HAYDN Op.33 no.4 in B flat major; DVOŘÁK Selection from Cypresses, B11; ELGAR Early quartet fragments; MENDELSSOHN Op.44 no.1 in D major –  Victoria String Quartet

I have now got my hearing fully restored. How nice to hear things properly….

As you can see this was at the Stoller Hall, part of Chetham’s Music School but having its own independent life as a concert venue as well. It seats about 500 people and has great acoustics, with a platform large enough to seat a chamber orchestra as well as not being too large for a solo performer. It was very far from full for this concert though – 100 people maybe at most

I felt the Quartet was a bit under-powered and not always fully together, even though the 2^nd violin is David Creed, otherwise leader of the Opera North Orchestra, currently immersed in Parsifal, as below. I felt the leader didn’t have enough attack in the faster movements and somehow felt quieter voiced than the other quartet members.

The Haydn was wonderfully quirky – the first movement martial-sounding but never obvious, and constantly twirling off in unexpected directions; the finale great fun, but suddenly veering into pizzicato near to the end and coming suddenly to a final halt. The Dvorak pieces on the other hand I found rather tedious. Why not have a Mozart or another Haydn quartet instead?

The Elgar fragments were – well – fragmented. The most substantial piece was the early (aged 21) Elgar piece played first, somehow immediately more engaging than the Dvorak songs but not really recognisably Elgar – Mendelssohn came to mind. The last two fragments though were mature Elgar and immediately recognisable – and indeed the last piece was an early version of the end of the scherzo and the first subject of the slow movement from the First Symphony. Interestingly, after proceeding more or less exactly like the symphony for most of its length, Elgar suddenly chosen a different rather trivial melody for the second subject of the slow movement; the fragment then comes to an abrupt end, as though Elgar recognised something more was needed

I thoroughly enjoyed the Mendelssohn – the quartet is in his ‘Italian Symphony’ mode. I’ve long been prejudiced against Mendelssohn – the Wagner-generated image of Mendelssohn as a “superficial” musician, and an emotional lightweight, took hold early on in my life and I’ve never really shaken it off. But this was well-crafted, enjoyable, foot-tappable music which I really found myself engaging with. I bought myself a recording of the 0p 44 quartets immediately!

Richard Farnes, CONDUCTOR; Sam Brown, DIRECTOR; Bengt Gomér, SET & LIGHTING DESIGNER; Stephen Rodwell COSTUME AND WIGS; Toby Spence, PARSIFAL; Katarina Karnéus, KUNDRY; Robert Hayward, AMFORTAS, Derek Welton, KLINGSOR; Brindley Sherratt, GURNEMANZ; Stephen Richardson, TITUREL. Opera North Chorus and Orchestra

This was for me a much looked-forward-to concert. The Bridgewater Hall was – as it should have been – full – though interestingly the gallery wasn’t opened up, which is more evidence maybe that this sort of music is getting a diminishing audience, at least in the UK regions (the only really buoyant place I’ve come across since the pandemic audience-wise is ROHCG). The unanswered question is whether this is because of the pandemic and people’s continuing reluctance to be in crowded places, or because people are dying off, because some have just lost the concert going habit over the last few years or because of the cost-of-living crisis, or some combination of some or all of these.

My ear problems notwithstanding, expectations were more than met by the reality of this concert. This was musically the best Parsifal I’ve heard since Elder’s at the Proms in 2013. Apart from a few rather underpowered bells, the orchestra sounded fabulous. Richard Farnes conducted a very effective account of the work that had both sensitivity – eg flexible tempi in Act 2 – to support the interaction of the singers and considerable power, as in the Act 3 transition music. Farnes seemed to have a clear and coherent strategy for dealing with the 4 hours of music that allowed its ebb and flow to be accommodated without falling into the inflexibility of a ‘slow’ or ‘fast’ approach – Knappertsbusch/Goodall or Boulez!  Some sections such as the Good Friday music started surprisingly fast, but then slowed down later on., other parts of Act 3 sounded remarkably slow, but it all seemed part of a well-considered whole. Dynamics were also wide – often the orchestra was damped down a bit to give space to the singers on stage, but when appropriate Farnes let them rip to impressive effect – again the transition music in Act3, and also of Act 1, and the end of Act2. If I had one criticism it would be that the ending was marginally too fast- but others might disagree, and it was still very moving! For the obsessives among us, I calculate that the overall performance time was about 4hrs 5 mins, very similar indeed to (4.04) Herman Levi, in Bayreuth in 1882, and a little faster than (4.10) Knappertsbusch, at Bayreuth in 1962 and (4.12) Furtwängler at Bayreuth 1936! It was interesting to read somewhere recently that Farnes was one of the short-listed candidates to replace Pappano at Covent Garden – wouldn’t that be a great idea!!

This was a concert performance but enriched by the recent experience of the same company’s performing the work on stage in Leeds. All of it was very fine but Act 2 was truly exceptional – probably the best I’ve ever seen – because of that stage experience, and the way Parsifal and Kundry related to one another on the concert stage.

There’s endless discussion about what Parsifal as an opera might mean, but to me the basic starting point has to be the Christian story, which is very heavily referenced throughout the work, even though the references are always to ‘Him’, ‘the Saviour’, and nowhere is the name of Jesus used. While Wagner clearly was not an orthodox Christian, there is evidence, as Prof Richard Bell wrote in the programme, that he took Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross extremely seriously, even if he was unconvinced by an overarching Father creator deity.  It is equally clear that simply referencing Buddhism or Schopenhauer is insufficient to explain what this opera is about – and, after all, ‘entering the kingdom of heaven like a little child’ isn’t so different from ” Durch mitleid wissend, der reiner tor”. To me, the issue is that the Grail Knights’ view of religion has ossified so that it has become entirely focused on ritual and the externals of religious observation. Their treatment of Kundry or indeed Amfortas scarcely shows compassion. They seem inward looking and concerned with their own spiritual lives – as in their Communion – to the neglect of the wider world. The distortions of Wagner’s Communion service compared to that of the worldwide church bears this out.

Wagner’s Communion

Standard Church communion text

Take of the bread, turn it confidently into bodily strength and power; true until death, steadfast in effort, to work the Saviour’s will!   Take the wine, turn it anew into the fiery blood of life.   Rejoicing in the unity of brotherly faith, let us fight with holy courage!

So, Father, we remember all that Jesus did, in him we plead with confidence his sacrifice made once for all upon the cross. Bringing before you the bread of life and the cup of salvation, we proclaim his death and resurrection until he comes in glory. …… Lord of all life, help us to work together for that day when your kingdom comes and justice and mercy will be seen in all the earth. Look with favour on your people, gather us in your loving arms and bring us with all the saints to feast at your table in heaven.

I think (hope) you can see that the Grail Knights’ version is distinctly more inward looking. And that is reflected in the perhaps slightly coarse triumphalist music they sing….It is only Parsifal who expresses compassion both for Amfortas and for Kundry. Gurnemanz doesn’t to the same extent. Amfortas’ suffering comes from ‘eros’, from the expression of sexual desire as ‘Will’ and the too easily egotistical activity of sex, as well as of course his actual wound, and Kundry also needs our compassion in the way her life has been cursed (though there’s a question about why Jesus might have wanted to curse her for laughing at him – sounds very un-Jesus like – maybe this is a self-imposed suffering in horror at what she has done?). Act 2 is about the difference between eros and agape – ‘sex and charity’, if you like. In ‘Tristan und Isolde’ Wagner creates a world where Eros is opposed to Thanatos, and where it is a positive thing. In Parsifal Eros is seen as wilful, too much ‘me, me, me’ and it is agape – compassion – that drives personal development, Parsifal breaks out into agape through rejecting Kundry’s kiss and then feels compassion for Amfortas.

It’s Act 3 where the ambiguities come – is Parsifal a new ‘Redeemer’ or pointing people to the existing ‘Saviour’, This is unclear and reflects Wagner’s own unorthodox beliefs – does he assume a succession of Christ-like figures, of whom Parsifal is one? The fact that at the end there is a dove – emblematic of the Holy Spirit – hovering overhead might indicate a new Saviour, following the Biblical annunciation of Jesus’s Messiah-ship in the presence of John The Baptist – and also the Mary Magdalene associations of Kundry might support this as well. On the other hand, what Parsifal says to Kundry in Act 3 is My first office I thus perform: Receive this baptism, and believe in the Redeemer!’ – suggests it’s the ‘existing’ Redeemer, Jesus, who is intended. I’m not sure – this is work in progress in my thinking about this great work. Within this context the much commented-on phrase “Erlosung  an dem Erloser” is not such a complicated concept in my view. If referring to Jesus, it is suggesting that Parsifal has purified the Grail Knights’ corrupt practices so that the Saviour can again be fully honoured through the right balance of ritual and compassion; if referring to Parsifal it suggests that he who has changed the lives of others has also had his own life changed irrevocably. How interesting that this term ‘Erlosung’ features throughout Wagner’s oeuvre, from Fliegende Hollander to Parsifal…..Roger Scruton’s take on Parsifal I have always found very helpful: “I suggest that we are redeemed when the taint of wrong relations is washed away, when we can rejoin the community, freely accepting and accepted, able to lead a new life without sin. To achieve this condition we depend on those who can heal our wounds, who can perform the priestly office of retrieving, from the dark places of humiliation, the precious part of ourselves that was then severed from us. The outgoing part of us, the will that seeks to imprint the trials and triumphs of individuality on the world, once ventured forth, only to fall into sin. Redemption does not consist……. in the renunciation of the will, but in the recuperation of the will from tainted relations, and its return to a life of agapē. This work of recuperation cannot be achieved alone. Agapē comes to us from others, and in particular from the great examples of compassion”

Anyway……one final set of comments  – about misogyny. While it is true that you can see all the female figures in the opera as in some way or other symbolically subordinate to the men, this is actually an observation about how the women are controlled by the men rather than a statement of how things SHOULD be, and it is heartbreaking when Kundry is released from that control – OK, by a man, but that raises much wider issues about a Saviour. Work in progress….

In terms of the performers, there were three stand-outs. For me an unexpected star was Kundry – I have never heard the role sung as well as it was by Katarina Karnéus. She had it all – some beautiful phrasing (in ‘Ich sah das Kind an seiner Mutter Brust’), the fire to deliver the ‘Lachte’ notes, and the acting ability to convey the agony she experiences. Brindley Sherratt was an ideal Gurnemaanz – beautiful voice, beautiful diction, imposing presence; this was world class. And Derek Welton’s Klingsor was pure malevolence – a bit over the top, maybe, but strongly sung (I remember him being excellent at Bayreuth in 2017). But Toby Spence as Parsifal and Robert Hayward were in their different ways almost their equal  -Spence had much more vocal strength and projection than I was expecting and conveyed very well the transition from Fool to ? Redeemer/signifier to Redeemer. His Act 2 duet with Karneus was memorable for its intensity. And Hayward was much better than I remember him being in the ON Ring – strong-voiced and Amfortas was well-characterised.

All in all – a great evening!!! And made more enjoyable by the presence of some other Manchester Wagner Society colleagues and an old friend and his partner

This is being broadcast sometime by the BBC – watch out for it!!

BRITTEN Peter Grimes: Four Sea Interludes, ADÈS Inferno Suite, WALTON Belshazzar’s Feast. The Hallé with Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus and Leeds Festival Chorus; Conductor Finnegan Downie Dear, Baritone, Benjamin Nelson

This sounded like a very good concert though my hearing is a bit all over the place till Tuesday afternoon (visit to clinic).

The City Hall copes very well with the bright sounds that these three pieces offer. The Halle sounded in great form and the jazzy inner voices of the Walton came out well. The Britten in particular sounded incisive, passionate and really well characterised, with the complex harmonies of the Sunday morning church scene particularly memorable

The Adès piece I had heard in full last October at Covent Garden and it was remarkable in these extracts from the Inferno section of the ballet how many of the themes and turns of phrase I remembered. It all sounded exceptionally well under the Halle’s playing and this deserves to be a modern classic. It was clearly appreciated by a Sheffield audience not necessarily prone to welcome the new with open arms. The one thing I did think is that maybe Adès needs to consider is how to end this ‘symphony’ of extracts. The penultimate movement is riotous – very accessible and great fun; it drew spirited applause. The final scene -the actual encounter with the devil, in its nullity and blankness – I remember it being very powerful in its listlessness and inertia, in the theatre – but in the concert hall it is too short and not sufficiently audience drawing. It led to confusion at the end as to whether the work was over. I was struck again by how balletic this music is and the obvious influence of the big Tchaikovsky ballets

The Walton I doubt if I’ve heard live since the 70s. I’ve always enjoyed listening to it in the Previn recording from that era, and even seem to remember either Walton conducting it or coming on stage after it in the late 60s at the Proms.

The baritone, Benjamin Nelson, was very good in projecting the drama, with very clear diction. The Halle wee admirably tight in all the jazzy rhythms, and the racket was indeed colossal in the closing bars! The combined Leeds and Sheffield choruses didn’t quite have the heft one might imagine from such a large group of singers but I have to say that they sounded very effective, with little in the way of flabby sound. I realised how tricky a lot of the harmonies are particularly for the women choristers – it can’t be easy to sing
I also thought their diction was very good. A danger with this work is that the conductor ets over excited and the music moves too fast to really be able to snap and crackle That didn’t happen, but there were some rather exaggerated rallentandos, I thought

The concert did give me though lots of gloomy thoughts on the future of concert going at least in Sheffield. The concert was one that before the pandemic would have had the hall comfortably full, if not packed out. This one 3 years on had swathes of empty seats on the stalls and the gallery was closed off – and this despite two hundred or so choristers with potentially relatives to cheer them on. Part of the problem is the size of the hall – 2200. Part of the problem may be continued nervousness about infection and the pandemic. But it may be that the audience is simply dying off and not being replaced and the other problem that Sheffield has is that it is simply a much smaller place than Manchester and doesn’t have the surrounding conurbations to attract in the way Manchester does. The latter seems to have been much better too at attracting a student audience which is clearly vital for the future. What’s needed really is a smaller building and maybe less ambitious programming – but then that risks a spiralling decline. Before the concert the new Sheffield International concert season was announced. It’s got some big names – Vengerov, Benedetti – but I doubt if it’s going to pack them in. This seems to be very much a regional problem not a London and SE problem, though it will be interesting to see how the Proms fare this year. Sheffield also suffers because unlike Liverpool Birmingham and Manchester it doesn’t have its own ‘ home’ orchestra with the particular loyalty that provokes
To be honest if this concert didn’t pull them in it’s hard to see what would. Too many concerts are recycling the same narrow band of works and despite the whole pandemic experience orchestral managers are just retreating to business as usual.

CAST: Bradley Daley SIEGFRIED; Adrian Dwyer MIME; Paul Carey Jones THE WANDERER; Mark Stone ALBERICH; Simon Wilding FAFNER; Julieth Lozano WALDVOGEL; Mae Heydorn ERDA; Lee Bisset BRÜNNHILDE; CONDUCTOR Anthony Negus; DIRECTOR Amy Lane; SET AND PROPS DESIGNER Rhiannon Newman Brown; LIGHTING DESIGNER Charlie Morgan Jones; COSTUME DESIGNER Emma Ryott

What is it with Wagner and chicken barns?  Other members of the Manchester Wagner Society have long enthused to me about Wagner at the Longborough Festival opera house, and finally this year, with the resumption of full stagings after the pandemic, I decided to give it a go, choosing the Jubilee weekend as an appropriate time to not be in my home village, rightly or wrongly.

I guess part of a true mythic quest involves difficulty and inaccessibility – and indeed Bayreuth in 1876 was a pretty out of the way place – so, being car-less for the weekend I anticipated some difficulties. And difficulties there were – I had blithely booked accommodation at the Fire Services College in Moreton-in-Marsh, without looking too closely at the distances involved. There were no taxis available for the entire weekend in the Cotswolds – they all seemed to be employed in carrying wealthy Cotswolds dwellers to and from Heathrow – so I had to walk one hour 40 minutes to and from Longborough back to Moreton-in-Marsh, in miserable wet weather, the journey back being partly in the dark and a bit scary on the main road, even with a high vis jacket. Difficulties also manifested themselves with the weather at the opera house. The Manchester Wagner Soc people I had agreed to meet had very kindly set up a hamper of food and a gazebo in the grounds. It was very cold…. we had some super meals but dismantling the gazebo and getting drenched in the process before Act 3 of Siegfried took the principle of arduous quest to a new level of extremity. Added to which, my ears were full of olive oil (I’ll not go into the gory details) so my hearing wasn’t always 100%. Thus….lots of trials and tribulations….

So was it all worth it? The short answer is ‘yes’, though with a qualification I’ll mention at the end.  The opera house really did start life as a chicken barn, though now extended and with a range of trailers at the back for artists. It seats 500, the orchestra is mostly located under the stage, there are no flies, no real stage machinery and the stage is small. What makes it special is the proximity (unless you’re sitting in very expensive stalls seats at ROHCG or ENO) of audience to singers and the very special sense of engagement which that creates. It is a very bonkers project indeed to stage Wagner in this set-up and charge high prices but somehow the price seems justified.

In terms of this performance there were mostly pluses and a few minor minuses. The huge major plus was Anthony Negus’ conducting and the orchestra. What was notable about Negus’ conducting was the way everything felt ‘right’ in the flow of the music and in the speed relationships of different scenes. In particular the way the 3rd Act was paced felt instinctively right – enough slowness to appreciate the majesty of the music in the Wotan /Erda scene, enough speed to ensure that the Wotan / Siegfried scene didn’t drag  and enough flexibility to encompass both the stillness and wonder of the mountain surrounded by fire and the passion of Siegfried and Brunnhilde. The orchestra in a reduced orchestration (60 rather than 100+) sounded very fine, with some beautiful woodwind and horn playing. The orchestra pit, recessed, as I say, underneath the stage  doesn’t, unlike Bayreuth, have a cowl pushing the sound to the back of the stage before coming into the auditorium with a wonderfully melded feel – this seems to create problems of balance sometimes which are nothing to do with Negus but simply emerge from where particular groups of instruments are sited ( thus some of the climaxes are less overwhelming than they night otherwise be -on the other hand this might just be my olive-oil drenched ears).

The most effective part of the physical staging were the extensive range of video images projected onto the back screen of the set – there were bears, forests, streams, abstract images, sunrises – too many to name all of them. They always enhanced the action on stage, never detracted from it and I am surprised they are not used more often in Wagner productions, given the difficulties of Wagner’s stage directions. The basic set was a series of platforms that looked a bit ramshackle and further constricted a small stage. The problems of this approach were most apparent in the final duet, where Siegfried and Brunnhilde had to declaim to each other stuck on opposite platforms and then totter down steps to perform the final clinch. For the most part though this wasn’t so much of a problem, and of course Mime’s cave should feel constricted and cluttered. There were a few oddities of staging – it wasn’t clear whether there was any deep meaning in Wotan’s bringing Brunnhilde on stage to lie asleep on the rock or whether, given the lack of machinery, this was the only way to get her on stage. Less controversial was Fafner being a top-hatted Victorian Scrooge like figure on crutches – slightly au Chereau. The Woodbird was a very visible figure on stage – human, again, perhaps a little Victorian (possibly a virtuous clerk) – writing in a book and referring to it (maybe the book of nature). It wasn’t clear what her relationship with Wotan was – if the latter was in anyway ‘controlling’ her that would seem to be against the whole concept of the Wanderer’s renunciation of his god-hood. Anyway, it’s a clever idea and fully justified by Wagner’s text.

The best singer and performer was Paul Carey-Jones as Wotan. He’s not got a big voice – I wonder how he would fare in a bigger theatre in this role – and not as dark or as deep as maybe an ideal Wotan should sound. But he sang beautifully and characterfully – good word pointing and sensitive phrasing. Adrian Dwyer’s Mime was also excellent, in its way, but this was quite a quirky reading of the role – not the usual caricature evil dwarf but a tallish languid urban bachelor, maybe slightly hipsterish, in his 40s, amiable on the surface but deeply malevolent underneath. This seems to be not quite what Wagner intended, but in its own terms it was well done. Lee Bisset was one of the most believable and striking Brunnhildes I’ve seen and in her middle and lower ranges her voice was beautiful.  However her high extended notes had a heavy vibrato, and she emitted a graceless  squawk of a top C at the end (on the other hand at least she tried, unlike the one in the LPO performance just before lockdown)

Bradley Daley as Siegfried had of course a thankless task in the role, as every performer taking on ‘Siegfried ‘ does. He didn’t look stupidly old in the role; he was unfailing in vocal and physical energy and sounded much the same at the end of the evening as he did at the beginning. This is all one can reasonably ask any Siegfried to offer. He had a voice that offered not much variation but he did hit the high notes with ease, and he was at times sensitive in the lyrical passages. He made a decent shot of acting the impetuous teenager. All in all, his contribution was significant and appreciated.

There was a rather wobbly Erda, an excellent bright voiced Woodbird, and a resonant Alberich, looking very much like Wotan – the director clearly playing on the licht-Alberich, schwarz-Alberich comparisons in the text.

In short this was a story telling Ring approach and very successful on its own terms.

Would I go again? Yes in both senses – I am going to Die Tote Stadt in two weeks time and I will certainly make plans to go to Gotterdammerung next year. Would I go to a full Ring cycle in 24 or 25. Hmmmm – a week in the Cotswolds tramping backwards and forwards from Moreton or Stow on the Wold might be a bit much……

COPLAND Duo for Flute & Piano; WEIR Airs from Another Planet; MOZART Quintet for im Horton’s Piano and Wind in E flat K452: Ensemble 360

Not really a great deal to say here. I found the Copland work as undistinguished as other works I have come across of his recently. It was very well performed by flautist and pianist

The Judith Weir piece promised to be fun, but actually wasn’t really…..it was premised on the idea of space colonists remembering the Scottish folk songs from several generations back their ancestors sung before moving to Mars. Anyone expecting an Orkney Wedding style would be disappointed……

The Mozart was very well played, and lovely to listen to. Not one of Mozart’s darker pieces…..

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas No.30 in E Op.109; No.31 in A flat Op.110; 32 in C minor Op.111; WALLEN The Negro Speaks of Rivers; FRANCES-HOAD Invocation; BEETHOVEN Cello Sonata Op.102 No.2 Tim Horton, Ensemble 360

These are very difficult works to listen to with many incidental – indeed transcendental –  beauties,  but often with quirks and turns which make it difficult to know where the music is going – as I seem to remember Barenboim saying, even if you play two notes on a piano you are in a way telling a story because you are setting up a relationship between the two and asking the question ‘what next?’. Telling a story, however complex, does seem particularly important in these sonatas. One of my favourite movements in these great works, the final movement of Op109 ends particularly abruptly – and indeed I’m put in mind of the end of the Missa Solemnis which has a similar ‘that’s it, take it or leave it’ feel. In the case of the latter work, it’s very much up to the conductor and the speed relationships established in the Agnus Dei as to whether that ending makes sense and the same of course is true of the pianist in these sonatas. So in Op 109 I felt, in Tim Horton’s performance, that the first movement was too fast and unvarying, while the slow movement seemed under characterised and too quick. Consequently, the ending seemed too abrupt and without clear meaning. In Op 110 I didn’t get a sense of ‘the story’ either. In Op111 however there was a much better sense of narrative and the second, slow, movement was taken at a much slower pace than Op 109 and was very beautiful, with a real sense of peaceful resolution at the end.

It will be interesting to hear how Andras Schiff plays these works at the Proms in early September (I bought a Proms weekend standing pass for that and the two Berlin Phil concerts)

I had planned to stay for the second half of this concert but felt so emotionally drained after 80 mins or so of these works without a break that I felt the better course was to go home at the interval!

Director, David Alden; Set designer Paul Steinberg; Costume designer, Gideon Davey; Lighting designer, Adam Silverman. Conductor, Jakub Hruša; Brandon Jovanovich, Lohengrin; Jennifer Davis, Elsa; Maida Hundeling, Ortrud; Craig Colclough, Telramund; Gábor Bretz, King Henry

This is only the third live production I’ve been to of Lohengrin. The first was in 1972 at Bayreuth (a Wolfgang Wagner production), the second was the Moshinsky production at Covent Garden in the late 1970’s (Haitink conducting, Rene Kollo, Lohengrin) to which I went maybe 2-3 times, and the third was this, David Alden  one which I saw in its first outing in 2018. I have to say this time round the Alden production made a much more powerful impression – I’m not sure why the 2018 one didn’t: maybe it was where I was sitting, possibly I was tired…….certainly I had it in my mind that it was good but I had no memory it had been THIS good. This was another of those evenings when you think – of all the art forms, when opera gets it right there’s nothing to beat it

The design context is post First World War – partially ruined buildings, wounded civilians. Clothing for the chorus is generally 1920s. The buildings are mainly brick/concrete/metal-looking structures, distorted to look shelled or partially destroyed by fire, and  which can be moved around cleverly to represent the town square, Cathedral  a dungeon and so forth. The German presence is threatening – soldiers with guns oversee the Brabant populace. The Brabantines are needy, wanting a leader. King Henry is not the leader they hope for – he’s portrayed as weak,  lacking authority. When Lohengrin arrives, he is seen as the leader the Brabantines have wished for and he becomes a cult figure – a giant white Swan monument Albert Speer-style is at the back of the stage for the conclusion of Act 2, and red, white and black Swan banners decorate the last part of Act 3, with fairly obvious but still powerful connotations. The one totally different scene is Act 3 scene 1, a white/faun coloured bedroom with a huge Neuschwanstein painting of the arrival of Lohengrin on the wall. The lighting by Adam Silverman was beautiful and effective. The one thing that may be didn’t work in the production was the use of the auditorium at the end of Act 2 and very beginning of Act 3 – the toasting of the happy couple by Ortrud from a box made some sort of in-character sense, but why Lohengrin and Elsa were wandering around the Stalls seats on the way to the bedroom didn’t really add much…..though quite amusing

The very clear trajectory of the opera as seen by Alden is from delusional belief – in leaders, in a religious saviour figure, in love and a perfect romantic partner – towards a clearer understanding of self and others. Lohengrin himself is to some extent delusional – he seems willing to combine at first his role as a Knight of the Grail with his marriage to Elsa, and leadership of the Brabantines to war, yet these are unreconcilable opposites which he has to choose between. The pivotal question both Lohengrin and Elsa have to ask themselves and answer is – who are you? By the end of the opera there has been some kind of progress towards a new reality, based upon  as so often in Wagner a sort of renunciation:

• Renunciation by Lohengrin of an ordinary ‘human’ life for his real vocation as a Grail Knight
• Renunciation by Elsa of her marriage to Lohengrin for either life with her new-found brother (though the stage directions say she falls lifeless into Gottfried’s arms at the end, to me she still looked alive in this production), or, if a death, a death that represents a new understanding of her failings and transforms her death into a new truth
• Renunciation by the community from Lohengrin as supreme leader to a new rightful heir to the throne of Brabant, Gottfried.

Gottfried’s gradual emergence from a crumpled rally banner, holding up a sword – which  in a Wagnerian setting, is something positive, representing new life – is one of the great coups of this production and gives it a more positive and moving ending than most (the other great coups are Telramund bursting through the paper walls to kill Lohengrin at the climax of Act 3 Scene 1, and the collapse of the banners as the Brabantine community realises it delusions about leadership in the last scene ). The one person who consistently speaks the truth is Ortrud, and she sees through both Lohengrin’s and Elsa’s delusions. However, she uses that understanding, integrity and insight, that self-knowledge, only to promote her own and her husband’s interests, and to destroy Elsa – in some ways almost a prototype of Wotan. The concept of how religious faith ‘works’ is explored – Lohengrin is seen by Elsa as a saviour figure, to be believed uncritically. By the last act, her last words essentially to us are ‘ Lord, Have mercy upon me’ as she realises the extent of her delusion (and here I wonder if Wagner was aware of the resonances with ‘Erbarme Dich’ in the St Matthew Passion – would he have heard one of Mendelssohn’s performances) – she has moved from her image of an idealised Saviour to a radical emptying of self and a reliance on God’s mercy.. Telramund is a weak self interested figure unable to measure up to any of the three major protagonists

There are many glorious moments in this score and musically chorus and orchestra were on top form. The chorus was in fact tremendous – quite the best singing I’ve heard from them in a long time. I don’t remember them being quite as good in 2018. Similarly the conductor in 2018 was Andris Nelsons  but Jakob Hrusa’s conducting was equally effective In bringing out the power and beauty of this score (rumour has it he might be one of the contenders for Pappano’s position in 2024)

As Lohengrin Brandon Jovanovitch was very effective – he looked good, moved well, engaged fully with the other singers . He also sung sensitively. His voice was getting tired towards the end of Act 3. Jennifer Davis’ Elsa was much more variedly and sensitively sung than in 2018. The last two performances of this run had a different Ortrud – this was Maida Hundeling, who was extremely ‘in your face’ ,- which is a totally reasonable way to play the role. She’s a mid- career German singer, with a powerful voice; not much subtlety, but in this role subtlety might be a disadvantage! Telramund  played by Craig Colclough, is a protoGunther type  manipulated by a powerful woman. Mr Colclough didn’t make much of an impression but then that’s also possibly in-character. Gabor Bretz conveyed the right sort of unsteadiness as King Henry, in a good way – his is an excellent Wagnerian bass voice (I remember him singing a good Act 3 Parsifal Gurnemanz with Mark Elder in York Minster)

All in all, a very memorable evening! This will have to be in my top ten live musical events of the year!

Richard Strauss: Don Juan, Burleske, Also sprach Zarathustra: Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Andris Nelsons conductor, Rudolf, Buchbinder, piano

All the paeans of praise about this great orchestra from last night are equally applicable again tonight. A few points I perhaps missed out:

• The clarity and precision of the orchestral sound, even in very dense passages. In these complex scores, with many different things happening on different instruments at once, it was extraordinary how much you could hear of the individual lines, particularly in Also Sprach Zarathustra
• At the same time, unlike, say, Rattle occasionally, the clarity and beauty of line did not get in the way of drama and pushing the music forward when it needed to be – the blend seemed to me just right, and we didn’t move in to ‘beauty at all costs’ territory

There was so much to enjoy in this second concert – in Don Juan, the rush of the strings at the start, the glorious sound of the horns in their big tune in that piece, and the sheer strength and passion of the strings when they repeat the horn theme at the climax of the work, plus the beauty of the oboe in the second love scene, for instance.

Burleske is not a work I know – apparently, it’s an early piece originally written when Strauss was 21 and after various revisions eventually published in 1894. It became eventually one of his favourite works, and he programmed it in his last concert in London with the Philharmonia Orchestra in September 1947, along with Don Juan, the Symphonia Domestica and the waltzes from Der Rosenkavalier. I can’t say I would particularly welcome a second hearing but it’s a pleasant enough piece and Rudolf Buchbonder dashed it off with brilliance although with also what sounded to me like quite a small tone. His encore was a piece elaborating music from Die Fledermaus, I am not quite sure by who. I wonder what Yuja Wang, originally down to play the Burleske, would have made of the piece?

Also Sprach Zarathustra received the most engaging performance I’ve heard live. It’s always seemed to me a rather poor cousin of Ein Heldenleben, Don Quixote, the Alpine Symphony and even the Symphonia Domestica – without the melodic invention of these works and much ‘bittier’ in some ways. But the brilliance of the orchestra engaged me more than I ever have been before as I listened to the piece unfolding, and the sequences, and how they fit together, made more sense.

All in all these two concerts have been terrific. As the Times reviewer said this morning “In the way that the starving man dreams of roast dinners with all the trimmings, so in the endless Covid winter a visit from an orchestra like the Leipzig Gewandhaus with huge romantic works was the sort of thing that classical music lovers fantasised about.”. And now it’s come true! My only slight grouse is that those promoting the tours of these big European orchestras seem to have a short memory of what they have played in the same venue previously. In the case of the Leipzigers, it didn’t bother me because I wasn’t there for it, but Chailly and the Leipzig Orchestra played Don Juan, Also Sprach Zarathustra and Ein Heldenleben in 2015; it seems strange to be doing the same pieces 7 years and only 1 visit later. Similarly I note that the Berlin Philharmonic is performing Mahler 7 at the Proms with Kirill Petrenko, yet it is only ?6 years since Rattle and the BPO performed this work. Strange….

Dinara Klinton piano: Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor Op. 111; Prokofiev, Piano Sonata No. 8 in B flat Op. 84

The Benjamin Britten Piano Fellowship was won in 2014 by Ukrainian-born Dinara Klinton who currently combines the role of Professor of Piano at the Royal College of Music with her career as a concert and recording artist.  Like Heldenleben in my last blog post, the late Beethoven piano sonatas are also in the London buses category – I’m hearing them several times in the next few months – next week in Sheffield and Andras Schiff in September at the Proms

Ms Klinton gave what I thought was a very clear exposition of the Op 111 Beethoven sonata – muscular and rhythmically tense in the first movement and taking me on a story I could understand in the 2^nd. It probably wasn’t a performance strong on mystical insights, but I found it very satisfying, with the different stages of the variations clearly delineated. I enjoyed also the Prokofiev Piano Sonata, apparently the third and longest of the Three War Sonatas he wrote, first performed at the end of 1944, in Moscow, by Emil Gilels. Again, Ms Klinton signposted very clearly for me the different stages of the sonata’s journey, with the wistful ballet-like melodies very well-done, and some ferociously clear and steely playing in the finale. One of the better of the lunchtime recitals I have been to recently…..

Ms Klinton played two encores – one was a piece called ‘Song’ by a Ukrainian composer written in 1929; the other piece might have been by Rachmaninov

Richard Strauss: Macbeth, Der Rosenkavalier suite, Ein Heldenleben: Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Andris Nelsons conductor

The concert was supposed to be the first of four this week, with not only the Leipzig but also the Boston Symphony, Nelsons’ two orchestras, and featuring with the BSO at the Festival Hall the Alpine Symphony, the Sinfonia Domestica, Lisa Davidsen singing the 4 Last Songs and extracts from Salome – a completely mind-blowing week in prospect! Sadly the Boston bit fell through but at least the Leipzig part has gone ahead and this, the first of two, was a very fine concert indeed. It’s 3 years almost since I heard one of the great European orchestras live (oddly enough amongst other things also playing the Rosenkavalier Suite – the Bavarian RSO with Yannick Nezet-Seguin at the Proms in July 2019). I last heard – I think – the Leipzig Orchestra in 2017 at the Barbican – playing Bruckner 7 with Herbert Blomstedt  

The Leipzig Orchestra – coming up for its 280th birthday – is truly excellent and clearly enjoys working with Nelsons, their chief conductor.  Their sound is ideal for Strauss – the firmness and fruitiness of the combination of cellos and horns at the opening of Ein Heldenleben, the glorious interweaving of the principal horn and other principal woodwind in lyrical passages, the voluptuousness of the upper strings, the assertiveness of the timpani – all seem part of an organic whole. Ein Heldenleben had the most distinctive and enjoyable reading of the three pieces in the concert, and indeed I don’t think I’ve ever heard it live since a memorable performance at the RFH with the Berlin PO and Karajan in 1972, so it was doubly exciting to hear it in concert after nearly 50 years! Oddly, as seems to be the way with concert programming, some works come along a bit like London buses – nothing for ages but then actually there are three performances of Ein Heldenleben I am going to this year (others being the Oslo Phil and Klaus Makela at the Proms and Mark Elder and the Halle in Manchester). This was certainly a more characterful and sensitive performance than the old Chicago S 0 /Reiner RCA recording I got to know the work from (I can remember very little of the Karajan performance). Among its many excellent aspects were:

• Some very varied and really characterful violin solo playing – much better than the Reiner recording
• Nelsons’ judging of the degrees of climax in the music which were very carefully handled, particularly in the battle scene
• Some beautiful phrasing, the sheer lushness of the Leipzig strings at full stretch, and ultra quiet playing in the love scene and the closing sequence
• The malevolence of the woodwind critics – somehow spot-lit and made much more characterful, sometimes more amusing, sometimes more malevolent than I remember, by the orchestra and Nelsons
• The power and noise of the orchestra at full throttle when unleashed by Nelsons, and the splendour of the return of the main theme after the battle

There are aspects of Ein Heldenleben which can make you slightly queasy, but this was as good a case as you could make for the piece, I think, and the final bars were really very moving.

The Rosenkavalier Suite featured beautiful woodwind playing, particularly in the orchestral simulation of the glorious final trio, whooping horns superbly done, and the whole thing was superbly played, huge fun, and a great reminder of what a wonderful piece this is. The Macbeth tone poem is an early work and frankly not that interesting.

Though it was not sold out, there was a good very appreciative crowd – indeed this is the first really world-class major orchestra I think to have come to London from outside the UK since the pandemic