Unsuk Chin: Cello Concerto; Bruckner: Symphony No.7 in E . BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: Alban Gerhardt cello, Ryan Wigglesworth conductor
I have never been to the Aldeburgh Festival before – ever – and the last time I went to Snape Maltings was late October 1990 for a chamber music concert. I don’t wear this as a badge of honour – rather, Snape is just highly inconvenient to get to by public transport from where I live in the Peak District, and relatively expensive, in terms of pubs and B&B’s. I do have fond memories of the Maltings in the 1970’s – Reggie Goodall conducting Act 1 of Walkure with the ENO in 1974, and Peter Pears singing the Evangelist in the St Matthew Passion in 1975. Probably I might have gone on not going to the festival, but this year I saw a must-see item – Curlew River, performed as it was at its premiere in an Aldeburgh Festival Church. In order to make sense of an 8-hour trek across England, I also decided to go to this concert.
Bruckner 7 I have heard many fine performances over the years of – conducted by Jochum, Solti, Goodall, Kempe, Haitink and more recently Rattle come to mind. I did also almost hear Klemperer conduct it – but he fell ill (and subsequently died- a great might-have-been). In the normal run of things, I would probably have given this concert a miss, but decided to make it a package with Curlew River.
The Unsuk Chin piece I approached without a programme note, so I was a bit unclear on its structure, though I think it was in four movements. I thought at first it might be a relatively dignified conversation between cello and orchestra, with a mournful, thoughtful contribution from the cello in the first movement. But the orchestral comments become increasingly violent – short stabbing surges by the 4th movement and in response to this the cello bristled with angry splashy runs. So more of a battle than a dialogue. There were some amazing orchestral sounds – wonderful combinations of bells and woodwind, and whizzing firework sounds! Such was the bristling nature of Gerhardt’s playing in the final movement that he broke a string, and had to grab an orchestral player’s cello to finish the work. All in all I found this heavy-going on a first listen, but would welcome an opportunity to hear it again.
Listening to Bruckner 7 in the Maltings is a curious experience. It is a building constructed for smaller forces and though a warm acoustic it is not particularly resonant, and it’s therefore not an ideal place for a spacious approach to Bruckner – the silences seem a little dead, and the climaxes can sound coarse. Whether because of the conductor’s approach or the acoustics (but certainly the splitting of the violins helped), one of the most enjoyable aspects of this performance was listening to the inner voices of the score, and the sometimes-extraordinary harmonies the woodwind and strings produce. This was a performance that by timing was brisk – certainly less than the advertised and standard 70 mins – but never seemed rushed. It was tightly controlled, but also with time for lyrical grace. Wigglesworth is clearly of the school that believes in speeding up rather than slowing down for Bruckner climaxes and so the big one in the slow movement was certainly exciting but not overwhelming – and, sadly, without a cymbal crash. On the other hand, the postlude to the slow movement, the scherzo and the finale were all extremely well done. Throughout there was some lithe sweet string playing and some excellent horns/Wagner tubas, and also occasions of extreme clarity – I’m not sure I’ve ever heard the final bars of the finale so clearly laid out. Maybe at the end of the day not one for the ages, but this was a very enjoyable performance.
The Aldeburgh audience was slightly curious – there were people who, I suppose, like me, go to lots of concerts like this, but there were also a number of people (maybe local to Ipswich and surrounding Suffolk towns) who clearly were hearing this work for the first time, and who sounded (in the snatches of conversation I heard afterwards) a bit non-plussed by the length of the work and the noise!!
John's musical journey 