Aimard/Philharmonia/Honeck - Weber, Beethoven, and Dvořák, 2 February 2025

Royal Festival Hall

Weber: Overture: Der Freischütz
Beethoven: Piano Concerto no.3 in C minor, op.37
Dvořák: Symphony no.9 in E minor, ‘From the New World’, op.95

Pierre-Laurent Aimard (piano)
Philharmonia Orchestra
Manfred Honeck (conductor)

Manfred Honeck’s unfussy musicianship has long offered an antidote to crass media veneration of mediocre ‘star’ performers. Much the same might be said of Pierre-Laurent Aimard, who, although certainly celebrated, could not stand further removed from the likes of… [I had better stop there]. The Philharmonia, on better form than I have heard it for some time, clearly relished the opportunity to perform with both in this Sunday afternoon concert at the Royal Festival Hall, which also went to show there is life yet in the ‘classic’ overture-concerto-symphony programme, whose popularity may have been attained with good reason. 

Weber’s Freischütz Overture announced a reassuringly large orchestra, sounding very much as ‘of old’. Taken in gorgeously relaxed fashion, the introduction unfolded rather than being harried. Not that it lacked the tension and release of incipient drama, whether in dark, threatening intimations of the Wolf’s Glen or elsewhere, later glorying in the gentlest of lyricism and well-nigh Brucknerian power of silence. 

A smaller Philharmonia, strings thinned by several desks, reassembled for Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto, Aimard at the keyboard. As Donald Tovey observed, the opening movement’s difficulty lies first in the ‘sheer symphonic exposition’ offered by the orchestra; ‘it rouses no expectation of the entry of a solo instrument, and … leaves nothing essential for the pianoforte to add when its time comes.’ Save to the most strenuous musical minds, doubtless counter-productively strenuous, Beethoven saves the day, although a fuller learning of Mozartian lessons, such as we see in very different ways in the Fourth and Fifth Concertos, would have avoided the problem in the first place. Why mention this? Because, perhaps through estimable fidelity to the work in all respects, Honeck and Aimard brought that difficulty to the fore, before settling down to a fine performance. Honeck’s ‘first exposition’ was motivically coherent and imparted a strong sense of goal-orientation; but it was only after the piano’s second attempt, as it were, announcing a true partnership between soloist, conductor, and orchestra, that all fell quite into place, the basic tempo slightly broadening in a reading of mutual responsiveness. Aimard’s way with the piano was, as one might have expected, not to be pigeonholed. Neither old-fashioned, nor ‘period’, doubtless modernist in its way, though without shouting about it, it gave a sense of having considered the music anew, without stinting on spontaneity of the moment. The first movement close provided a case in point, suspense and climax working so well because fully prepared from all. 

That disinclination to be categorised was certainly to be heard, if so inclined, in the slow movement too. Shaped rather than moulded, it was always heading somewhere, yet with plenty of space to enjoy what arose during the journey. Possessed of an ultimately long line, yet with much variegation within, it spoke of a Beethoven once again – is he not always? – in transition, in a noble, deeply felt utterance from piano and orchestra alike. Taken attacca, the finale sounded as a necessary response. Occasional slight gear changes might have been better avoided or integrated, but the crucial thing was a feeling of life, of drama. No ‘designer Beethoven’ here. Fortunately, this was not a performance in keeping with a bizarre programme note attributed to Andrew Mellor, reading at best as if the work of ‘artificial intelligence’ (sic): ‘That realisation [of deafness] had a cataclysmic effect on Beethoven as a person and shot entirely new sentiments and concepts into his music, starting with this piece. … Beethoven got wise to that new reality in this piece.’ It is difficult to know where to start with that, so let us instead end by saying performers and audience, let alone Beethoven, deserved far better. In all other respects, they received just that—other programme notes, by Joanna Wyld and Douglas Shadle, included. 

Dvořák’s ‘New World’ Symphony came up similarly fresh, even if I left not quite convinced that elements were strongly integrated enough to avoid accusations – more justly levelled at work than performance – of the episodic. As might be expected, I felt that above all in the finale, though I should not wish to exaggerate. Otherwise, there was much to enjoy from the large orchestral forces reassembled. The first movement’s introduction proved tender and wistful, speaking of both darkness and light; in essence, it told, as surely it must, of many things. Indeed, that movement as a whole proved full of drama, flexible without meandering, musicians at the top of their game both in solo and tutti work. Antiphonal violins had one ask why anyone would ever have considered placing them together. 

Warm, dignified, excellent playing from all, not only but certainly including Henry Clay’s cor anglais, characterised the slow movement: much implied, no overstatement. Horns, as in the Weber, were simply to die for. String playing would have gladdened any of the great conductors from the past who had led this work, whether with the Philharmonia or other orchestras. The scherzo was urgent, perhaps at times a touch hard-driven, yet certainly giving a proper sense of release and relaxing without meandering. Transition to the trio was intriguingly disorienting, suggesting a more ‘modern’ Dvořák than many of us might be used to, material almost dream-like prior to sharpening of focus. The finale was likewise urgent, though not breathless. Tender strings, characterful woodwind, and implacable brass more or less suspended those nagging formal doubts.

Salzburg Festival (5) – Bronfman/Pittsburgh SO/Honeck: Rachmaninov and Mahler, 22 August 2024

Grosses Festspielhaus

Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto no.3 in D minor, op.30
Mahler: Symphony no.5

Yefim Bronfman (piano)

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

Manfred Honeck (conductor)

Images: SF/Marco Borrelli

Rachmaninov’s music requires a tight structural command, especially for a work on the scale of the Third Piano Concerto, to dispel suspicions of the rhapsodic, or at least to ensure that rhapsodic qualities contribute to a sense of a greater whole. Yefim Bronfman and Manfred Honeck are very considerable musicians, yet in this performance, the first movement did not quite for me cohere as it might. Its conversational opening, understated yet on the move, compelled, as if ‘recalling’ music whose origin was lost in the mists of time. The performance was swift, perhaps a little too much at times, though that is surely preferable to lapsing into sentimentality; it enabled one to listen to often kaleidoscopic harmonies coming together thematically, especially in the piano part, though the second thematic group already sounded a little distended. The development section was nicely exploratory and the recapitulation had a proper sense of return; only some sense, at times, of quite why we moved from A to B was at times lacking. If the lack of heaviness was welcome, Bronfman bringing out passagework affinities with Prokofiev as well as Liszt, there were times when Honeck kept down the Pittsburgh Symphony a little too much. 

The second and third movements redressed that relative imbalance, rhapsodic elements more properly integrated. Honeck and the orchestra were more willing to take the lead, strings properly allowed their head for the first time.  When the excellent Pittsburgh brass had spells in the limelight, featuring more prominently in a richly protean finale, the temperature rose further. To some extent, I think this was a performance conception, an expression of trajectory; in retrospect, it seemed a pity that the greater urgency – as opposed to mere speed – could not have been read back into the first movement. The audience, though, disagreed, seemingly acclaiming the performance without reservation. 

Mahler conducted the Rachmaninov concerto in New York in 1910, with the composer as soloist. It is difficult to think of any other obvious connection between the two works and also difficult to say the combination worked to Rachmaninov’s advantage. Nevertheless, the performance of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony experienced one major difficulty of its own, though not one for which the performers were in any way responsible. The opening promised excellent things, the Pittsburgh solo trumpet – as, subsequently, the brass section as a whole – spellbinding in his macabre opening solo. From the outset, this first movement sounded more grounded than its first-half counterpart, Honeck communicating a clearer sense of where it was heading. It felt like a funeral march, or rather set of obsequies, without in any sense being reduced to an implied programme. This was, as Mahler always insisted, music, not a musical rendering of something else. 

A further strength of Honeck’s reading was his strong sense of the symphony’s division of five movements into three ‘parts’, the second movement very much following on from and necessitated by the first. Here, the generative role of rhythm came to the fore. If there were occasions when I wished the strings might dig deeper, there was nothing especially wrong with the playing. In such music, one often, however unfairly, recalls favoured performances or recordings of the past; such recollections can be tinged by unreliable romanticism and perhaps mine were too. Brass nonetheless seized the initiative for a thrilling first rendition of the chorale. A certain harshness at climaxes seemed to be deliberate. What, then, was the problem? A strange noise to be heard above the orchestra, both in pitch and seemingly in location. Although it sounded like a giant mouse, I assumed it must be some sort of electronic interference. I was closer initially; it transpired a bat had come to the party and was voicing its appreciation. 

After a short pause in which the problem was somehow resolved, we heard a properly liminal, transitional Scherzo, its neo-Bachian counterpoint clear and directed. The Adagietto convinced similarly: a little slow by curren, fashionable standards, but there is no one way to perform this music, in which fashion is as unwelcome as in Bach or Mozart. It is perhaps unsurprising, given Honeck’s pedigree as a string player, that we heard chamber music writ large. He handled the transition to the finale with as great skill as the connection between first and second movements, the fifth movement then proceeding with welcome hints of the sardonic. I wondered at times whether it was a little lacking in sheer abandon, but all came together perfectly for the chorale, whose advent and jubilant aftermath imparted sense to much of what had preceded them. I say ‘much’ only because the flying rodent’s disruption to my experience had been severe: a great pity. It was almost made up for, though, in a splendid encore performance of Ochs’s waltz from Der Rosenkavalier, rubato judged in echt Viennese fashion.

Staatskapelle Dresden/Honeck - Mozart and Haydn, 11 April 2022

Semperoper

Mozart: Overture: La clemenza di Tito, KV 621
Haydn: Symphony no.93 in D major
Mozart: Masonic Funeral Music, KV 477/479a; Vesperae solennes de Confessore, KV 339: ‘Laudate Dominum’; Requiem in D minor, KV 626; Ave verum corpus, KV 618, interspersed with Gregorian chant and readings

Nikola Hillebrand (soprano)

Marie Henriette Reinhold (contralto)

Sebastian Kohlhepp (tenor)

Mikhail Timoshenko (bass)

Ulrich Tukur (reciter)

Dresden Chamber Choir (chorus director: Tobias Mäthger)

Dresden Kreuzchor (chorus director: Karl Pohlandt)

Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden

Manfred Honeck (conductor)

Whilst much of the Staatskapelle Dresden is in Salzburg for the Easter Festival, those players staying at home are offering a good deal of Mozart: complementing, for those able and willing to take the two-hour rail journey, the current Mozart festivities in Berlin. (Salzburg, ironically, is giving Wagner, Bruckner, and Shostakovich.) Manfred Honeck and the Dresden orchestra here paired Mozart with Haydn, culminating in an imaginative presentation of the Requiem—part of it, anyway—interspersed with plainsong and readings. 

It was difficult not to think of Sir Colin Davis during the Overture to La clemenza di Tito—or indeed elsewhere, given his long association with the Dresden orchestra. Odious though comparisons may be, this was a sound he would have recognised, I think, albeit in a more excitable and, to an extent, more rhetorical reading. The Staatskapelle sounded fresh and transparent, boasting fine string agility and sheen. Habsburg counterpoint told as it should. It was a welcome curtain-raiser that augured well. 

Honeck’s view of Haydn was more severe, worlds away from the ‘genial’ label that characterised the composer, arguably too much, for much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Shocks and surprises registered forcefully, suggesting consciously or otherwise an attempt to have one feel something akin to what Haydn’s first, unsuspecting audiences might have done. Indeed, the snarling first chords had one wonder, even when one knew, whatever was coming next. A rigorous introduction followed, the exposition only a little more smiling. One could only marvel at Haydn’s concision, the repeat upon us in no time at all. Honeck showed a keen ear for detail and not a little theatricality in the preparation and instantiation of surprises. Whether one needs the fortissimo bassoon ‘intervention’ in the second movement to be quite so heavily underlined is, I suppose, a matter for debate, but it worked as a climax as well as local colour. Prior sternness had summoned the future spirit of the late Masses; I could not help but think the joke was played less straight than humourless. More importantly, an array of invention was on show throughout Haydn’s variations. 

Idiomatic swing notwithstanding, the Minuet was similarly severe, its Trio’s heightened contrasts offering nothing in the way of relaxation. This was fiercer Haydn than I could readily recall, more Napoleonic than Viennese. And indeed, in the finale, it was the Beethoven of the Fourth Symphony that came to mind, in a reading replete with contrast and meaning conveyed through articulation. (It is surely no coincidence that Honeck is a violinist.) Here, though, severity was not unrelieved, Rafael Sousa’s delightfully ‘sung’ oboe solo a case in point. Returning to the idea of imaginative recreation of a first hearing for that London audience—and the slightly smaller Dresden orchestra aside—this would have been quite the calling card. 

And so, to the second part of the evening’s proceedings. Tubular bells heralded offstage members of the Kreuzchor, bidding us commence our observance: ‘Requiem aeternam…’. Throughout the plainsong, and despite not even being onstage, these young singers’ words were perfectly clear, pitches and phrasing perfectly judged. This and three further invocations, ‘Domine exaudi orationem meam’, ‘In quacumque de inocavero te’, ‘and ‘Christus factus est’, joined readings from one of Mozart’s letters to his father (4 April 1787), the composer at his most Catholic in recognising the comfort of death as the destination of all life; from two poems by Nelly Sachs, ‘Wer weiß, wo die Sterne stehn’, ‘Wenn im Vorsommer’; and from two passages in the Revelation of St John the Divine. Animated, involved, and involving readings by Ulrich Tukur, culminating in Scriptural death and resurrection, contributed greatly to the fuller dramatic and intellectual conception. Like musical themes, certain words, ‘Tod’ unsurprisingly among them, echoed, connected, even developed. 

The Masonic Funeral Music came first among the musical pieces, between Mozart’s letter and the second instance of Gregorian Chant. One of the crucial things that letter tells us—and which many ignore—is that Mozart saw no contradiction between Freemasonry and his Catholic faith, quite the contrary. Once past an immediate puzzling harshness—I am not quite sure what happened, nor whether it were deliberate—wind chords were beautifully voiced. Strings brought tragedy and some degree of consolation. Honeck’s reading proved well paced and articulated, with a strong sense of liturgical intonation; no one could have missed the cantus firmus here. The ‘Laudate dominum’ from the KV 339 Vespers flowed beautifully, soprano Nikola Hillebrand as warm and stylish as the Dresden strings, the Dresden Chamber Choir (Dresdner Kammerchor) similarly clear and warm, holding out what seemed to be real hope of consolation. Honeck shaped the movement well, without rendering it unduly moulded. 

The Requiem ‘Introitus’ followed Sachs’s poems, seemingly rising out of what had precieded it. Again beautifully voiced and paced, it offered choral singing of equal clarity and impact (characteristic throughout of these thirty-six singers). Hillebrand returned almost as if a character, transfigured by what had passed: an angel, perhaps. Honeck moulded the performance dynamically, again without it becoming mannered. Rhetorical shifts in tempo made sense, as did the swiftness and momentum of a ‘Kyrie’ that yet remained unhurried. This meant something, something important. When, following the first of the Revelation readings, the ‘Dies irae’ burst forth, it terrified, souls trembling in torment and embodying that torment. Clean, rich performances from bass Mikhail Timoshenko and trombonist Nicolas Naudot opened the ‘Tuba mirum’, were answered in vividly human fashion by tenor Sebastian Kohlhepp, voicing both fear and consolation, and the splendidly contraltoish mezzo Marie Henriette Reinhold, as well ultimately as our returning angel Hillebrand. They made a fine quartet too, in excellent balance with the orchestra (and choir). 

The ‘Rex tremendae’ bore down with all the weight of the Counter Reformation itself in mourning. One could almost hear the veils of mourning, mediated or rather amplified by the old ‘Spanish’ Habsburg court dress. Mozart transformed it with searing modernity, and yet also preserved it: tradition aufgehoben. Did Honeck slow too much for the cries of ‘Salva me, fons pietatis’? Perhaps for some, even for me in the abstract, but he clearly had his reasons, yielding far more often in Mozart than Haydn. The ‘Recordare’ made for a fine contrast, orchestra and soloists wonderfully transparent, movement forward ignited by counterpoint. Cellos led telling, accompagnato-like rhetorical thrusts. It was all there in the words, or at least could well be discerned to be. In the ‘Confutatis’, operatic Furies became real, which for Mozart is to say Christian. And yet, they were tamed, enabling the noble ‘Lacrimosa’ to conclude its section. 

Chant, the Kreuzchor as excellent as ever, and a final passage from Revelation, telling us of the heavenly Jerusalem, the Lord making all things new, prepared the way for a lithe, urgent ‘Offertorium’. Some aspects of the orchestration I did not recognise; I assume this to have been a matter of the edition used, but perhaps I was just hearing the music differently. The ‘Hostias’, sweetly, even devoutly, imploring, gained meaning from its liturgical context. Here, one felt, was the point at which this prayer, shunned by Protestants, could become possible. At any rate, singing was beautifully sustained, quite different from what had gone before. Both ‘Quam olim Abrahae’ sections were well directed and meaningfully shaded, for this was outstanding choral singing as well as orchestral playing. And then, there came a short pause, followed by a repeat of the ‘Lacrimosa’, only to stop at the end of the eighth bar, where Mozart’s hand falls away. Had I looked properly at the programme, I should have known this was coming, but I am rather pleased I did not, shock to expectations thereby fully registering. Instead of the rest of the Requiem, however understood, we moved to the heavenly funeral motet, ‘Ave verum corpus’, sweet in consolation and truthful. 

Bells tolled briefly again. And then, magical silence, only broken some time later by an idiotic ‘Bravo!’ (Can anyone seriously think that an appropriate response to a setting of a Requiem Mass, save, perhaps Verdi’s?) With this Requiem, though, there will never be peace. It was interesting to hear it done like this, all the more so given my lack of preparation. Yet, as when I have heard similar performances, I ultimately felt it a pity not to hear what ‘should’ have followed. Do we really think Mozartians such as Karl Böhm or Sir Colin had no idea what they were doing? Not that Honeck was making any such claim, of course; he was simply presenting his own, thoughtful, in many ways brilliantly conceived version for the evening. Different occasions present different choices, none of which ever quite adds up: heartbreaking, given the perfection of Mozart’s music. Requiem, but no peace: what could speak better to our current situation?

Znaider/LSO/Honeck - Gynn, Schubert, and Brahms, 24 March 2013

Barbican Hall

Eloise Nancie Gynn – Anahata (world premiere)

Schubert – Symphony no.8 in B minor, D 759
Brahms – Violin Concerto in D major, op.77

Nikolaj Znaider (violin)

London Symphony Orchestra

Nicholas Collon, Manfred Honeck (conductors)

Eloise Nancie Gynn’s Anahata was the latest work to receive its first performance in the LSO Panufnik Young Composers Scheme. The best, alas, that could be said about it was that it was competently enough orchestrated, if relying far too heavily upon ‘eastern’ colour: bowed vibraphone, Tibetan singing bowl, and so forth. (Edward Said might never have existed.) Otherwise, the piece sounded akin to the sort of soundtrack one might hear on an average television programme: a few ‘effects’, which might have gravitated some meaning in conjunction with an external narrative, but with apparently zero musical justification. Tonal harmonies sounded rather more than shop-soiled. The work, one read, was ‘inspired by my [Gynn’s] exploration of spirituality through meditation. Finding a way through life and its obstacles and emotions; a journey inside, from the head and all its mental chaos, thoughts and “stuff”  ... into the stillness of the heart space, connecting to the peace within.’ I could go on quoting; on second thoughts, I am not sure that my stomach could withstand the effort. Nicholas Collon and the LSO seemed to give the piece a far more authoritative performance than it deserved. No matter; I doubt we shall hear it again.

 

I certainly cannot imagine that we shall hear it again in the company of the otherwise well-suited pair of Schubert and Brahms. Manfred Honeck, deputising for Sir Colin Davis, led a performance that for the most part convinced, though it sometimes went a little overboard in its pursuit of extremities, whether of tempo or of dynamic contrast. The opening cellos sounded dark, mysterious, yet controlled: just right. Perhaps the basic tempo adopted was on the fast side, but it soon yielded – arguably too much. Still, better to enjoy flexibility than Kapellmeister-ish straitjacket. Cultivated playing from the LSO alternated with furious eruption. It was the beauty of the softest playing, however, which ultimately lingered longest in the memory. Moreover, one certainly heard a good few of the harmonic seeds for Brahms, preparing the way for the second half. This was a musical landscape whose breadth tempted one to think of Bruckner, albeit with greater incident. Unwanted applause ensued. For the most part, the second movement flowed beautifully. ‘Beauty’, however, proved to be a slight problem, for however exquisite the opening of the second group sounded – and it certainly did – it sounded a little too much like an object of appreciation rather than a participant in a musical, indeed above all a harmonic, drama. It undoubtedly offered contrast with the outburst that followed, but the contrast seemed too much: an easy way out, however impressively controlled. That said, it was impossible not to warm to the echt-Viennese quality of Schubert’s Harmoniemusik: not just its exquisite tonal quality, for which the LSO players stood beyond praise, not only on account of its timbral differentiation, but also for its communication of the menace within the ‘heavenly’ material. With a stronger sense of continuity, this might have been a great performance. It is probably a good thing that I do not possess the vocabulary to describe those who applauded before the final chord had ceased to resound.   

 

Nikolaj Znaider joined the orchestra for Brahms’s Violin Concerto. The orchestra showed typically impressive symphonic heft in the opening, Znaider offering in response winningly-old fashioned silken sweetness, not that he lacked cleanness and precision. (Let us pass over the problematic cadenza.) Honeck proved an attentive ‘accompanist’, perhaps a little too much so, clearly following Znaider’s tempo fluctuations rather than emerging as an equal partner. As a whole, there was much to enjoy, but there is something a little amiss when Brahms sounds more ‘enjoyable’ than profound; I could not help but long for Menuhin and Furtwängler, or perhaps even Znaider and Sir Colin. The slow movement offered ravishingly beautiful woodwind playing, and not only from Fabien Thouand’s exquisitely turned oboe solo; once again, Vienna and even Mozart came to mind. When Znaider entered, he creditably sounded as first among equals rather than dominating soloist. With a flowing, uncontroversial tempo, this sounded as Brahms closer to Mendelssohn than to Schoenberg, but there is nothing wrong with that once in a while. The finale, however, proved somewhat awkward, a state of affairs that seemed more Honeck’s doing than Znaider’s. The ‘Hungarian’ rhythm of the principal theme was shaped with fine understanding, its rhythmic accent spot on. Alas, the music soon began to meander, for which Honeck appeared to over-compensate by bringing out an excessive, almost Tchaikovsky-like, array of primary colours as ‘interest’. Such vulgarity has no place in Brahms.

 

Röschmann/Bostridge/LSO/Honeck - Mozart and Mahler, 4 October 2012

Barbican Hall

Mozart – Symphony no.41 in C major, KV 551, ‘Jupiter’

Mahler – Des Knaben Wunderhorn

Dorothea Röschmann (soprano)
Ian Bostridge (tenor)
London Symphony Orchestra
Manfred Honeck (conductor)

 

This concert was to have been conducted by Sir Colin Davis; indeed, the prospect of our greatest living Mozartian conducting the Jupiter Symphony was what had brought me to it in the first place. Alas, recovery from a recent illness meant that Davis was unable to return to the podium quite yet. However, whereas hisrecent eighty-fifth birthday concert had therefore to suffer considerable programme reorganisation, here the only alteration necessary was Sir Colin’s replacement with Manfred Honeck.

 

The first movement of the Jupiter was faster than Davis would have been likely to have taken it, but not unreasonably so. Perhaps it was a little unsmiling, but the LSO was on excellent form, and neither orchestra nor conductor had any truck with silly reduction of forces or withdrawal of vibrato. Excellent woodwind playing was a particular joy, the magic flute of Gareth Davies in particular. The violins’ silken grace in the second subject was equally impressive. If it remained difficult to warm to Honeck’s direction in this movement, at least he took it seriously, the development section evincing almost Beethovenian strength and purpose, though overall form was undeniably Mozart’s in its balance and symmetry. I had no reservations whatsoever concerning the slow movement, which, for once, actually was a slow movement. Taken at a judicious tempo, it was anything but somnolent; indeed, it received a performance close to ideal. Drama told through maintenance of line and understanding of harmonic rhythm, not via any applied ‘effects’. The LSO’s playing from all sections was beyond reproach, dark not sugary, counterpoint unerringly projected. Honeck and the orchestra combined the intimacy of chamber music with the dramatic urgency of the opera house, and in its dark Romanticism, this performance edged the music to but a stone’s throw from Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony. The minuet was almost, but not quite, neo-Classical in its grace; intimations of La clemenza di Tito were not far away at all. Mozart’s harmonic richness and the sheer deliciousness of his melodic inspiration – the woodwind especially delightful here – were justly relished.

In character, the finale rather resembled the first movement. I should have preferred something less fierce, more ‘Austrian’ in a sense (and despite Honeck’s nationality), but great strength of purpose was still to be applauded. Mozart’s structural genius, if not his profoundest humanity, shone through, the LSO on scintillating form. And that coda miracle of quintuple invertible counterpoint told with clarity of dynamism. All that was lacking, at least for me, was a smile. I should add that the LSO clearly loved playing with Honeck, and rightly so, for this was quite a debut, with Mozart surely the cruellest test of all.

 

The only other occasion on which I have heard Des Knaben Wunderhorn in concert in its entirety was a truly first-rate performance in 2009 from Petra Lang, Hanno Müller-Brachmann, and the Staaskapelle Berlin under Michael Gielen. There, alas, the problem, at least for me, was the companion piece on the programme: the ‘Vienna version’ of Bruckner’s First Symphony, which, try as I might, I continued to find more or less interminable. Honeck’s direction of the LSO seemed to me the equal of Gielen’s in Berlin, which represents praise indeed. Indeed, I do not think I could come up with an adverse criticism of either conductor or orchestra even if I tried. (Well, perhaps I could, but I shall resist the underwhelming temptation.) The pianissimi in particular were breathtaking. From the very first song, ‘Der Schildwache Nachtlied,’ we were treated to wonderfully transparent orchestral colours. The militarism of this and some other songs was equally well judged – take the three LSO trumpets in ‘Revelge’ – and the Wagnerian harmonies of alternate stanzas (Dorothea Röschmann’s) were tellingly conveyed. Rhythms throughput were taut, and whenever necessary, or desirable, for instance in the second and eighth songs, a properly idiomatic Viennese lilt was to be heard – and felt. The orchestra fairly seethed in ‘Das iridische Leben,’ chilling as it must, whilst the dark, ominous tread of ‘Der Tambourgesell’ also displayed an English horn plangency (Christine Pendrill) that might have come from Bach. ‘Lob des hohen Verstandes’ sounded, as it should, like a chamber offshoot of Die Meistersinger, albeit with the irony so signally lacking in Wagner’s own ‘Meisterstück’. Finally came the seemingly endless sadness of ‘Wo die schönen Truompeten blasen,’ searingly presented.

 

Röschmann began a little tremulously, but soon calmed down, permitting us to enjoy both a truly Romantic richness of voice as well as detailed attention to the words. Ian Bostridge certainly could make some claim to the latter, but I am afraid that, try as I might, I found his contributions very difficult to take. If, in that first song and in ‘Trost im Unglück’, one could convince oneself this was an interesting ‘alternative’ reading, perhaps foretelling the Captain in Wozzeck, ‘Des Antonius von Padua Fischpredigt’ was so wearyingly presented in inverted commas that it sounded as if the tale were being told by a caricature of Wagner’s Mime. Yes, there was apt bitterness of tone, but the directness, which yet lacked nothing in subtlety, of Müller-Brachmann in Berlin was infinitely preferable, at least to this listener. ‘Lied des Verfolgten im Turm’ again had bitterness, but Bostridge’s delivery tended so strongly toward Sprechgesang as to sound like straightforward caricature. Some, I can imagine, may have found ‘Reveille’ well ‘characterised’, but for me it crossed the boundary from mannerism into outright grotesquerie, more akin to the ravings of a morphine addict than anything Mahler seems to have had in mind. ‘Verlorne müh’!’ offered the ne plus ultra, vocal tone so unpleasant that all one could do was try to concentrate upon the orchestra. There was, of course, much to enjoy from Röschmann, whether the beautiful handling of the melismata in ‘Wer hat dies Liedlein erdacht’, or the winning delivery of ‘Rheinlegendchen,’ from which one emerged smiling, in true Viennese fashion, one eye dry, the other moist.