Munich Opera Festival (2) - Pénélope, 21 July 2025

Prinzregententheater

Images: Bernd Uhlig
Pénélope (Victoria Karkacheva)

 

Pénélope – Victoria Karkacheva
Ulysse – Brandon Jovanovich
Euryclée – Rinat Shaham
Eumée – Thomas Mole
Cléone – Valeria Eickhoff
Mélantho – Seonwoo Lee
Alkandre – Martina Myskohild
Phylo – Ena Pongrac
Lydie – Eirin Rognerud
Eurynome – Elene Gvritishvili
Antinoüs – Loïc Félix
Eurymaque – Leigh Melrose
Léodés – Joel Williams
Ctésippe – Zachary Rioux
Pisandre – Dafydd Jones
Shepherd – Nicolas Bader
Ulysse double – Stefan Lorch
Pénélope double – Teresa Sperling
Archer – Daniela Maier

Director – Andrea Breth
Designs – Raimund Orfeo Voigt
Costumes – Ursula Renzenbrink
Lighting – Alexander Koppelmann
Dramaturgy – Lukas Leipfinger, Klaus Bertisch

Vocalensemble ‘LauschWerk’ (chorus director: Sonja Lachenmayr)
Bayerisches Staatsorchester
Susanna Mälkki (conductor)

 

Pénélope, Ulysse (Brandon Jovanovich and Stefan Lorch)

Fauré’s only opera Pénélope was premiered at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo in March 1913, moving to the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées only two months later. It has fared incommensurably less well with posterity than the Stravinsky ballet that had its premiere there later that month. The opera is no Rite of Spring, of course, yet what is? In an excellent new production for Munich directed by Andrea Breth and conducted by Susanna Mälkki, Pénélope emerged as an opera quite undeserving of its neglect, intrinsically and by comparison with more than a few ‘repertoire works’, especially from the previous century. What we heard should also have confounded some lazy preconceptions about the composer. 

Breth’s production is a typically serious piece of theatre, which grapples with the highly untheatrical nature of the work and, to my mind, largely succeeds. A fellow musicologist friend I met at the performance pointed to its place in a specifically French conception of drama dating back at least as far as Corneille and Racine, in which little happens onstage in terms of stage action, almost all unfolding through words, I am sure he is right. The classical unities are also certainly observed. I thought also, inevitably, of Pelléas et Mélisande, though the relationship between Fauré and Debussy was not an easy one. They certainly shared contexts and influences and neither cared for operatic display, to put it mildly, but ultimately this was probably more correspondence than anything else. 

In any case, Breth’s mixture of realism and ritual, the latter founded in doubles for characters, but also ways of acting (in more than one sense), proved compelling and fitting, removing any doubts that this might be an oratorio or something else masquerading in operatic guise. Characters processed, imitated, took their time, and just occasionally acted hurriedly—in keeping with the work yet not bound by it. Opening action during the Prélude presented an elderly man guiding a woman in wheelchair to view museum exhibits, stark yet broken. This Pénélope and Ulysse framed the action and in some sense presaged it, three suitors, ready for action, later removing their shirts and adopting the poses of those statues. There was, then, a circularity that came into conflict with yet also helped form the drama literary and staged. What we saw and heard played with time and involved characters and audience in reception of myth and opera alike. 

When revenge came, economic presentation unmistakeably evoking the rural hinterland of Ithaca, before closing in once again on the palace, it lacked nothing in brutality, suitors treated as replacement pieces of meat for those they would have served at the banquet. It was clear and direct, like the work itself, meaningfully adding to rather than merely doubling or indeed contradicting it. If the conclusion struggled to convince – two people in front of me talking through the closing bars did not help – then that is more a problem with the work. A hymn to Zeus is one way of rounding things off, I suppose, but something a little more ambiguous or indeed human might have worked better. That is not what we have, of course. One might sense Breth undercutting things with the frozen, tableau dimension to what we see at the close, or one might not. Perhaps that was the point. 

Susanna Mälkki’s direction of excellent orchestra, chorus, and cast was similarly sympathetic and comprehending, with work and staging alike. One sensed, rightly or wrongly, that musical and stage interpretation had developed in tandem. Where there was a light sense of Götterdämmerung’s Gibichung decay onstage, perhaps even a stylised Gallic return for Salome/Salomé, so was there in the music, Mälkki knowing what was and was not Wagnerian in Fauré’s method and soundworld, the latter more than one might expect, though far from all. Likewise with Debussy. Orchestral lines developed differently, of course, at times not unlike Fauré’s chamber music; vocal lines emerged woven like Pénelope’s shroud, again showing consciousness that, whilst there were unsurprisingly aspects in common with the composer’s songs, this was not a song cycle writ large but an opera.    

Victoria Karkacheva and Brandon Jovanovich made for a compelling central pair, musically and dramatically conceived in utmost sympathy with work and staging. There was a deep connection between the two expressed in words, music, and gesture, that did not shy away from darker aspects of fate and revenge, without being merely consumed by them. Rinat Shaham’s nurse Euryclée offered an exquisite, chalumeau-like voice of wisdom and recognition. The similarly faithful shepherd Eumée received compelling characterisation from Thomas Mole. A duly nasty yet individual set of suitors received what it deserved yet offered much vocal pleasure in the meantime. Loïc Félix’s ringing Antinoüs, Leigh Melrose’s typically compelling Eurymaque, and Joel Williams’s subtle Léodés especially noteworthy (to me). But there was no weak link in the cast. The evening’s success relied throughout on collaboration—acted as well as sung, for which Stefan Lorch and Teresa Sperling as doubles for Pénélope and Ulysse and Daniela Maier gymnastically stringing the latter’s bow must also be credited. 

Comparisons with Monteverdi’s Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria are near inevitable for the opera-goer, yet are not especially helpful. What would not pale slightly at least in its shadow? If only we lived in a world in which comparisons with Dallapiccola’s Ulisse were meaningful. Perhaps one day. In the meantime, this excellent staging and these equally excellent performances can well stand for themselves. They may just prove a milestone in this opera’s unlucky reception history.

Dubois/Raës - Massenet, Fauré, Dubois, Godard, and Saint-Saëns, 28 October 2024

Wigmore Hall

Massenet: Elégie; Nuit d’Espagne; Sonnet
Fauré: Aubade, op.6 no.1; Chant d’automne, op.5 no.1; Dans les ruines d’une Abbaye, op.2 no.1; Puisque j’ai mis ma lèvre; L’Absent, op.5 no.3; Tristesse d’Olympio
Théodore Dubois: Musiques sur l’eau
Benjamin Godard: Fleur d’exil, op.19 no.5
Camille Saint-Saëns: Mélodies persanes, op.26

Cyrille Dubois (tenor)

Tristan Raës (piano)

Tenor Cyrille Dubois and pianist Tristan Raës are to make Wigmore Hall history in a five-year series of the complete songs of Gabriel Fauré. Dubois will be the first artist to perform all of them at the hall; I presume, though do not know for certain, that Raës will be with him throughout. In this, the first concert which dovetailed neatly with 2024’s commemoration of the centenary of Fauré’s death, Dubois and Raës gave voice to ‘Young Fauré and his masters’, six of Fauré’s early songs heard with mélodies by Jules Massenet, Théodore Dubois, Benjamin Godard, and Camille Saint-Saëns. If there were a few, mostly by Dubois, I could happily live without hearing again, there were discoveries aplenty; it is hard and indeed would be foolish to begrudge outings for songs many of us will not have heard before, certainly in concert and quite likely at all. 

For me, the opening Massenet songs were quite a discovery. I have never been much of a fan, but that has been founded on the operas. These three songs from around 1870 offered a spur to reassessment. Whereas much of the operatic talk of Wagnerism has left me a little bemused, it was certainly present in the opening Elégie, from the harmonies of Raës’s striking piano introduction onwards. Their pairing, on Dubois’s entry, with Gallic elegance of vocal line made for a striking, even passionate mode of expression. ‘Nuit d’Espagne’ offered winning contrast and obstinate determination to prove the old saw, however fallacious, of the best ‘Spanish music’ having been written by Frenchmen. Affinity with Carmen was noteworthy; so too was the song’s composition having preceded that of Bizet’s opera. Enchantment of various kinds, eroticism without the Nietzschean decadence one might have expected, characterised Sonnet, which shared with its predecessor a frankly operatic climax chez Dubois. 

The Fauré songs initially inhabited stiller waters, yet already at the beginning of his œuvre, the closer one listened, the more varied the palette and the emotions, both within and between songs. Chant d’automne emerged as a splendidly Romantic response to Baudelaire, Dans les ruines d’une abbaye and, still more so, Puisque j’ai mis ma lèvre (as early as 1862) acting in not dissimilar fashion to Hugo. The passionate climax of another Hugo setting, L’Absent, was finely judged by singer and pianist alike, whilst the turbulence of the last in the set (also Hugo), Tristesse d’Olympio grew ‘naturally’, art concealing art, from the preceding verse and music. Few will need reminding of the difficulties attendant to French word endings in song; no one would have guessed so from Dubois’s seemingly effortless command of idiom. 

The tenor’s namesake – no relation – Théodore Dubois close the first half. I cannot say I really ‘got’ his (considerably later: 1904-10) cycle, Musiques sur l’eau, the musical material coming across as rather characterless. Despite committed performances, (Cyrille) Dubois here suffered from a persistent catch in his throat. If it were to happen anywhere, it was probably better here, and he soon recovered, maintaining line and style. Raës’s performances were at least the equal of his partner’s. I was a little confused regarding one song, ‘Promenade à l’étang’, whose text differed from that printed in the programme; checking afterwards, it would certainly seem to have been included correctly, so perhaps the wrong text was inadvertently included. No matter. 

There was no doubting the sincerity of responses, nor to Benjamin Godard’s songs, which followed the interval. One would hardly call them adventurous, but they seemed more comfortable in their skin than Dubois’s, and were again given with a fine command of idiom and, where appropriate, as in Fleur d’exil, delectable vocal hush. The turbulence of Amour fatal, piano scalic passages and all, built to tumultuous climax, Je respire où tu palpates falling somewhere in between. I shall admit to wishing at one point that I might hear Dubois’s Don José or Samson instead, but full marks for his keenness to explore little-known corners of the repertoire. 

Finally, we heard Saint-Saëns’s outrageously Orientalist Mélodies persanes from 1870. Problematic nature aside, they offered a welcome change not only in mood but in compositional ambition and, for the most part, achievement. A vigorous yet subtle account of ‘La Brise’ showed the way for what was to come, patient attention to detail paying off handsomely in painting a larger picture. Ringing top notes (‘La Solitaire’) and Orientalist melismata (‘Sabre en main’) rested firmly on the foundations of rock-solid piano rhythm. A haunted visit ‘Au cimetière’ prepared us, in contrast as much as complement, for the étude-like piano blizzard of ‘Tournoiement’. 

By way of a calling-card for what is to come, the musicians gave Fauré’s op.1 no.1 as an encore. Le Papillon et La Fleur received a performance both buoyant and seductive. A smallish yet enthusiastic audience certainly appreciated the endeavour as a whole and seemed keen to hear more. Dubois and Raës merit following in this journey. Watch, or rather listen, out for the new year’s next instalment, devoted to the theme of Fauré and Nature.

‘Après un rêve’ – Despax: Poulenc, Fauré, Ravel, and Saint-Saëns, 1 July 2023

Wigmore Hall

Poulenc: Les Soirées de Nazelles
Fauré, arr. Despax: Après un rêve, op.7 no.1
Ravel: Gaspard de la nuit
Saint-Saëns-Liszt, arr. Horowitz: Danse macabre, S 555

Emmanuel Despax (piano)

By way of a CD launch, Emmanuel Despax gave a wonderful Saturday lunchtime programme, as deeply committed as it was unfailingly stylish, of French music at the Wigmore Hall. First came Poulenc’s Les Soirées de Nazelles, the composer’s 1930s ‘portraits’ or, as he a little confusingly also called them, ‘variations’, initially improvised for friends assembled by his countryside piano, introduced by a ‘Préambule’ and cadenza. That ‘preamble’, essentially a prelude, opened in Prokofiev-like manner, soon melting slightly to reveal a softer, yet never merely soft, Poulenc centre, all despatched with characteristic élan. Momentum sprang from Despax’s repeated notes – ‘Extrêmement animé et décidé’ – though he always maintained the impression of allowing due time and space; it was never hurried. The darker cadenza, albeit illuminated by shafts of musical light, gave a fine sense of extemporisation. Then came that parade of characteristic ‘variations’, the first delightfully dry, its successor, a full-bodied ‘La cœur sur la main’ turning to the heart. The composer’s indications for each were respected to the letter and, more important, in their spirit, exquisitely voiced, as if fruits of marriage between music of the French clavecinistes and Romantic preludes or character pieces. Scampering certainty and momentary doubt of ‘Le contentement de soi’; mock pomposity of ‘La suite dans les idées’: time in sinuous near-suspension, or at least elongation, in ‘Le goût du malheur’: by way of such delights, we turned to a second cadenza whose open fanfare seemed at first to suggest the Organ Concerto, again more an occasion for metrical, fantasia-like freedom than overt display, and a lightly summative ‘Final’ with a closing touch of something more darkly enigmatic. 

Despax’s own transcription of Fauré’s ‘Après un rêve’, which gave its name to the recital as a whole, sang beautifully in two piano registers, with a proper sense of the original and its words, yet without being unduly limited by them. As ‘itself’, the piano wove its magic around, a little in the line of Liszt. A Lisztian spirit of the transcendental variety is and was present also in Gaspard de la nuit, ‘Ondine’ beginning to shimmer in Fauré’s shadows—or rather, its waters did. A fine balance between the pictorial and something beyond, allure and (rightful) distrust, coolness and heat, is Ravel’s own, but here it was Despax’s too, all painted with the most atmospheric precision. The measured, inexorable tread of ‘Le gibet’ evoked the subjectivity of solitude in the midday sun. Then the flickering malevolence of ‘Scarbo’ burst forth, punctured yet never vanquished by pregnant silences. Virtuosity here is a sine qua non, yet was only the starting point for musical performance. 

Liszt’s transcription of Saint-Saëns’s Danse macabre, further embellished in 1942 by Vladimir Horowitz, emerged in context in duly diabolical fashion, and very much in nineteenth-century voice. Insistent and fantastic, and both as vivid and as virtuosic as Gaspard, it spoke with a freedom that suggested paraphrase yet was not: ideal for such repertoire. Debussy's ‘Clair de lune’ made for a magical encore postlude. This will clearly be a recording to savour.

Kolesnikov - 'In Memory of Marcel Proust': Schubert, Louis Couperin, Hahn, Fauré, and Franck, 3 February 2022

Wigmore Hall

Schubert: Piano Sonata in G major, D 894: 1st movt
Louis Couperin: Unmeasured Prelude in G minor
Reynaldo Hahn: Le rossignol érpedu: ‘Les deux écharpes’
Schubert: Atzenbrugger Tanz in A major, D 365/30
Hahn: Premières valses: ‘Ninette’, ‘Valse noble’
Schubert: Waltz in B minor, D 145/6
Hahn: Premières valses: ‘La Feuille’
Schubert: Atzenbrugger Tanz in A major, D 365/30
Hahn: Le rossignol érpedu:’Narghilé’
Fauré: Nocturne no.12 in E minor, op.107
Louis Couperin: Sarabande in A minor
Franck: Prélude, choral et fugue
Hahn: Le rossignol érpedu: ‘Ouranos’
Schubert: Piano Sonata in G major, D 894: 2nd, 3rd, and 4th movts

Pavel Kolesnikov (piano)


Pavel Kolesnikov has never shied away from imaginative programming, connecting small pieces and movements from larger works so as to provoke fascinating encounters and transitions. In this case, he wished explicitly to pay tribute to Marcel Proust in his centenary year, intriguingly playing with conceptions of musical time—and what could be more apt for this of all novelists? I confess to having felt a little scepticism toward Kolesnikov’s claim, cited in the programme note, that Schubert and Proust would ‘merge miraculously’ in an ‘art of stretching time and communicating poignant intensity through what is intimate and even miniscule,’ but was quite won over by what I heard in practice. 

Schubert’s G major Sonata, D 894, opened and closed the recital, indeed stretching time in ways quite unexpected. The first movement, heard at the opening, was spacious and highly, subtly flexible. In some ways, it felt slow, in others not at all; I honestly have no idea how long it took, nor did I feel any desire to find out. It spoke with wounded nobility, without ever tending to the lachrymose or anything otherwise sentimental. It had all manner of colours, whilst only rarely raising its voice. Kolesnikov may have looked as if he were lost in reverie, but this was throughout a directed as well as highly imaginative performance. And then, Schubert transformed into Couperin, Louis Couperin that is, in one of his Unmeasured Preludes, G major transformed into its tonic minor—sort of. I say ‘sort of’ because the use of tonality is as different as other aspects of the writing. One might have spoken of improvisatory ‘style’, but in reality, it was more a matter of creating music out of what had been left, the pianist revelling in apparent weirdness, in clashes of melody and harmony. Whose music, whose memory, is it anyway?

The rest of the first half sequence was given not only to Schubert and Louis Couperin, but also to Reynaldo Hahn (Proust’s lover) and Gabriel Fauré (greatly admired by Hahn and Proust). Hahn’s ‘Les deux écharpes’ emerged from within that Unmeasured Prelude, or so it sounded. Kolesnikov captured flow, chiaroscuro, glitter, and fleetingly something darker below. A Schubert dance, in many ways similar to a waltz—think of Mozart’s various ‘German dances’—and an actual Schubert waltz, more wistful and refined, danced on and off stage. New moods, new vignettes, new boundaries to be blurred—until the subtleties of a Fauré Nocturne were heard, not slowly, yet supremely un-rushed. If I find Hahn’s music charming whilst it lasts, yet always struggle to remember a note of it thereafter, that says its own thing about time, or me, or both. A closing Louis Couperin Sarabande evinced quiet dignity, speaking of a past (real or imagined) from a similar past and present. 

César Franck’s Prélude, choral et fugue opened the second half, in more improvisatory fashion, yet convincingly so, than one might have expected. Whether that were on account of the specific context, or because that is how Kolesnikov hears it anyway, is rather beside the point; it made sense here, interior subjectivity the thing. An appealing, ‘after-dinner’ pedal haze sustained harmonies without loss to purpose. Not that the machine à modulation (Debussy) failed to make that aspect of his presence felt, especially in a ‘Choral’ as Romantic as a ‘Fugue’ that favoured harmony over counterpoint. Hahn offered a wandering interlude, less still than evoking stillness.

And then, back to Schubert. It felt like a shift to another plane, as if a flashback were over (oddly, given much of the chronology, yet it did not feel odd). The ‘Andante’ received a lovely, unsentimental reading even before its sterner turn. The Minuet had a fine spring in its step, more forthright than its sister dances earlier on, enabling its trio to take us once more to a dream-world, albeit a different one. The finale united and set against one another those twin tendencies. Taking its time, it and we enjoyed both the route and diversions from it. It sounded very much like the finale to an evening, not only to a sonata, though Debussy’s ‘La cathédrale engloutie’ made for a strikingly Parsifal-ian encore, reminding us of two further Proustian enthusiasms.

Degout/Lepper - Fauré, Brahms, and Schumann, 5 June 2018

Wigmore Hall

Fauré: Aurore, op.39 no.1; Poème d’un jour, op.2; Automne, op.18 no.3; Brahms: O kühler Wald, op.72 no.3; Die Mainacht, op.43 no.2; Auf dem Kirchhofe, op.105 no.4; Feldeinsamkeit, op.86 no.2; Alte Liebe, op.72 no.1; Nicht mehr zu dir zu gehen, op.32 no.2; Willst du, dass ich geh? op.71 no.4; Schumann: Kerner Lieder, op.35

Stéphane Degout (baritone)

Simon Lepper (piano)

Another wonderful Wigmore song recital: this time from Stéphane Degout – recently shining in George Benjamin’s new operatic masterpiece, Lessons in Love and Violence – and Simon Lepper. We began with Fauré, whose songs alas often leave me cold. (I have little doubt the fault lies with me.) Such was not the case here, however. Perhaps I have at long last found the key to the door: I do hope so. That Degout was fully in command of an often elusive – and not only to non-Francophone artists – idiom might have been expected; that I was put in mind of the mastery, rather than any specifics, of a Gérard Souzay had me realise from the off that these would be no ordinary performances. Lepper, in the opening Aurore, captured just the right sort of ‘floating’ tone to the piano part too, the composer’s harmonic subtleties suspended. Surpassing elegance here and in the following Poème d’un jour did not preclude death (of the stars) at the close but rather proved its agent. Turbulence and torment naturally marked Toujours – the sequence was splendidly programmed – albeit within a similar yet far from identical framework. Lepper was permitted in its final stanza a hint at Lisztian pianism, which he gratefully took – and communicated. Fauré sometimes puts me in mind of Elgar; for me, it was an almost Elgarian dignity that characterised the prelude to Adieu, even though chronologically that was the wrong way around. Automne offered a nice link to Brahms, the music darkening, the crucial role for the piano bass line brought out without exaggeration. A perfect sadness in its final line – Où jadis sourit ma jeunesse! – sounded not un-Wagnerian. Is it fanciful to hope for an Amfortas some day…?

There is certainly no problem with Degout’s German: clean and meaningful as his musical line. The dark simplicity of Brahms’s O kühler Wald mirrored that forest itself. Darker shadows (‘dunklere Schatten’) were sought and found in Die Mainacht, providing relief for its premonition of the soprano solo movement in Ein deutsches Requiem. Brief, unmistakeably late, inner tumult characterised Auf dem Kirchhofe, even before its chorale reference: ‘O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden’. It is a different, yet not entirely unrelated Einsamkeit – and certainly was in performance – that we heard in Feldeinsamkeit. As ever, Degout’s reserves of breath seemed endless. Alte Liebe seemed almost to reminisce about Schubert, retaining consciousness that reminiscence was now all that was possible: old love indeed. Darker, still more Romantic, Nicht mehr zu dir zu gehen seemed almost – whether I am sentimentalising or not – to speak of Brahms’s passion for Clara Schumann. And it was a Brahmsian echo of Schubert’s Winterreise crow that seemed to hover over Willst du, dass ich geh? It may have ended in the major mode, but it was hardly affirmative. Brahms’s ‘lateness’ spoke for itself, here and elsewhere; it neither needed nor received underlining.

Schumann (Robert, that is) had the second half: his Kerner Lieder, op.35. It was a stormy night indeed with which the set opened, thus picking up tendencies from both Fauré and Brahms, yet also turned us towards new paths – or Neue Bahnen, as someone, I believe, once put it. The ambiguity of its close seemed almost to open a new door for us; there was certainly no reason not to follow its hint. An illumined quality to the following ‘Stirb, Lieb’ und Freud’!’ proved spellbinding, never quite permitting one to put a finger on the source of that light: artistry indeed.  Muffled bells sounded not only on the line in question (‘Alsbald der Glocken dumpfer Klang’), but subliminally throughout, prefiguring in context the ambiguous swagger of ‘Wanderlied’. Schumannesque sadness was captured to a tee in ‘Erstes Grün’, nowhere more so than in Lepper’s piano rubato, although not only there. A forest path took on metaphysical meaning too in ‘Sehnsucht nach der Waldgesang’, whilst ‘Auf das trinkglas eines verstorbenes Freundes’ seemed already to revisit past joys: the song of travel heard, as it were, through the aural lens of ‘Erstes Grün’, prior to the magical moonlight of the final stanza. It seemed as if the question of ‘Frage’ was posed without ever having arisen. Be that as it may, ‘Stille Tränen’ quite rightly offered the emotional climax. Relief and repose of a sort, in ‘Wer machte dich so krank’, again hinted at a hushed awe not so distant from Parsifal, an impression of holy ground furthered in ‘Alte Laute’. If only an angel might have woken the narrator (‘Und aus dem Traum, dem bangen, weckt mich ein Engel nur’), what if that angel were actually singing? Such perhaps was the thought that made the appreciative audience so reluctant to break rapt silence at its close.

Brahms’s Lerchengesang, op.70 no.2, seemed very much to come ‘after’ Schumann’s set. Degout and Lepper offered it as an encore that was beautiful in the very best sense: rare, painful, the opening of a new path to something else, something deeper.

Samling 20th Anniversary Concert, 8 November 2016

Wigmore Hall

Britten – A Charm of Lullabies, op.41: ‘A Cradle Song’; ‘The Nurse’s Song’

Warlock – My Sweet Little Darling
Schubert – Wiegenlied, D 498
Ives – The Children’s Hour
Schumann – Lieder-Album für die Jugend, op.79: ‘Marienwürmchen’
Poulenc – La Courte Paille; nos.4-7
Schubert – Licht und Liebe, D 352
Liszt – Tre sonetti di Petrarca, S 270/1: Sonnets nos 104, 47
Quilter – Five Shakespeare Songs (set 2): ‘It was a lover and his lass’
Britten – The Foggy, Foggy Dew; Soldier, won’t you marry me?
Schubert – Schwanengesang, D 957: ‘Kriegers Ahnung’
Schumann – Der Soldat, op.40 no.3
Wolf – Der Soldat I and II
Fauré – Les Berceaux, op.23 no.1
Poulenc – Bleuet
Barber – I hear an army, op.10 no.3
Liza Lehmann – Nonsense Songs from ‘Alice in Wonderland’: ‘Fury said to a Mouse’
Bolcom – Twelve Cabaret Songs: ‘Amor’
Brahms – O wüsst ich doch den Weg zurück, op.63 no.8; Alte Liebe, op.72 no.1
Barber – The Secrets of the Old, op.13 no.2
Copland – Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson: ‘Going to Heaven!’
Schubert – Nachstück, D 672; Der Tages Weihe, D 763

 

Kiandra Howarth (soprano)

Kathryn Rudge (mezzo-soprano)

David Butt Philip (tenor)

Benjamin Appl (baritone)

Andrew Foster-Williams (baritone)

James Baillieu (piano)

Ian Tindale (piano)

Malcolm Martineau (piano)

James Garnon (actor)

The Samling Artist Programme has nurtured the careers of many a young artist, both singers and pianists (or, if you will, accompanists), gathering them together (apparently, gathering, collective, even assembly are possible translations of the Norse ‘Samling’) with an array of senior artists. Part of that programme is an annual showcase at the Wigmore Hall. For its twentieth anniversary, Samling Artists from 2000 (Andrew Foster-Williams) to 2016 (Kiandra Howarth) took the stage, joined by Malcolm Martineau (one of those senior artists or ‘Leaders’) and the actor, James Garnon. Thomas Allen, Samling’s Patron was to have joined the assembled company, but flu put paid to that, and thus to an ensemble from Sullivan’s Trial by Jury. I cannot comment on every single song, but hope to give a flavour of what was on offer in this particular showcase.

The programme traced the ‘seven ages of man’, prefaced by Garnon’s engaging reading from As you like it’s ‘strange eventful history’. Two songs from Britten’s A Charm of Lullabies (Kathryn Rudge and James Baillieu) opened ‘Infancy’, Baillieu’s piano making much of the harmonic affinity of the Blake ‘Cradle Song’ with the world of The Rape of Lucretia, Rudge captivating in the a cappella opening of ‘The Nurse’s Song’. Her mezzo-soprano voice here and elsewhere proved both rich and variegated of tone. The post-Mozartian simplicity of Schubert’s Wiegenlied was well captured by Kiandra Howarth and Malcolm Martineau, paving the way for ‘Childhood’. Benjamin Appl seemed not to come truly into his own until later in the recital. Although Ives’s The Children’s Hour was beautifully sung, he missed a certain lightness of touch. Four songs from Poulenc’s La Courte paille were more successful. They were shared between Howarth and Rudge, the former seemingly relishing a more absurdist side, the latter more seductive.

 

When we reached the stage of ‘The Lover’, David Butt Philip joined Howarth and Ian Tindale for Schubert’s Licht und Liebe. Tindale proved equally alert rhythmically and harmonically. The ardent quality of Butt Philip’s singing carried into an unapologetically Italianate rendition of Liszt’s first Petrarch Sonnet. Vocal passion was matched in Baillieu’s piano playing of that and the second, for which Howarth returned, to give a similarly dramatic performance. I cannot claim to care much for the music of Roger Quilter, but Rudge and Appl gave a charming performance.

 

A welcome change of mood – Britten folksongs are really not for me – came after the interval with ‘The Soldier’. Following a reading from Henry IV, Part I, Andrew Foster-Williams was heard for the first time, with Baillieu, in Kriegers Ahnung. A greater depth was immediately announced, carried into an especially commanding performance (now with Tindale) of Schumann’s Der Soldat, sadness and anger in compelling balance. Appl seemed much more at home in two soldier songs from Wolf’s Eichendorff-Lieder, using the words to excellent effect. Another highlight, not just of this section, but of the concert as a whole, came with the Rudge-Martineau performance of Fauré’s Les Berceaux, its sadness deeply felt. Honesty and integrity of feeling were equally apparent in Butt Philip’s Poulenc Bieuet. Stylish, never mawkish, he impressed just as much as he had in the very different music of Liszt. Much the same might be said of Foster-Williams, in Samuel Barber’s Joyce setting, I hear an army.

 

‘The Justice’ was missing the aforementioned Sullivan number, so was confined to a charmingly despatched Liza Lehmann song (Butt Philip/Tindale) and a cabaret song by William Bolcom: not my thing, I am afraid, although Howarth was very much in her element. Lugubrious Teutonophile that I am, I responded more warmly to ‘Old Age’ and Brahms. Foster-Williams and Bailliue gave an unexaggerated, deceptively straightforward performance of O wüßt ich doch den Weg zurück, Rudge and Martineau displaying depth to match that of the Fauré song in Alte Liebe. Rudge’s Barber song, The Secrets of the Old, captured the idiom perfectly: an equally fine performance, again well supported by Martineau. Much the same might be said of Howarth and Tindale’s sincere, aware Going to Heaven!  

 

Our revels now were ended, as the final Shakespeare reading reminded us. ‘Oblivion/Second Infancy’ opened with a fine performance of Schubert’s Nachtstück from Appl and Martineau. With beautiful vocal shading, Appl offered ample consolation for the misery of dotage. A heartfelt consecration of the day (Des Tages Weihes) concluded proceedings, with a well-matched performance form Howarth, Rudge, Butt Philip, Foster-Williams, and Baillieu. It seemed fitting to leave to the echoing strains of a Schubertiade.

Liebeck/Apekisheva - Messiaen, Prokofiev, Fauré, and Stravinsky, 17 May 2015

Wigmore Hall

Messiaen – Thème et Variations

Prokofiev – Violin Sonata no.1 in F minor, op.80

Fauré – Violin Sonata no.1 in A major, op.13

Stravinsky – Divertimento

Jack Liebeck (violin)

Katya Apekisheva (piano)

 

There was much to enjoy in this violin and piano recital, although Jack Liebeck took a while properly to get into his stride, his intonation and depth of tone proving somewhat variable earlier on, especially during Messiaen’s early Thème et Variations. The Theme suffered most in that respect, although there was nothing to fault in Katya Apekisheva’s despatch of the piano part. In the first variation, she offered a splendidly ‘hammerless’, post-Debussyan account, bells verily tolling and resounding. Later spikiness seemed to presage aspects of the Prokofiev sonata that would follow. The fourth variation seemed to point to Messiaen’s often overlooked Franckian inheritance in a properly full-blooded performance from both players. Indeed, the piano part seemed closer than usual to Messiaen’s organ writing. The final variation offered a taste of quintessentially Messiaenic ecstasy, notwithstanding an unfortunate slip by Liebeck.

Prokofiev’s First Violin Sonata proved more consistent. The first movement revealed what we might think of as the ‘emerging chaconne’ quality of the opening theme and its consequences. This was a dark, rich-toned, yet variegated performance, the piano part astutely layered. The ghostly closing material disconcerted: the piano rock-solid, the violin casting proper doubt upon alleged certainty. Liebeck’s intonation again wavered during the second movement, but not really to the detriment of its character. Apekisheva’s performance was splendidly big-boned. Her opening una corda flurries in the third movement seemed to look back again to Debussy, as if the snow really were dancing. The violin melody that emerged above was nobly and sweetly sung. There was a winning sense of contrapuntal battle and of fun between the instruments in the final movement, before the sombre close paralleled that to the first movement. Darkness of mood and quality of musical invention worked in tandem.

Fauré’s First Violin Sonata opened the second half. From the opening of the first movement onwards, it sounded like what it is: a freer, subtler, far less obvious, precursor to the better-known Violin Sonata of César Franck (a wildly overrated work). For me, this early work is one of Fauré’s most attractive, but then I have yet to ‘get’ several of his later works, which many people whose judgement I greatly respect consider his finest. Liebeck and Apekisheva achieved an excellent balance between ‘Romantic’ ardour and hints of something cooler, subtler to come. Lightness of touch did not deny emotional weight. Motivic unity was clear without any need for (Franckian) underlining. The scherzo was especially pleasing, a light-footed impression of Gallic homage to Mendelssohn. Various tendencies were united in the finale, which yet remained true to its particular character.

Stravinsky’s Divertimento completed the programme, again in an excellent performance. The strangeness of the composer’s writing for violin registered, albeit without undue exaggeration. Here, of course, it is mixed with the strangeness of his response to Tchaikovsky. Rhythmic and melodic ghosts of The Soldier’s Tale danced in the Danses suisses, Stravinsky’s changes of mood and character very well handled. The ‘Russianness’ of the Scherzo seemed to evoke Petrushka’s Shrovetide Fair’; indeed, ballet was, quite rightly, the order of the day thereafter. Liebeck and Apekisheva showed themselves quite at home with the composer’s technical and musical demands alike.

 

Salzburg Festival (4) - Capuçons and friends: Fauré, Shostakovich, Birtwistle, and Brahms, 22 August 2013

Grosser Saal, Mozarteum

Fauré – Piano Quartet no.2 in G minor, op.45

Shostakovich – Piano Trio no.2 in E minor, op.67
Birtwistle – Bourdon, for violin and viola
Brahms – Piano Quartet no.1 in G minor, op.25

Renaud Capuçon (violin)

Gérard Caussé (viola)

Gautier Capuçon (cello)

Nicholas Angelich (piano)

 

 

Your reviewer’s spirits were not lifted by checking the Festival website just before leaving for this concert. Birtwistle’s Trio, the principal attraction of the programme, still present in the morning, had been replaced by Shostakovich’s second piano trio. A programme insert informed us that the change had been necessitated by one of the musicians – it did not say which – having fallen ill during the rehearsal period. Such things happen, but given that the programming of works by Birtwistle throughout the festival had been intended to complement Gawain, it was still a great disappointment, heightened by the identity of the interloper. What had already looked an odd collection of pieces looked still odder.

 

With respect to Fauré, I continue to try – from time to time. His second piano quartet is pleasant enough, but I still cannot hear what some others apparently do in this music. The players opened the first movement with turbulence and instrumental richness not so very far removed from Brahms, as if attempting – creditably – already to forge a link with the final piece on the programme. There was some spellbinding pianissimo playing The scherzo proved mercurial, yet did not lack backbone. Gérard Caussé’s noble viola solo launched the slow movement, the obliqueness of whose harmonies proved not without interest, though it remained somewhat placid in character. (Doubtless devotees will point to troubled waters beneath the surface; I wish I could hear them.) The finale benefited from ardent and cultivated playing, with at least a slight sense of a legacy to composers such as Debussy and Ravel, though not without a sense either of high Romanticism. If the conclusion appeared to come out of nowhere, then that is a matter of the piece rather than the performance.

 

Fauré’s quartet, if hardly a masterpiece, is, however, a far superior work to Shostakovich’s typically obvious second piano trio, which nevertheless received an excellent performance. Gautier Capuçon navigated the first movement’s opening harmonics with precision and evident identification. The all too predictable imitative passages that followed were equally finely despatched, likewise the transition to Moderato and the balance between players. Doubtless this was just the right note of hysteria; but once one has heard two or three pieces by Shostakovich, one knows his tricks all too well. The second movement was fast and furious, the excess of fury more than the threadbare material really deserves, yet making an insistent dramatic point out of its repetitions. Again, there could be no faulting the intensity of response in the slow movement, nor the shaping of it progress. There was excellent advocacy for the typical, all-too-typical dance of ghostly dolls in the opening to the finale, though it was difficult not to find the score itself several vulgarisations of Mahler too far. The all-purpose hysteria pervading so much of the rest of the movement has one wishing it over before it had begun, but the players clearly gave it their all. Is there, though, with the possible exception of Verdi, any more grotesquely overrated composer?

 

Having lost Birtwistle’s piano trio, the Bourdon for violin and viola seemed a little lost at the beginning of the second half. It was good, nevertheless, to hear it, a miniature exploration of the instruments’ characters, paying especial attention to their open strings, albeit with scordatura tuning: both violin and viola tune their lowest string down a semitone and the second lowest up a semitone. The music begins, almost as if tuning up, the prevalence of open strings perhaps inevitably putting one in mind of Berg’s Violin Concerto. There is already, though, a typical sense of temporal refraction, with (relative) violence soon interposed. More than once I heard an affinity not only with the composer’s recent Violin Concerto, but also with the new Classicism characteristic to a certain extent of that work. Soon, one felt quite hypnotised by the almost lullaby-like rocking; all too soon, it was over.

 

It was interesting to note immediately in the first movement of Brahms’s G minor quartet how, in an age of homogeneity, how recognisably ‘Gallic’, in a quite traditional sense, the string tone sounded. It is often difficult, if not impossible, to say what one means by that; yet, one knows it when one hears it. Brahms’s expansiveness was relished, even if the structure were not always quite so clearly determining as it might have been. Metrical complexities, however, were vividly communicated. The second movement offered quiet insistence, the complexities of its central section sung rather than grimacing. But were the outer sections just a little well-mannered? Sometimes the music sounded more like Fauré than Fauré had. Prior tonal richness came to the rescue in the third movement, which received a splendidly songful yet passionate account, which had to be restarted when Renaud Capuçon broke a string. The finale was taken at quite a lick, without sounding harried. ‘Hungarian’ excitement, however, tended to be conveyed at the price of stopping and starting a little too much. Brahms is deeper than this, though such a performance is preferable to straining for a profundity that would only sound appliqué. Nicholas Angelich occasionally glossed – indeed, pedalled – over some piano detail.

Prohaska/Schneider - Song of the Sirens, 4 March 2012

Wigmore Hall

Debussy – La Mer est plus belle
Haydn – The Mermaid’s Song, Hob.XXVIa/25
Lawes – Slide soft, you silver floods
Schubert – Der Fischer, D 225
Am See, D 746

Szymanowski – Songs of a Fairy-Tale Princess, op.31: ‘Song of the Waves’ and ‘Dance’

Mahler – Phantasie aus Don Juan
Wolf – Nixe Binsefuss
Schumann – Die Meerfee, op.125 no.1
Mendelssohn – Schilflied, op.71 no.4
Schubert – Des Fischers Liebesglück, D 933
Fauré – La Fleur qui va sur l’eau, op.85 no.2
Honegger – Trois Chansons de la Petite Sirènes, H 63 : ‘Chanson des Sirènes’ and ‘Berceuses de la sirène’
Dowland – Sorrow, stay, lend true repentant tears
Dvořák – Rusalka: Song to the Moon


Wigmore Hall debuts do not come much more impressive than this: a beautifully programmed ‘Song of the Sirens’ from Anna Prohaska, splendidly partnered by her regular pianist, Eric Schneider, in which the soprano’s heavy cold could happily be written off. (One really would never have known.) Not only were we treated to a stunning variety of works, whether considered in terms of language, style, or chronology, that variety proved to be the flip side of the coin to as impeccably selected and intelligently ordered a survey of the siren in song as could be imagined. Fortunately, one did not have to imagine, for a mere hour in the stalls took us from Debussy to Dvořák via Haydn, Schubert, Szymanowski, Honegger, Dowland, and many others.

It was Schneider who announced himself first in Debussy’s 1891 Verlaine setting, La Mer reste plus belle. His announcement was vigorous rather than pastel, much to the sea’s – and to Debussy’s – benefit. The same could be said of Prohaska’s voice, richer in timbre than one might expect from a high soprano: again much to the benefit of the music, and with excellent French (often, alas, a problem with singers). ‘Un soufflé ami hante la vague, et nous chante: “Vous sans espérance, mourez sans souffrance!"’ The first but far from last of our siren calls proved ravishingly sensuous. ‘Plus belle que tous, meilleure que nous!’ Who could resist? Haydn’s Mermaid Song was playful, yet seductive in its own way. The change of language – this is one of the composer’s English canzonettas for Anne Hunter, still far too little known – posed no more problem than any subsequent shift. Echoes of earlier eighteenth-century English style – Handel and Arne, perhaps – were certainly present, providing a winning link to the earlier, more serious English writing of Henry Lawes, in his lute song, Slide soft, you silver floods. The performance from both artists was not only stylish, but more importantly, highly alert to the composer’s harmonic shifts and their implications. It is perhaps inevitable that with hindsight one would think of Purcell. Two Schubert songs followed. The insouciance of Der Fischer nicely set up the dissolution of any easy opposition between ‘reality’ and ‘unreality’. Who, after all, is a siren? And for whom is she whatever we might think she is? Goethe’s voice, moreover, shone through, the sheer quality of his verse relished in its rendition. Am See conveyed a sense of the metaphysical without any need for portentous exaggeration; it was all the more powerful for that.

The ‘Song of the Waves’ (‘Pieśń o fali’) and ‘Dance’ (‘Taniec’) from Szymanowski’s Songs of a Fairy-Tale Princess were especially welcome, both for their inclusion – what wonderful songs these are, and how rarely we hear him – and for the manner of their performance, imperceptible union of eroticism and exoticism combining in a properly Szymanowskian magic carpet, harking back to the Debussy of the first song, to be sure, but the composer’s personal voice unmistakeably present. We stood close to the world of King Roger, and rightly so. Prohaska presented a combination of Carmen, Zerbinetta, and Stravinsky’s Nightingale, in ‘Dance’, and above all, seemed both to experience and to enjoy both music and text. Schneider navigated the difficult piano part with ease, teasing out the inviting ambiguities of Szymanowski’s harmonies. Already a noted Zerlina (Salzburg and La Scala, the latter under Daniel Barenboim), Prohaska then turned to a very different Don Juan fantasy, that of Mahler – although, of course, Da Ponte’s predecessor, Tirso de Molina is the writer. It is a tribute to both artists, as well of course as to Mahler himself, that the composer’s own voice, even in a song from the early 1880s, should sing out so clearly. His bitter irony is present even here, emerging from the magical world of Das klagende Lied. Haunting indeed, not least in terms of Schneider’s voicing of Mahler’s harmonic language. Wolf’s Nixe Binsefuss was properly sprite-like, capricious and not without menace, leading into a rare opportunity to hear one of Schumann’s late songs, Die Meerfee, the performance at one with the composer’s deceptive ‘simplicity’. Mendelssohn’s Schilflied, a setting of Nikolaus Lenau, not only benefited from a sense of the metaphysical, reminding us of the earlier Schubert Am See; it also showed that Prohaska, even when indisposed, could sustain a long line, musical as well as verbal virtues to the fore.

The last of the three Schubert songs featured was Des Fischers Liebesglück. Prohaska and Schneider rightly took their time, imparting a dolorous sense of longing that long haunted the imagination. Schneider’s voicing of apparent simplicity enabled detail, both in his and the vocal part, truly to stand in relief. Again, one wondered, what is reality? Should we even care, when we might more profitably, or at least pleasurably, be ensnared? Fauré’s La Fleur qui va sur l’eau showed a more tempestuous side to the composer than one often hears, both artists displaying a fine sense of dramatic narrative and metaphor. It was a delight thereafter to sample two – alas, only two – of Honegger’s 1926 Trois Chansons de la Petite Sirène, ‘Chanson des Sirènes’ perfectly placed in the programme to have one relish its relative harmonic astringency. It brought in its wake a real sense of dissolution in the waves and ultimately of the siren’s unanswerable call. ‘Berceuse de la sirène’ thereafter allowed one to luxuriate in its dangerous lullaby. Dowland’s Sorrow, stay, lend true repentant tears not only reminded one of Prohaska’s roots in early music, but crucially distilled the essence of one of our most extraordinary song-writers: sorrow, despair, and of course, melancholy. The falling ‘down’ and ‘down’ truly tugged at the heart-strings. So, in its different way, did the operatic climax, the ‘Song of the Moon’ from Rusalka, at present receiving its first staging at Covent Garden. (Prohaska sang in that production’s first outing, at the Salzburg Festival in 2008.) Once again, musical and dramatic gifts were united, in a reading poignant to a degree, a fitting finale to a fine recital, rounded off with a delightfully ambiguous encore of Wolf’s Erstes Liebeslied eines Mädchens.


See also the review on Classical Iconoclast.

Hvorostovsky/Ilja - Fauré, Taneyev, Liszt, and Tchaikovsky, 21 October 2011

Barbican Hall

Fauré – Automne, op.18 no.3
Sylvie, op.6 no.3
Après un rêve, op.7 no.1
Fleur jetée, op.39 no.2
Taneyev – All are sleeping, op.17 no.10
Menuet, op.26 no.9
Not the wind, blowing from the heights, op.17 no.5
The winter road, op.32 no.4
Stalactites, op.26 no.6
The restless heart is beating, op.17 no.9
Liszt – Oh! quand je dors, S.282
Sonetti del Petrarca, S.270/1 and 3
Tchaikovsky – Six Romances, op.73

Dmitri Hvorostovsky (baritone)
Ivari Ilja (piano)


This was in some ways rather a strange ‘event’. It is not entirely unheard of for a singer to be the main attraction in a song recital, but I have never seen it illustrated to the extent that the singer was allotted his own ‘solo’ bow whilst his poor companion stayed offstage. That was clearly what Dmitri Hvorostovsky’s fans wanted, however, for they reserved their greatest applause for that moment – even more than when they ruined the conclusion of Liszt’s first Petrarch Sonnet by pre-emptively applauding so as to obliterate the final piano chords. An equal annoyance was the insistence upon applauding after every song, worst of all during the performance of Tchaikovsky’s Six Romances, op.73. But there was clearly no reflection from such listeners; they simply wanted to applaud and then to hear the next number. Hvorostovsky did not of course invite such behaviour directly; nor, however, did he entirely discourage it. Granting encores, he veered dangerously close to the manner of a cruise-line crooner. Moreover, his general bearing was often more that of a singer delivering a recital of arias rather than of song. His figure-hugging suit and matinée idol looks doubtless contributed to the hysteria: he certainly has an excellent line in smouldering, impassive stance .

Much of that is a great pity, for Hvorostovsky is a fine singer, who deserves to be heard as such. Admittedly, the opening Fauré group was odd. One can certainly respect Hvorostovsky's journey outside the comfort zone: this is someone who could undoubtedly satisfy, even inspire, audiences if he never strayed from Russian song. By the same token, however, one cannot ignore the weirdness of idiom. This was, perhaps unsurprisingly, very Russian-inflected, or rather Russian-accented, Fauré, not just in terms of pronunciation, though there were some very odd vowel sounds indeed, but also in terms of style and general tone. Pianist, Ivari Ilja to a certain extent followed suit. Indeed, I should not have been surprised to hear that the opening Automne had been written by Tchaikovsky. Sylvie was lighter, both in vocal and pianistic terms; Ilja handled Fauré’s modulations particularly well. Yet it was unclear that the words meant anything very much in performance, an impression underlined by Hvorostovsky’s broad grin at the end, when the words read – one could not necessarily hear them – ‘Tout pour mon cœur n’est que douleur!’ Après un rêve was more operatic than one might expect, but could take it (just about), and there was a splendid sense of anger to the closing Fleur jetée, though some words were again simply incomprehensible. The piano part was despatched in grandly Romantic fashion: impressive, if not quite what Fauré might have expected, even in this, somewhat atypical song.

The Taneyev group fared much better. Although Hvorostovsky really only came into his own in the second song, there was already  in the opening All are sleeping a marked improvement in terms of idiom. The Menuet benefited greatly from the classicising quality imparted to its opening by Ilja (not entirely unlike M. Triquet in Eugene Onegin). Both artists properly darkened their tone for the fourth and fifth stanzas, in which the mood of the ball is disrupted, and presented a fine portrayal of disintegration thereafter. This is really rather an interesting song – at least on a first hearing. Hvorostovsky’s gift for characterisation, even when of a stock nature, was on display recounting the timid gaze that shone with a tear. Not the wind, blowing from the heights proved a charming interlude prior to the cold urgency with which the striking song, The winter road, was brought to our attention. Though Hvorostovsky’s tone could sometimes harden, it really did not matter. Stalactites – I cannot imagine there are many vocal treatments of the theme – seared itself into the consciousness through the fine performance of the piano part, its downward freezing patterns highly evocative. (Were one to need reminding of the difference between stalactites and stalagmites, this would be a useful aide-mémoire.) Operatic urgency told in The restless heart is beating: the heart was clearly restless – and relentless – indeed. Taneyev emerged here as a considerably more interesting composer than his chamber music suggests.

That said, there was no doubting the rise in temperature occasioned after the interval by the arrival of Liszt. Hvorostovsky’s French sounded somewhat improved in Oh! quand je dors, but it was in the two Petrarch Sonnets that he truly shone. (What a pity we could not have heard all three!) His Italian was much better than his French, but more important still was the Romantically impassioned, at times almost Wagnerian, quality he imparted to delivery of words and music. There was the occasional coarseness to climaxes, notably in the first stanza of ‘Pace non trovo’, but the proof of the pudding lay in being reminded what magnificent songs these are. I really did not mind them being more or less transformed into arias, save for the aforementioned applause. Even the occasional slip concerning the words – something very odd happened in the final line of ‘I’ vidi in terra angelici costumi’ was of relatively minor importance.

Finally came the enchanting set of Tchaikovsky romances. It was clear from the outset that both singer and pianist had command both of form and of that ineffable Tchaikovskian sadness, though it was unpardonable that the ending of ‘We sat together’ was compelled to compete with a mobile telephone for attention. ‘Night’ was especially impressive, the lugubrious piano introduction truly foreshadowing the intensifying words that followed; ‘The candle is flickering…/The gloomy darkness fermenting …/And my heart is being squeezed/so mysteriously by sorrow…’. ‘On this moonlit night’ was performed with grand sweep, almost as if in a single breath, whilst ‘The sun has set’ was genuinely moving, clearly heartfelt. The final ‘Again, as before, alone’ was darkly tragic, marked by a painful tread of regret that would not have been out of place in the ‘Pathétique’ Symphony.

There was a very odd claim, however, in Christopher Cook’s programme note that ‘Tchaikovsky’s ear was as much tin as Richard Strauss’s when it came to poetry!’ Having almost no Russian myself, I cannot comment when it comes to Tchaikovsky’s choice of verse, though surely his use of Pushkin was not entirely arbitrary. However, it seems to me a bizarre claim in the case of Strauss: it would be almost impossible to find a better-read composer. But then, Cook’s assessment of Liszt – ‘here is a composer who reminds us that you can change your national style as easily as exchanging a silk shirt for the Abbé’s soutane – was at least as misleading.

Maltman/Martineau recital, Wigmore Hall, 11 April 2011

Wigmore Hall

Fauré – Cinq mélodies ‘de Venise’, op.58
Schumann – Zwei Venetianische Lieder, op.25/17 and 18
Schubert – Gondelfahrer, D 808
Mendelssohn – Venetianisches Gondellied, op.57 no.5
Hahn – Venezia: Chansons en dialecte vénetien
Schubert – L’incanto degli occhi, D 902/1
Il traditor deluso, D 902/2
Il modo di prender moglie, S 902/3
Du bist die Ruh, D 776
Lachen und Weinen, D 777
Sei mir gegrüßt, D 741
Mahler – Rückert Lieder

Christopher Maltman (baritone)
Malcolm Martineau (piano)

This recital, I am afraid, turned out to be rather less than the sum of its parts, lesser parts somewhat dragging down the rest. Malcolm Martineau proved a dependable pianist, often more than that. Christopher Maltman was generally an engaging soloist, though there were a few too many intonational problems to be able to disregard them as occasional slips. Nevertheless, the programme was the greater problem, not least in that we appeared to have two smaller recitals joined together; one pertained to impressions of Venice, the other to songs with texts by Friedrich Rückert, with Schubert’s Italian Metastasio settings offering a not entirely convincing bridge. Luca Pisaroni had recently employed those very same Schubert songs in a Wigmore Hall recital that was far more coherent as a programme – and often better sung too.

Fauré opened the recital with his five Verlaine settings, ‘de Venise’. Much of this composer’s output I stubbornly fail to ‘get’; others talk of his subtlety where I tend to find blandness. Popular favourites such as the Requiem and the incidental music to Pelléas et Mélisande continue to offer greater interest; perhaps I am destined forever, or at least for a while longer, to remain uninitiated. To be fair, not everything sounded bland here: the fourth song, ‘A Clymène’ certainly offered stranger harmonies, though I could not really understand them or where they were going, and they sounded a good deal stranger when Maltman’s tuning slipped. Moreover, Martineau’s evocation of the mandolin in the opening song that bears the instruments name was quite magical in its way; he also captured very well the (slightly) fragrant nonchalance of 'C’est l’éxtase', though Fauré seems to have a different understanding of ecstasy from mine. Maltman’s French was better than that of many, though word endings were not always perfectly sounded: what a difficult language this is for singers! The baritone also brought a fine sustained line to these mélodies, especially to 'En sourdine', whose closing nightingale song benefited from a touching use of head voice (an effect that was perhaps employed a little too readily in many of the songs to come).

Four gondoliers’ songs followed: two from Schumann, one from Schubert, and one from Mendelssohn. The Schumann songs proved a highlight to the recital, Maltman immediately sounding more at home with the Lieder-style, and not just in terms of language. From the first setting (both texts are by Thomas Moore, translated by Ferdinand Freiligrath), the beautifully shaded repetitions of ‘Leis’’ in the first stanza and ‘sacht!’ in the second could hardly have been better accomplished. Martineau’s command of rhythm securely underpinned the first, whilst the charming, almost Schubertian – in Taubenpost mode – manner of the second delighted. Mendelssohn’s Venetianisches Gondellied (again Moore-Freiligrath) bewitched with its barcarolle rhythm and evocative minor-mode harmonies whose implications extend further beyond the merely pictorial than one might expect. The better of Mendelssohn’s songs are better than many realise.

Reynaldo Hahn’s six songs in Venetian dialect were frankly tedious. Again, the subtleties of which some speak quite passed me by – and whilst I suspect that with Fauré, a lack of receptiveness on my part is a factor, I simply cannot imagine what might be of interest here to anyone. Gerald Larner’s programme note comparison with Poulenc seemed to me wide of the mark, to say the least. The opening ‘Sopra l’acqua indormenzada’ brought from Maltman a more operatic delivery, akin to a gondolier regaling his tourists. At least ‘La Biondina in gondoleta’ and ‘Che pecà!’ are less emoting, though the former seems merely bland – and prolonged. The latter has a jaunty rhythm in the piano interludes, of which Martineau made the most, and benefited from Maltman’s forthright, highly masculine tone, though he missed his first entry and had to re-start the song. A ringing final ‘ciel’ in the final song, ‘La primavera’, might have delighted devotees, but I was ready for the interval bar.

Schubert’s Metastasio settings opened the second half. ‘L’incanto degli occhi’ benefited from lightness of touch on the part of both artists, though the contrasting section was perhaps taken a little too operatically by Maltman. Certainly Pisaroni in the aforementioned recital had offered something more suggestive, less blatant. Richly-coloured accompagnato was evoked in the recitative section of ‘Il traditor deluso’; Martineau even managed to make the piano part to the aria sound as if it were a piano reduction from an orchestral original. High (melo-)drama marked Maltman’s once again operatic delivery. If not Mozart, then at least Rossini was pleasingly evoked in the buffo tone of ‘Il modo di prender moglie’.

Du bist die Ruh, the first of the three Schubert Rückert settings selected, received a rapt performance, along with the Schumann songs, perhaps the finest of the evening, Martineau’s piano part heart-rendingly limpid, Maltman using words as well as notes to touch. That magical final-stanza modulation truly opened up new vistas, setting an apt precedent for Mahler. The account of Sei mir gegrüßt was to be commended for not playing to the gallery, but I wondered if it was just a little too low-key.

If Maltman had arguably used the head voice to touch a little too much, it sounded apt indeed in Mahler’s ‘Ich atmet’ einen linden Duft,’ the first of his Rückert-Lieder. It finely matched the weaving of harmonic magic in the piano, though later on insecurities of tuning slightly marred the performance: I wondered whether the tessitura was less than ideal for Maltman’s voice. There was nevertheless just the right sense of wonder to be heard: I was put in mind of the ‘Forest Murmurs’ from Siegfried. Intonation again proved variable in ‘Blicke mir nicht in die Lieder!’ but there was a proper sense of something darker than a mere time of day being at stake in ‘Um Mitternacht’: a true midnight desolation of the soul. Here, though, whilst I had tried my best not to do so, I could not help but miss Mahler’s orchestra. Maltman showed a creditable willingness to harshen his tone where necessary, for instance when speaking of man’s afflictions, forsaking mere beauty. ‘Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen’ again made one realise what one was missing in orchestral terms: not Martineau’s fault, but in what might seem the quintessence in miniature of Mahler’s variegated orchestral writing, the piano inevitably seems second choice. However, the stillness of the final stanza was judged finely indeed. To offer arias from Verdi’s I due Foscari and Amilcare Ponchielli’s La Gioconda might have fitted the ‘Venetian’ theme but seemed jarring at best after Mahler.

Tiberghien/Britten Sinfonia - Debussy, Richard Harrold, Thomas Adès, and Fauré, 17 February 2009

West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge

Debussy – Sonata for violoncello and piano
Richard Harrold – Ink (British premiere)
Thomas Adès – ‘Court studies’ from The Tempest
Fauré – Piano trio in D minor, op.120

Cédric Tiberghien (piano)
Jacqueline Shave (violin)
Caroline Dearnley (violoncello)
Joy Farrall (clarinet)

Each of the Britten Sinfonia’s lunchtime concerts presents a newly commissioned work alongside other chamber or ensemble works; each, moreover, is curated by an established British composer, who selects a younger composer as recipient for the commission. Last month, we had Oliver Knussen and Ryan Wigglesworth; this time, it was the turn of Thomas Adès and Richard Harrold.

Harrold’s Ink had been premiered in Krakow at the weekend, so this was its second performance. Scored for violin, ’cello, clarinet, and piano, it is described by the composer as a ‘neo-baroque study of rhythm and asynchrony’. In the busy opening section, it was unsurprising therefore that it was Stravinsky who sprang to mind, especially the Stravinsky of Dumbarton Oaks. The performance was appropriately metronomical: Stravinsky’s peculiar vision of Bach has a great deal to answer for. A slower section follows, characterised by slow, somewhat mysterious piano chords, whose harmonies were sometimes suggestive of Debussy and perhaps even Schoenberg. Cédric Tiberghien’s beautiful touch and discreet legato pedalling served this music extremely well. The other three instruments develop this material, soon rejoined by the piano, enabling the music to gather pace and the opening, angular voice to be restored. Harrold’s quoted ‘asynchrony’ most strongly characterises the concluding bars: slower again, but with disruptive outbursts. This was well-crafted music, well performed, even if it was difficult to detect an individual voice. That said, this was my first encounter with Harrold’s music, let alone with this piece, so perhaps my ears need time to adjust. So young a composer has, in any case, plenty of time in which to develop.

Adès certainly can lay claim to a distinctive voice. Yet I have often wondered, as again I did here, what he is actually saying with it: shades of Schoenberg’s ‘A Chinese poet speaks Chinese, but what is he saying?’ There is an accomplished, self-conscious brilliance to this music, ‘transcribed ... freely’ for the same forces as Harrold’s piece, from The Tempest, but what lies behind the facade? I had asked myself much the same about Adès’s opera, although the instrumental suite naturally avoided the mother work’s vocal infelicities. Even when the harmonies begin to sound more reflective, they soon become predictable. There is, of course, a playfulness typical of the composer’s work – and very well captured by the performers – but, whilst playing on the ruins of tonality is all very well, it is hardly sufficient in itself.

At least, however, Ades’s music evinces more bite than that of Fauré. A self-conscious distancing from Teutonic tradition is very much part of Adès’s persona – but there might be more worthy candidates for inclusion in such a programme than Fauré’s late piano trio. It goes nowhere in particular, for quite some time. Again, it was well performed, once Caroline Dearnley had – quickly – surmounted some early intonational difficulties. Yet the blandness of the harmonies, even in the final Allegro vivo, which at least boasts greater rhythmic interest, is for me the abiding memory of the piece. It ought to appeal to those members of the English musical establishment who devoted vast swathes of programming time last year to a forlorn attempt to convince the rest of us – and perhaps even themselves – that Vaughan Williams was anything but a minor composer. (It will not, since Fauré was not English.) Tiberghien’s pianism proved on its own terms most impressive, whether in the rippling opening of the first movement or the relatively more virtuosic passages of the finale.

Such musicianship was far better served, however, by Debussy’s ’cello sonata, with which the concert had opened. Tiberghien’s alternation between the virile and the feline perfectly captured the ambiguities of the first movement. Both he and Dearnley showed keen ears not only for the composer’s harmonies but for their rhythmic and structural implications. Shades of old France – Debussy was by now signing himself ‘musicien français’ – were apparent without emblazoning them. The ensuing Sérénade was, if anything, still more impressive, its haunting uncertainty sometimes blossoming into lyricism, yet with appropriate hesitation. Dearnley’s pizzicato and Tiberghien’s bass-register staccato proved a good match, so as not only to imitate but also to blend. Rhythmic control in the finale was impressive, as the sonata reached a duly exciting, yet unexaggerated conclusion. If Tiberghien unsurprisingly remained the musically dominant partner, Dearnley’s performance also impressed, especially when her instrument was singing upon the upper reaches of the A string. The sonata was for me the definite highlight of the concert.

This concert was recorded for subsequent broadcast on BBC Radio 3.