stood closer to Schoenberg’s ‘Brahms the Progressive’. Certainly there had been more metaphysical striving, and a darker, more ‘German’ tone to his great orchestra. Rank ingratitude, of course; this was a noble, dignified, in many ways revelatory account. Yet one cannot have it all; Brahms’s symphonies are greater than any one interpretation will ever permit.  So maybe the ‘problem’, not really a problem at all but an opportunity, a provocation even, lay partly with Brahms after all.