Philharmonia/Pons - Schubert and Mahler, 16 October 2016

Royal Festival Hall

Schubert – Symphony no.8 in B minor, ‘Unfinished’, D 759

Mahler – Das Lied von der Erde


Catherine Wyn-Rogers (mezzo-soprano)
Robert Dean Smith (tenor)
Philharmonic Orchestra
Josep Pons (conductor)

First Christoph von Dohnányi had to withdraw, then, at the last minute, Matthias Goerne. Schubert and Mahler remained, though, alongside the Philharmonia Orchestra and Robert Dean Smith. They were joined by Catherine Wyn-Rogers and Josep Pons, in a decent enough concert, which neither truly disappointed, nor truly inspired, although I must admit that I felt more moved at the end of Das Lied von der Erde than I had done during its performance: testament, no doubt, to the enduring greatness of the work itself.

Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony probably received the better of the two performances. The first movement’s opening was dark – how could it not be? – although I have certainly heard darker, not least from Bernard Haitink, in an identical programme with the LSO a few years ago. The Philharmonia’s playing was cultivated throughout, a keen sense on offer of the players listening to each other as chamber musicians. Pons proved somewhat rhetorical at times, arguably a little too much, but not unduly disruptively. I was struck once again by the harmonic daring and sheer darkness of the developmental night of the soul: there were no extraneous histrionics applied to the music, simply a sense of a great Romantic speaking truth about out human condition. A shadow, then, was cast over a nevertheless variegated recapitulation, the coda proving both dignified and defiant. The second movement flowed well, although its pulse was perhaps a little too close to that of its predecessor. Mood was contrasted enough nevertheless, if somewhat bright for my taste at times. Darker passages received their due, though, and there was a concluding sense of contentment in culmination.  
 

Das Lied von der Erde took a while, arguably a movement, to settle down. The opening was brusque, even brash. Woodwind shrillness made its point, but Pons drove too hard all in all. One can hardly fail to feel sympathy for the poor tenor in this work, but Dean Smith’s unpleasantness of tone sounded distinctly superannuated. He almost always managed to make himself heard, though. ‘Der Einsame im Herbst’ was more sympathetically conducted, flowing in a way one might trace back to Schubert. There was strength beneath the surface too. Wyn-Rogers proved dignified and sincere: the Mahlerian heart was certainly weary, but humanity nevertheless survived. The third movement proved nicely rhythmical, with necessary flexibility. Dean Smith had the notes, but his expressionless delivery did little for me. ‘Von der Schönheit’ had a welcome sense of symphonic ‘following on’. Occasional lapses in orchestral ensemble surprised, although they were nothing too grievous. Both orchestra and voice imparted a sense of the pictorial, courting comparison with Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder, without any danger of veering into contradiction between ‘drama’ and ‘music’. Dean Smith’s charmless, colourless singing overshadowed some at least of the considerable orchestral detail to be heard in ‘Der Trunkene im Frühling’. His vibrato was on the wide side, even for me. Pons conducted it briskly, but not without feeling: probably the best course of action in the circumstances.

Mahler marks the opening to ‘Der Abschied’ schwer, heavy; and that was just how it sounded. Mezzo, flute arabesques, and cello pedal soon combined to underline the music’s – our – desolation. If Wyn Rogers’s intonation were not always perfect, musical and poetic sense was always conveyed: a far more important a thing. Schoenberg seemed already to be with us in some of the orchestral textures – which he is, to all intents and purposes. Pons was sometimes a little deliberate, underlining figures that might have flowed, even flown, more freely, but I should not exaggerate. A cold wind indeed blew at times, chilling me to the bone, but there was consolation, if far from unalloyed, to be had through the bitterness, the sardonicism, the ghostly, echt-Mahlerian marionettes. If the orchestral interlude, if one can call it that, sounded a little thin of tone to begin with, it grew in symphonic stature, reminding us that this is not ‘just’ a song-cycle. The ‘liebe Erde’ was, ultimately, what we heard and felt; it was that Earth that won through.

 

Why o why, though, the instant applause? Are these people not only hard of hearing, but hard of humanity?

 

Gubisch/BBC SO/Pons - Schreker, Busoni, Ravel, and Schoenberg, 4 December 2013

Barbican Hall

Schreker – Vorspiel zu einen Drama

Busoni – Berceuse élégiaque, op.42
Ravel – Shéhérazade
Pavane pour une infante défunte
Schoenberg – Chamber Symphony no.1, version for full orchestra, op.9b

Nora Gubisch (soprano)

BBC Symphony Orchestra

Josep Pons (conductor)

 

A refreshing programme of early(-ish)-twentieth-century orchestral music from the BBC SO and Catalan conductor, Josep Pons, which, if it did not always possess the last word in refinement, certainly benefited from Pons’s palpable enthusiasm for this repertoire. Indeed, the opening Schreker Vorspiel zu einem Drama – not, as the Barbican website had it, the Overture to Die Gezeichneten, from which this longer concert work derives – can rarely, if ever, have been heard with such liveliness, even bumptiousness. The performance itself made a refreshing change from the over-ripe decadence to which we have become accustomed in such music. Not that there was no hint of such a tendency, but the last thing the music needs is exaggeration in that quarter. Amidst a sea, no an ocean, of coughing and even – I kid you not – widespread eating and drinking, Pons projected a strong sense of line, the BBC SO responding with apparent glee to Schreker’s orchestral phantasmagoria. There was plenty of bite too, rhythmic command being especially impressive. And if there were perhaps times when Pons’s infectious enthusiasm threatened to run away with itself, the performance was one of warmth: just the ticket for a cold December night.

 

Busoni’s Berceuse élégiaque followed. If Schreker is a minor master of whom it would be no bad thing to hear a little more, then Busoni is a scandalously neglected figure, his Doktor Faust one of the great twentieth-century operas, and his other three operatic scores all fully worthy of repertory status. Given his pre-eminence as pianist, Busoni’s orchestral music is often still more overlooked than his operas. (Not that his piano music is performed nearly so often as it should be.) Schreker’s large orchestra contrasted strongly with Busoni’s refined instrumentation, likewise the former’s superior proto-Hollywood harmonies with the latter’s radical ambiguity. Is this the major or minor mode? We may well be asking the wrong question – but not in a Schoenbergian sense (though at times, the orchestration sounds not so different from a Schoenberg ensemble, ‘influence’ being most likely to fall at least as strongly in the opposite direction). There was a properly nauseous and ominous sense of the rocking berceuse to this performance, though there were times when it sounded a little effortful. In general, however, there was admirably clean, classical elegance to be heard, coupled with a dark, troubling undertow. Late Liszt, unsurprisingly, came to mind more than once as prelude to Busoni’s dissolution of ‘form into feeling’, a wondrous tribute to his mother upon her death.

 

Ravel, that towering master of orchestration, was to be heard immediately before and after the interval. Nora Gubisch joined the orchestra for a wonderful account of Shéhérazade, her tone both lustrous and clear: in many ways ideal for the composer. Pons assured a variegated account, matched by his soloists, transitions in ‘Asie’ especially well handled. There was true dramatic urgency where required. The ecstasy upon the word ‘Chinie’, followed by a plethora of orchestral chinoiserie, was just as impressive as the exultant climax upon ‘haine’ and resultant orchestral afterglow. ‘La Flute enchantée,’ with an excellent flute solo from Michael Cox, was expectant than ‘langoroureux,’ the balance between mystery and clarity well judged. ‘L’Indifférent’ emerged with all its sexual ambiguity. What a wonderful hush was to be heard upon the injunction, ‘Entre!’ The Pavane pour une infante défunte was treated to an unsentimental account, which Pons kept moving without rushing. Dance rhythm was apparent, even generative, throughout.

I wish I could feel greater enthusiasm about Schoenberg’s 1935 version for full orchestra of his First Chamber Symphony. Whilst understanding his reasons for providing this alternative, it seems – and continued to seem – inferior in every respect to the original, like a considerably more extreme case of Verklärte Nacht. Timbres and edges are smoothed and blunted; solo moments come as welcome relief, reminding one of just what one is missing. That said, there were in this performance occasions when a stronger still kinship to Mahler and Brahms came through, partly as result of the larger forces. Pons’s tempo shifts were considerable but not unconvincing, save for a sagging of tension during the slow movement. Still, this is Schoenberg, and it is no bad thing to remind ourselves from time to time of a weaker, yet indubitably ‘authentic’, version of what remains a strong candidate for the title of most joyous twentieth-century musical masterpiece.