Zimmermann/VSO/Hrůša - Beethoven and Franck, 6 June 2017

Grosser Saal, Konzerthaus

Beethoven – Violin Concerto in D major, op.61

Franck – Symphony in D minor

Frank Peter Zimmermann (violin)

Vienna Symphony Orchestra

Jakub Hrůša (director)

What a wonderful surprise! It was not that I had not expected something good; I should hardly have dragged myself to another Beethoven Violin Concerto if not, still less to a performance of a symphony about which I felt decidedly ambivalent (if not nearly so hostile as many seem to). Frank Peter Zimmermann had given, with Bernard Haitink and the LSO, what had been probably the best performance I had ever heard in concert. Moreover, Jakob Hrůša had impressed me last year in Glyndebourne’s Cunning Little Vixen, and I had heard good things about him from others too. Nevertheless, to hear a performance that exceeded my memories of the Haitink, not least on account of a truly astonishing contribution from the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, and an account of Franck’s D minor Symphony that had me wondering, at least until the finale, whether all my doubts concerning the work had been misplaced, came as significantly more than I might dared have hope.

The first movement of the Beethoven was taken swiftly, but never harried (not unlike, indeed, Zimmermann’s performance with Haitink, so I presume this must be his concept). What struck me immediately was the cultivated sound Hrůša drew from the VSO; I really do not think I am merely lapsing into some sort of ‘national’ stereotype when I say that the sound reminded me of the Czech Philharmonic in its heyday, or indeed one of Rafael Kubelík’s bands. There was something Bohemian, to be sure, about the character of the orchestral playing, at least as I heard it; it was certainly not sweetly Viennese, to resort to another caricature. The other striking, indeed surprising, thing about the opening ritornello was Zimmermann’s playing along for parts of it; I am not quite sure why, but it did not detract from his official entry, since one never heard him individually. When that did come, his playing offered a combination of the best of ‘old school’ tone with a variegation that one does not always, rightly or wrongly, associate with some of those hallowed performances of old. A simple – or not so simple – scale could encompass great musical variety, with the emphasis on ‘musical’; this was not variety, nor was it difference, for the sake of it. And all the time, Hrůša emphasised, subtly yet unquestionably, the dynamic process of Beethoven’s motivic working, its generative quality. Woodland woodwind sounded heartbreakingly beautiful; one could almost see Beethoven on one of his countryside walks, hear what he heard, transmuted into gold. Zimmermann’s cadenza did more or less what one would have expected it to do, if not quite always in the way one would have expected: different again, then, without that difference being for its own sake. A coda as autumnal as Brahms offered one brief, final blaze; as so often, at the close, Beethoven says just enough, no more than that.

The slow movement proved the most tender of songs, with multiple soloists, the VSO wind singing with just as great distinction as Zimmermann, bassoon and horns as ravishingly beautiful as any of those instruments more accustomed to the soloistic limelight. If anything, I think these instrumentalists incited Zimmermann to still greater heights. ‘Rapt’ is doubtless a word overused, not least by me, but it seems apt, as it were, here. A masterly transition to the finale was Zimmermann’s doing, of course, but the broader character of the finale was again as much Hrůša’s and the orchestra’s doing as Zimmermann’s. Impish, exhilarating playing had one’s ears on tenterhooks, in the best way. Once again, Hrůša’s subtle yet sure tracing of Beethoven’s motivic dynamism provided the basis for everything else that ensued.

The opening figure of Franck’s D minor Symphony sounded full of Lisztian promise, with lower string tone simply to die for. The violins’ response proved to be of equal distinction, as indeed soon was that of the entire orchestra. Once again, the playing of the VSO, and Hrůša’s conducting sounded – however lame this might sound on the page – as if it were imbued with the very spirit of music. Even when the first movement were driven hard, as sometimes it was, it grew out of what had gone before; indeed, it made me wonder what Wagner from these forces might sound like (not something I say lightly). Even the frankly vulgar passages in Franck’s score made me smile, even shiver a little, rather than frown. This was certainly a superior performance in every way to the over-praised recordings from Leonard Bernstein (which may have done a great deal to put me off the work). For there was delicacy, even tenderness, to be heard too, in a performance that at the very least seemed to reach for Lisztian heights. I do not think, indeed, that I have heard a performance, whether in the concert hall or even on record, in which the music had so clearly been internalised by conductor and orchestra (well, perhaps, Klemperer, but otherwise…)

The Allegretto was inexorable, yes, but charming too, with a wealth of orchestral colour that had me think several times of Berlioz. I was able by now simply to sit back and enjoy, quite convinced that any previous fault had lain with me, not with the work. If I still did not feel that the finale quite came off, it came closer than I could recall, uniting tendencies, not just material, from both previous movements. It wore its workings on its sleeve, of course, but does not Berg’s music, or Stravinsky’s, for that matter, too? There was much, then, for me to think about after the event, even more for me to relish in the moment. This was, in summary, a quite outstanding concert.

Zimmermann/LPO/Zweden - Wagenaar, Lindberg, and Beethoven, 9 December 2015

Royal Festival Hall

Johan Wagenaar – Overture: Cyrano de Bergerac, op.23

Magnus Lindberg – Violin Concerto no.2 (world premiere)
Beethoven – Symphony no.7 in A major, op.92

Frank Peter Zimmermann (violin)

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Jaap van Zweden (conductor)

 

This was a strange concert programme, whose internal logic I found and continue to find difficult to fathom. The London Philharmonic was on excellent form throughout; otherwise, there was not much to unite these works. Moreover, Jaap van Zweden’s conducting of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, whilst starting promisingly, proved a decidedly mixed blessing.

 

One can hardly begrudge a work more or less unknown an occasional outing, but I really cannot understand what would possess someone to conduct Johan Wagenaar’s Cyrano de Bergerac Overture. Its opening flourish is so clearly derivative of Don Juan, as are a good few other, strangely decontextualised progressions that Strauss would surely have had a case for plagiarism. Not that the piece, of course, in any sense approaches Strauss in quality. Stale bits of Brahms seem as though they are there to provide padding, but rarely succeed in doing so, at least coherently. It begins pleasantly enough, soon becoming merely tedious. The conductor’s irritating, sub-Bernstein podium manner did not help.

 

Magnus Lindberg’s Second Violin Concerto benefited not only from fine playing from the LPO but quite stunning virtuosity from Frank Peter Zimmermann, not only in the cadenza but throughout. Zweden’s conducting, the visual element aside, could hardly be faulted either, insofar as I could tell. It certainly seemed that the composer received a true performance of the work. What of the work itself? In three movements, the first two of them connected without a break, its strongest point seemed to me to be its construction (something one could certainly not have said of Wagenaar’s piece). The opening solo, open fifths on the violin, is soon questioned by the orchestra. Intervals and their working out sound in this first movement strongly suggestive of Berg: there are worse models! Even towards the beginning, though, there is a stronger tonal pull. Orchestration is colourfully (post-)Romantic, sometimes, especially in its use of celesta and harp, strongly echoing composers such as Bartók and Prokofiev. Harmonies and indeed orchestration seem to become more and more overtly Romantic as the work progresses, at times edging, bizarrely to my ears, towards Khatchaturian (if rather more careful in its construction). There is a point in the final movement at which I thought the work had finished, but then it started again, moving ever closer to a Hollywood film score; there is more, much more, of the same to come. One passage sounds – I should like to say ironically, but I really am not sure – extremely close to the Waterfall in Strauss’s Alpine Symphony. I found myself longing for another performance of Boulez’s Anthèmes 2, such as I had heard in the same hall a few nights earlier.

 

The first and second movements of the Beethoven symphony fared best. Above all, one could relish the full sound of a decent-sized, uninhibited symphony orchestra, an increasingly rare occurrence in this music. Violins were not split, but clarity was such that there was no overriding need for them to be. There was some splendid raucousness from the horns too. Quite what Zweden meant in a programme quotation saying ‘There are still people who play Beethoven like Brahms. And that I refuse to do,’ was unclear; I have never met someone who claimed to play Beethoven ‘like Brahms’, although I suspect the ‘authenticke’ brigade might have accused him here of doing just that. Rhythms in the first movement were nicely sprung, although the harmonically-founded inevitability of a great performance (think, for instance, of Daniel Barenboim) was lacking in an ultimately sectional reading. The exposition repeat, for instance, merely sounded as if we were starting again, unmotivated. Zweden took the Allegretto faster than I think I have ever heard it. Any element of a processional was banished, but there was a highly creditable command of line, which put me in mind of no less a conductor than Herbert von Karajan – albeit, if you can imagine so implausible a thing, Karajan in a rush to catch the last bus home. The LPO’s cultivated, variegated playing was a joy to listen to. Sadly, the third movement resembled a caricature of Karajan in less flattering light: one of those faceless, breathless Beethoven symphonic recordings from the 1970s. We were spared ‘authenticity’, but it did not seem that Zweden had anything to say. (The contrast with recent performances from Christoph von Dohnányi and Oliver Zeffman was stark.) There was grandeur to some elements of the Trio, but it was unclear where it had come from, or indeed where it went. If you were a Toscanini fan, I suppose you might have liked this. The finale was unsmiling in similar vein, but to a greater degree: quite absurdly hard-driven, despite unerringly fine orchestral playing. Zweden occasionally brought out subsidiary parts to no obvious end. It was, I am sorry to say, a bit of an ordeal.

Prom 57: Zimmermann/GMYO/Gatti - Wagner, Berg, Strauss, and Ravel, 26 August 2012

Royal Albert Hall

Wagner – Parsifal: Prelude to Act III and ‘Good Friday Music’

Berg – Violin Concerto
Strauss – Suite: Der Rosenkavalier (attrib. Artur Rodziński)
Ravel – La Valse

Frank-Peter Zimmermann (violin)

Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra

Daniele Gatti (conductor)

 

There is probably no finer Parsifal conductor alive than Daniele Gatti. It was once again a privilege to hear his shaping of music from Wagner’s final drama, even if I find it difficult to reconcile myself with the practice of performing ‘bleeding chunks’ as the ‘Good Friday Music’, and remain a little surprised at conductors with a deep understanding of Wagner’s works performing such snippets out of context in this way. (That is not, I hasten to add, a matter of ‘purism’, simply a feeling that the experience remains insufficient. There is nothing wrong, for instance, with performing the Prelude to Act I of Die Meistersinger as a curtain-raiser. If it works, it works; but if it does not...) At any rate, there seemed something a little odd about starting with the opening to the third act. Nevertheless, the performance was of such dramatic intensity that one expected to hear Kundry groaning, and felt a little disoriented by a transition of sorts into the ‘Good Froday Music’. The Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra’s woodwind solos were especially fine, reminiscent of the Siegfried-Idyll. Gatti’s varied pacing proved unerring, some though by no means all of it unerringly slow; the crucial thing was the unbroken communication of Wagner’s melos.

 

It was perhaps noteworthy that, as with all the music on this programme, Gatti conducted the Berg Violin Concerto from memory. Gatti has a distinguished track-record in the music of the Second Viennese School; there could certainly be no doubting either his or Frank-Peter Zimmermann’s knowledge of the score. The GMYO woodwind again played with great intensity throughout, though Zimmermann’s account began in somewhat subdued fashion. (Perhaps it was partly a matter of the Royal Albert Hall’s dreadful acoustic.) I wondered whether it were too subdued, despite the apt impression of the ‘angelic’ thereby imparted, but it came to life during the Allegretto section of the first part. Gatti’s understanding of Berg’s twelve-note writing was abundantly clear in his shaping of woodwind lines in particular, pointing the way to the Bach chorale that would be fully sounded in the second part. There was, moreover, a winning Viennese lilt, rubato and all, to be heard to the rhythms. The second part opened with a vehemence previously lacking; there could be no doubting Zimmermann’s virtuosity here either. Moments of Mahlerian stillness were just as striking, the vistas (Carinthian?) that opened up as striking as anything in the music of another composer with whom Gatti has long exhibited a particular affinity. Zimmermann’s working out of serial processes, and more generally Berg’s motivic development, was as impressive as Gatti’s. The Andante from Bach’s A minor Sonata, BWV 1003, made for an apt, wonderfully intimate, encore.

 

If I continue to harbour doubt about performing extracts from Parsifal, feelings about the Rodziński (allegedly his work) suite from Der Rosenkavalier go beyond any conceivable understanding of reasonable doubt. Yes, of course it is always a pleasure with a fine orchestra and conductor to hear this music, but it could surely have been better put together; indeed, one sometimes wonders whether it could have been worse put together. It was all wonderfully performed, making one long to hear Gatti and indeed the orchestra in the work as a whole. The opening horns resounded with such magnificence that I had to check first that we remained in the Royal Albert Hall, and second that there were only four of them. (We had remained there, and there were only four.) Masses strings could barely have sounded more Straussian in the Act I Prelude, but the melying away after Strauss’s initial flourishes was every bit as impressive. Gatti pointed up echoes of Elektra without overdoing them; this was less a determinedly modernistic Rosenkavalier selection than a Romantic performance with a sense of alternatives. Throughout tone and textures were subtly variegated, even when the allocation of vocal lines to instrumentalists, however splendidly played, proved a little difficult to take. I was left wondering how much, if any, sense the selection would have made to someone unacquainted with the opera as a whole, but that was not the fault of the performance.

 

For that reason alone, La Valse proved more satisfying. I was struck from the outset at the ‘French’ quality of the sound Gatti drew from the orchestra, not unlike that which one would expect from his own Orchestre National de France. Ravel’s score sounded as if a painterly, Cézanne-like, phantasmagoria. It seemed to be taken faster than usual, though not excessively so, and the tempo was certainly not unvaried. The vortex into which the Viennese waltz whirled itself had a mechanistic, Stravinskian quality: Ravel viewed through the prism of The Rite of Spring. There was something finer to come, however, and despite my reservations concerning ‘bleeding chunks’, a rapt account of the Prelude to Act III of Die Meistersinger, the orchestra’s strings offering a challenge to any permanent opera or symphony orchestra. Again, one longed to hear Gatti in the complete work.

Berg and Mahler, Zimmermann/Philharmonia/Dohnányi, 27 April 2008

Royal Festival Hall

(Christoph von Dohnányi’s final concert as Principal Conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra)

Berg – Violin Concerto
Mahler – Symphony no.1 in D major

Frank Peter Zimmermann (violin)
Philharmonia Orchestra
Christoph von Dohnányi (conductor)

I have for some time admired Frank Peter Zimmermann as one of the most musical – in every sense – violinists of his generation. Having recently heard his relatively new recording of the Busoni Violin Concerto and Violin Sonata no.2 – very fine indeed – I was eager to hear him in the Berg concerto, not least since I had just missed hearing him perform it earlier in the season in Berlin with Bernard Haitink. I was not disappointed. I noticed something upon which I had remarked on hearing Zimmermann perform the Beethoven concerto with the LSO, again under Haitink, namely, that a work whose ‘concerto’ elements can often be lost suddenly had them found, albeit with no loss whatsoever to the ‘symphonic’ thread. The sense of give and take, including a supremely natural rubato, with the orchestra was faultless, which of course does great credit to the Philharmonia and Christoph von Dohnányi too. Early on, the work’s triple-time rhythms evinced a veritably post-Mahlerian swing, tossed between soloist and orchestra, and often shared.

For sometimes Zimmermann was first among equals, not least in an exquisite duet during the third movement with the principal viola; but he could equally be the Romantic soloist, standing in opposition to the orchestra. The supreme versatility of Berg’s twelve-note technique is demonstrated by the fact that it invites or rather demands both approaches, necessitating both horizontal and vertical understanding of the score. Technically Zimmermann’s account was flawless. The combination of double-stopping and pizzicato held no fears for him, although there was nothing showy about his application. His sweetness of tone and expressive vibrato were beautiful indeed, the latter especially notable – and rapid – upon the violin part’s long, held final note. It sounded, if this be possible, as if it were spun from silver. The clarity Dohnányi brought to the orchestral part was rare indeed, although I should make clear that this entailed no loss of tonal warmth. Indeed, the Philharmonia sounded so much better in every respect than when I had last heard it (in January, under Vladimir Ashkenazy), that it was difficult to believe that it was the same orchestra. If string tone has often been considered the Achilles heel of London orchestras, it certainly was not on this occasion, when we were treated to a sound that was thoroughly central European. Moreover, the woodwind statement of the harmonised Bach chorale was, quite simply, perfect in its organ-like blend. The chorale, needless to say, truly grew out of what had gone before, a further tribute to Berg’s technique, and to the players’ application thereof. And the concerto ended with a truly redemptive halo, as distant from tonal saccharine as one could imagine, yet not fearing to make the attempt to reconcile.

Dohnányi’s skill as an orchestral trainer, of which members of the orchestra spoke in a programme article, was once again displayed to great advantage in Mahler’s First Symphony. That the Philharmonia again sounded thoroughly mitteleuropäisch is testament enough to his influence and to the recounted scrupulousness of his rehearsal technique. For in the concert itself, this sounded like the most natural thing in the world, not in any sense appliqué. Likewise the celebrated – notorious? – harmonics of the symphony’s opening bars: as warm of tone as they were secure of pitch. The sound from beyond of responding brass brought an apt sense of Freischütz magic, which continued into the material from Mahler’s Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. It was enjoyable too, with a thoroughly idiomatic Schwung. There were baleful moments too, of course, including the sounding of a splendidly ghost-like harp and the horns’ intimations of the horrors of the final movement. However – and this was a supreme characteristic of the performance as a whole – the mood of the moment never detracted from a greater sense of line; instead, the two dialectically enhanced one another.

The second movement was a Ländler from the outset. Cellos and double basses really dug into their strings, complemented by impeccably rustic woodwind. There were also some finely-judged portamenti. In the busy nature of its counterpoint – crystal-clear yet tonally refulgent – there were intimations of the Fifth Symphony, and the horn’s transition to the trio briefly suggested the Seventh’s Nachtmusik. There could be no doubt that Dohnányi knew the Mahlerian corpus, although my Lob des hohen Verstandes should not be taken to imply pedantic reference (at least on his part). Careful control over dynamic contrasts presented a myriad of colours, distinct from each other yet nevertheless related. Delightful hints of Schubert dances surfaced. The movement reached its climax with a splendid antiphonal exchange between horns and trumpets, another occasion taken for the Philharmonia’s brass to excel. After this, the opening of the third movement was eerie indeed. Solo double bass and kettledrum were spot on with their contributions, as indeed would be every canonical entrant. The inexorable build up of tension was very well managed here by Dohnányi. Interludes were evocative yet always integrated into the greater whole, especially the lovely yet haunting passage referring again to the Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. There was a wonderful sense of ominous transformation when the Bruder Martin theme returned in a different key.

And then, Hell broke loose, all the more effectively for the rounded rather than hysterical sound of the orchestral tutti. The music was allowed to speak for itself, and speak for itself it did. There were, thankfully, no podium theatrics from the conductor; this is a symphony, not a ballet. Even the stereophonic kettledrums provided more of an aural than a visual feast. The D-flat major episode brought some heart-rending, indeed heart-stopping Sehnsucht, making the return of Hell all the more terrifying, if short-lived. Thereafter the instability of the to-ing and fro-ing between the F minor material of the opening and the destination tonality of D major was marvellously handled, perfectly aware of the tonal opposition and therefore resisting needless italicisation. When the horns finally did scream, leading us into D major proper and soon therefore resuming their earlier nobility, they were all the more powerful for not previously having shot their bolt. There was an apt sense of exhausted heaviness in the lead up to the final triumph, which thereby sounded all the more exultant – and hair-raising. To accomplish this, the climax needs to have been judged musically rather than emotionally, or rather the two should be coterminous. Here they were. At this stage, the minor theatrics of the eight horns standing – with good historical warrant, mind you – were justified, for this conclusion had been musically prepared. And so came to a fitting conclusion what was certainly the best concert performance of Mahler’s First Symphony I have heard: ‘objective’ in some senses perhaps, but all the stronger for it. So came to an equally fitting conclusion Dohnányi’s tenure as Principal Conductor of the Philharmonia, although he will return in the autumn as Honorary Conductor for Life.