Musikfest Berlin (8) - Tetzlaff/Konzerthaus Berlin/Eschenbach - Haydn, Jost, and Beethoven, 6 September 2020

Philharmonie

Haydn: Symphony no.21 in A major, Hob. I:21
Christian Jost: Violin Concerto no.2, ‘Concerto Noir Redux’ (world premiere)
Beethoven: Symphony no.8 in F major, op.93

Christian Tetzlaff (violin)

Konzerthausorchester Berlin

Christoph Eschenbach (conductor)

How wonderful to hear Haydn’s Symphony no.21 in the concert hall. I had never done so before, and whilst I should happily be corrected, I doubt many others in the audience had. Christoph Eschenbach led the Konzerthausorchester Berlin in a performance alert to the work’s formal strangeness, albeit with none of the exaggeration and downright grotesquerie that often, regrettably, accompany such exploration. The first movement ‘Adagio’ in particular benefited from simply being permitted to speak, however great the art concealed in that ‘simply’. Gorgeous, warm tone invited us in to contemplate and to experience Haydn’s formal mysteries, mysteries through which certain harmonic progressions and their rhythmic instantiation already seemed to prefigure the Beethoven of the Eighth Symphony, if only one listened (to both). Following the model, though only in the most skeletal sense, of the sonata da chiesa, Haydn follows that movement, which, like much in the Beethoven, makes sense so long as one does not wish to put a name to it, with a fast movement, here marked ‘Presto’. It sounded as an eruption of joy, of harmonic release, sharpened by rhythmic, alert playing. Concision and expression in thematic development again had one think of Haydn’s most celebrated pupil, but it was the teacher’s voice that was unmistakeable. Above all, this was music that made me smile. Eschenbach’s unfussy way with the ‘Menuetto’ again had it tell its own story. Its trio’s curious melancholy, rhythmic signature and all, was relished throughout the orchestra. If there were occasional untidiness here, it did little harm. The finale proved a veritable compendium of syncopated surprises, of invention and a posteriori inevitability—thus emulating the first movement, albeit in very different style, ‘Allegro molto’. The spirit of Haydn as revealed through the recordings of Antal Doráti seemed reborn, albeit warmer and more conciliatory. Delightful!


By contrast, I struggled to make much out of Christian Jost’s Concerto Noir Redux, notwithstanding the excellence of solo (Christian Tetzlaff) and ensemble playing. Opening effortful violin slides, taken up by other strings, eventually unleashed something akin to ‘traditional’ solo virtuosity, which Tetzlaff of course possesses in spades. It was interesting to hear how such techniques could be echoed by the skilled percussion section, here four strong, both tuned and untuned. Was that perhaps a sense of the ‘infectious’, in a nod to current preoccupations? So far, so good. Where the rest of this single movement (in roughly twenty-five minutes) went was, to me at least, more obscure. A new, softer focus section sounded redolent of a generic television score. Different moods and sections summoned up music suggestive more of note-spinning than anything else, with curious nods elsewhere, for instance clarinet lines that might have been offcuts from The Rite of Spring. A frenzied close brought this vaguely neo-Romantic, not unpleasant work to an end, at least ten minutes too late; or perhaps that was just me.


I had long ago given up hope of hearing the symphonic Beethoven this year (save for the wonderful ‘Beethoven-Séance’ given in Cologne, during the dying days of our ‘Freyheit’). Anything other than a catastrophe, then, would have been welcome for the Eighth Symphony, and this was certainly not that. Eschenbach’s way with the first movement was insistent, even through agogic accents which would not have been to all tastes. He made no apologies for old-style heft, and was all the better for it, though progress was at times a touch deliberate. There was splendid contrapuntal interplay, though, a battle of a development underpinned by crashing syncopations. Thereafter, the movement proved as full of surprises as the Haydn heard earlier. Again, this fresh reading made me smile, long before triumphant coda and witty sign-off. I was also reminded quite how difficult a piece this is to bring off—even to begin to understand.


Humour is best delivered straight in the ‘Allegretto scherzando’; to do otherwise in this case, would be entirely to miss the point. Its considerable charm suggested paths to Mendelssohn; it also proved an excellent choice of encore. There is more to it than charm, of course, and motivic development came to the fore once that charm could be (almost) taken for granted. There was charm of a different kind in Beethoven’s neo-Classical reinvention of the eighteenth-century Minuet. It boasted all the complexity such cunning reinvention entails, but also due affection. Eschenbach and his players showed a keen ear for detail and balance, the trio once more exuding a tenderness that brought Mendelssohn to mind. Woodwind were not always entirely together, but I could live with that were once. If the concert had begun with a formal enigma, it closed with another, at least in theory. In practice, of course, this finale is what it is—and must be made to sound as such, which it was. I sometimes had my doubts as to whether Eschenbach was proving over-demonstrative, but there is much to be said for such clarity of purpose and texture. It was unyielding at times, but again that was his conception. The jokes of the coda had me laugh, not only smile; for that, I could forgive anything.

NDR Chorus/Konzerthausorchester Berlin/Spering - Bach and Schubert, 3 April 2015

Großer Saal, Konzerthaus

Bach – Cantata: ‘Lass, Fürstin, lass noch einen Strahl’, BWV 198 (Trauerode)

Schubert – Mass in A-flat major, D 678

Marlis Petersen (soprano)

Katrin Wundsam (mezzo-soprano)

Colin Balzer (tenor)

Michael Nagy (bass)
 

NDR Chorus (chorus master: Michael Gläser)

Konzerthausorchester Berlin

Andreas Spering (conductor)

 

Mourning for the Saxon Electress, Christiane Eberhardine, ‘die Betsäule Sachsens’ (Saxony’s pillar of prayer), was deeply felt by her husband’s subjects, although neither he, nor their son, attended the funeral. Unlike Augustus the Strong, who had converted to Roman Catholicism to ascend the Polish throne, she had remained faithful to Protestantism. Protestantism thus remained faithful to her, not least in the guise of  Bach’s Trauerode, the text by Johann Christoph Gottsched, first performed in St Paul’s Church, Leipzig, in 1727. One of the touching aspects of the text is the sense of place: references to city, river, residence, and so on. Even in the Prussian capital, with a North German chorus, I could imagine myself back in Leipzig – not least since I tend always to think of that city on Good Friday, even when not attending a Passion or Parsifal.

In performance, Bach was not badly done by, although Christoph Spering might have offered greater ‘heart’ to a somewhat chilly account. The opening chorus, ‘Lass, Fürstin, lass noch einen Strahl,’ was taken very fast, bur rhythms were well pointed. Here and throughout, the clarity of the NDR Chorus was beyond reproach. ‘An dir, du Fürbild großer Frauen,’ the chorus closing the first of the two parts, proved tumultuous, redolent of one of the turba choruses in the Passions. (Flutes struggled a little there, though.) The final chorus did not entirely dispel the suspicion that Spering had a train to catch, and phrasing might have been less choppy, but again, counterpoint was communicated clearly, even as the weight of harmonic meaning was lessened.

The extraordinary orchestra Bach employs made its mark, as it always does: visually as well as aurally transitional, two gambas (to the fore in ‘Wie starb die Heldin so vergnügt!’) and lutes placed in the centre, the ‘modern’ orchestra surrounding them. (Hermann Scherchen’s recording is a typically provocative exploration.) The alto recitative, ‘Der Glocken bebenes Getön,’ sounded wonderful orchestrally, flutes against pizzicato violins and violas.  Flute and oboe obbligati sounded splendid in the tenor aria with which the second part opens. Once again, I was reminded of Bach’s almost modernistic exploration of instrumentation, a feature of his music to which Boulez has, perhaps unsurprisingly, drawn attention. Marlis Petersen offered a keenly dramatic account of her recitatives and arias, harking back to Bach’s seventeenth-century forebears. Some might have cavilled at the evident difference of approach to vibrato, she largely eschewing it, the strings warmer, but it did not especially bother me. Katrin  Wundsam’s aria (that one with the gambas) exposed the differences in tone between different registers in her voice, but again, that was not unduly distracting, and it is partly a consequence of the particularities of Bach’s vocal writing. Colin Balzer proved the weakest of the soloists, intonation variable, and coloratura less than perfect. (The writing is difficult, but even so.) Michael Nagy navigated with great success the transitions between recitative and arioso, likewise achieving an excellent balance between declamation and the longer line.

Schubert’s choral works are, by contrast, cheerfully South German: nominally Catholic, without any obvious evidence of great belief. (Nor is there any evidence of Beethovenian struggle, despite the similarities with, and perhaps influence of, the Missa solemnis.) As one might have expected, this was not the most ‘symphonic’ of readings, but so long as one could, at least for a few minutes, put Wolfgang Sawallisch from one’s mind, a good enough account was given of the work in, the Berlin Konzerthaus notwithstanding, more church-like fashion. Strangely, given Spering’s lack of what we might call ‘Romanticism’, I was nevertheless put in mind of Bruckner and indeed twentieth-century writing. Perhaps that was in part testament to the long-lasting influence of Caecilianism. Quite why a chamber organ was used I am not entirely sure, but such seems almost to be de rigueur in ‘early music’ performances, even when a perfectly decent instrument is present in the hall.

The opening ‘Kyrie’ set the tone for much of the performance, in its strong contrast between passages for solo voices (whether individually or in ensemble) and those for chorus. The dramatic quality of the imploring ‘Christe’ solos was rather winning. Spering’s way with the ‘Gloria’ I found unduly fast and brutal, rather as if Toscanini were back with us; others will doubtless have felt differently. There were times when a greater body of strings too would have been of benefit. Spering’s conducting of the concluding fugue proved wooden too, leading to loss of much of its dynamism, though matters improved as it progressed. Again, at the opening of the ‘Credo’, although the performers (chorus and orchestra) were excellent, the conducting was four-square. The strings, however, dug in nicely upon the word ‘crucifixus’, especially important on this of all days. The closing ‘Amen’ sounded glorious – from all concerned. A well-shaped ‘Sanctus’ followed: lyrical, yet with a strong sense of underlying power. Phrasing was a bit odd in the ‘Osanna’ section, for no evident reason. The ‘Benedictus’, perhaps predictably, was taken very fast. It flowed nicely enough, but I remained unmoved. The ‘Agnus Dei’, though on the swift side, was imbued with greater feeling than earlier, although the contrast between choral and solo passages was perhaps excessive. Still, there was no doubting the prowess of the excellent chorus.