BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Colin Currie conductor. Steve Reich Variations for Winds, Strings, and Keyboards; John Adams Frenzy (2023); Gabriella Smith f(x)=sin²x-1/x; Steve Reich The Four Sections
I had missed two concerts focusing on Steve Reich in Manchester in recent years, one because of a train strike, another because of bad weather cancelling trains. So, I was determined to get to this one – and I did, albeit with a grossly delayed homeward journey. As it happens, I was much more struck by the Adams piece than the two Reich ones in the programnme. The problem with the more trance-like slow moving minimalist pieces is that they send me to sleep after about 10 mins. I get the point – a sort of Zen-like meditation rather than the forward thrust and ‘meaning’ of more traditional works, but they are nonetheless soporific…..With the Reich Variations, I began by really enjoying the woodwind sounds it starts with, and the slow yet constant changes of harmony, as well as the swell and decline of the strings, and the gradual metamorphoses which were taking place – and then I slept.
The Adams piece, ‘Frenzy’. a newish piece (2023) first conducted by Simon Rattle, on the other hand is strangely traditional in its constant development of two motifs – what Adams describes as “a punctuated tattoo in the winds and the brass, and an urgent muscular theme in the upper strings’. Here the slow meditative gradually shifting sounds of Reich are replaced by manic, dense and forceful activity as these motifs are developed. In the midst of all the rushing around is a rather beautiful quasi-slow movement, rather haunting, which emphasises that there seems to be some sort of personal story suggested here, ‘frenzy’ against an inner calm. Occasionally the tools of minimalism are used but to very different ends. I liked this a lot and will try to listen to it again when the BBC broadcast it (as they will, it being the BBC Phil).
You don’t get music titles much more pretentious than ‘f(x)=sin²x-1/x’, which is something about measuring mathematically the progress of this piece of music, with a horizontal axis of time and a vertical axis of energy and dynamics. It has some interesting sounds and certainly didn’t outstay its welcome.
The other Reich piece (The Four Sections, as in the sections of the orchestra) moves from slow to moderate to fast, with gradually changing melodic material and some thunderous climaxes (rather reminiscent of the Rite of Spring). I didn’t fall asleep this time, but I did feel the Adams piece was the more rewarding one to listen to.
The BBC Phil played it all with great skill and enthusiasm, making a huge noise, particularly in the Four Sections
Conductor, Nicholas Carter; Director, Otto Schenk; Designer, Günther Schneider Siemssen; Costumes, Milena Canonero; Lighting, Gil Wechsler. Arabella, Rachel Willis-Sørensen; Zdenka, Louise Alder; Fiakermilli, Julie Roset; Countess Adelaide Waldner, Karen Cargill; Matteo, Pavol Breslik; Mandryka, Tomasz Konieczny; Count Waldner, Brindley Sherratt
This production looks like something from another era (and indeed it is – first seen in 1983) and may be, for some, as much a sentimental journey back to a period of operatic history long before the advent of regie-theater, as the work was for Strauss and Hofmannsthal in the evocation of a long-gone mid-19th century Vienna in the context of the 1920’s / early 30’s. How long is it since you heard a Covent Garden audience clap at the opening of the curtains on an act? – the Met audience was doing it ecstatically at the beginning of each act in this screening. Here is an idea of what the general mis-en-scene looks like and there’s also a clip of Arabella singing ‘Aber der Richtige’. Arabella: Live in HD ; Strauss’s Arabella: “Aber der Richtige” (Rachel Willis-Sørensen)
As I have said before in this blog, a cinema screening is a different experience from a live performance on stage as far as the audience is concerned. Things which would go undetected in what you’d see on stage in a live performance can be mercilessly shown up on the screen. While the slightly dilapidated sense of the scenery in the first and third acts could be reasonably explained away as demonstrating the kind of downmarket hotel the Waldners now have to stay in when in Vienna, owing to their penurious state, the second act also looked dingy, and as though it had seen better days, and this, I guess, is a reflection that all the scenery is now over 40 years old…….The other thing which cinema is bound to show up is any noticeable difference between the age of the performer and that of the character they’re playing, and here I have to say that Rachel Willis-Sorensen, to me, looked just too mature on screen to be a credible Arabella, even though she sung it wonderfully (while Louise Alder, by contrast, only 3 years younger, was a highly believable Zdenka(o)). Such is the way of the big-screen.
But apart from the set and the maturity of Arabella, this was a highly satisfying performance (and also from a purely chauvinist perspective, it was highly satisfying to see that three of the 5 main roles were taken by Brits – plus with Susan Bickley playing a support role). Rachel Willis-Sorensen was commanding in her singing, with a beautiful sense of line and some lovely soft singing and floating of high notes. Vocally she had the heft as well to soar over the orchestra, and also that intangible ability to connect with her audience through her voice (difficult to say what this is, but you know it when you see and hear it). Her facial acting was very good – always alert and meaningful – no staring out front trying to work out the conductor’s beat……Willis-Sorensen was interesting, during an interval interview, on the feminism of the opera (not an often-expressed view). She felt that, apart from one or two phrases from a past perspective (‘I am a subject and you are a ruler’, she says at one point to Mandryka), Arabella is a forthright character who knows what she wants and is clear when she has found it – she doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Louise Alder was a sympathetic Zdenka, again with some beautiful phrasing, an always alert stage presence, and excellent acting. Mandryka was sung by Tomasz Konieczny, whose performance, I thought, was outstanding, though it was unclear how loud his voice would have sounded live at the Met. He was a thoroughly sympathetic presence, he acted very well and credibly, and didn’t overdo the wild man of the woods aspect – he just came across as a man of strong emotions, in many ways the counterpart of Arabella, and at the mercy of his temper. His voice was able to encompass both the high register aspects and low notes of parts of the role, and his singing, particularly in the early part of Act 2, where he is singing about the lands he owns and what he can offer Arabella, was glorious. Brindley Sherratt and Karen Cargill both clearly enjoyed themselves hamming up aspects of their roles, while retaining their stage credibility.
The name of Nicholas Carter, who was conducting, is new to me, but it’s clear from a brief Google search that he is a rising star – an Australian, he was appointed General Music Director of the Stuttgart Opera recently, and this was his Met debut. He was interviewed in one of the intervals about how he went about preparing the orchestra for this work, and he was very interesting on how important clarity was for him in delivering the score – he said something like “the different sections of the orchestra were wanting to play everything very full-on. But there are so many different strands in the music that you have to hold back, to play everything at less than 100% intensity, and then you will be able to create both the sound Strauss wanted and not drown the singers”. And indeed the orchestral playing did have a sort of transparency and delicacy about it which added to the whole experience.
I loved hearing this work again, after listening to it live for the first time in over 50 years when I was in Berlin last March. I hope it’s done somewhere in the UK soon
Director, Katie Mitchell; Costume Designer, Sussie Juhlin-Wallén; Lighting Designer, James Farncombe; Set Designer, Vicki Mortimer; Video Designer, Sasha Balmazi-Owen. Emilia Marty, Ausrine Stundyte; Albert Gregor, Sean Panikkar; Baron Jaroslav Prus, Johan Reuter; Dr Kolenatý, Henry Waddington; Vítek, Peter Hoare; Janek, Daniel Matoušek; Count Hauk-Šendorf, Alan Oke; Krista, Heather Engebretson; Stage door woman; Susan Bickley
Of the mature Janacek operas, it’s now only From the House of the Dead I have never heard…..This is, I think, the third production I have seen of this work – the first was an ENO one with Mackerras in the 70’s, the second was a very fine performance by WNO about 3 years ago in a joint production with Scottish Opera.
Reviews of this new ROHCG production were mixed, as far as what was happening on stage was concerned, but all agreed on its musical merits. The more I hear The Makropoulos Case, the less it seems outlandish and the more i find to enjoy. There were splendid, even great, aspects to this performance and some other areas where things didn’t go quite as well. Foremost amongst the very positive things were the playing of the orchestra, with Hrusa as conductor, and Ausrine Stundyte’s towering performance as Emilia Marty/Makropulos etc (hereafer EM). The orchestral playing was glorious. The score, which I have only heard a few times, is more lyrical than I remembered, and the strings produced sweetness and intensity for the emotionally charged passages. The combinations of instruments are sometimes quirky but one felt an inherent rightness about the balance achieved in those moments in this performance, obviously benefiting from Hrusa’s long association and detailed knowledge of the work. I recall some particularly subtle and impressive horn playing. At the same time when, as in the prelude to Act 1 , there are outbursts of energy, these were performed with great brilliance and accuracy. The, in the context, eerie and unworldly sound of the viola d’amore to suggest the iciness of EM’s personality and her inner life was wonderfully done. Hrusa and his musicians seemed to be having a love-in at the beginning and end of the performance – Pappano is no easy act to follow, and it is very heartening to see such mutual respect developing between Hrusa and his orchestra.
Ausrine Stundyte was outstanding as EM. Her tall glamorous presence was ideal for the role, and she delivered the challenging task of making her stage presence one of infinite hauteur and infinite boredom while still keeping the audience’s fascination and attention. Vocally she was ideal – a bright strong voice (I saw her as an excellent Elektra at ROH a couple of years ago) which could be coloured to present her quiet, weary, and sad asides effectively. There were no weak links among the singers – Sean Pannikar and Johann Reuter were particularly effective. Hrusa praised Henry Waddington on the “Insights” stream for his idiomatic Czech.
The director’s concept was of a work which was wholly contemporary in focus. This worked very well – the sets, the costumes, and the acting of the singers, all reflected this admirably. An enormous amount of work must have been done with the singers to get them moving and reacting to each other so normally, and this meant that the complicated to-ings and fro-ings of the plot, with all the details of the will, in Act 1 seemed entirely understandable. So far so good…….
Unfortunately, while direction and stage pictures made for an effective contemporary setting, and huge efforts had been made to create believable characters on stage, the problem with the production was that it was cluttered in ways which did not help our, or at any rate my, understanding of what was going on. The introduction of a lesbian relationship between EM and Krista is not too much of a complication, though what it adds to the main themes of the work is debatable. What did add unnecessarily to the complexity was the displays of texting, below the surtitles, going on between EM and Krista, Krista and Janek and Krista and her Dad. The Krista and Janek exchanges at least allowed Krista’s rooting around EMs hotel room, and all the memories of over 400 years to be displayed to the audience, but on the whole it was just confusing to cope with so much going on at the same time. There were various changes to stage directions in the last two acts – Krista shoots Janek rather than Janek killing himself, and Krista keeps the everlasting life formula rather than its being destroyed. These were not particularly bothersome – the main problem was the two-sets-at-a-time on stage approach, which restricted room for action and movement. This was particularly an issue in the last act (when in fact three different rooms were on display). EM’s bedroom on stage was far too small to allow her the space to die dramatically and appropriately, and accommodate the 4 or so people who have to witness it. From where I was – second row Upper Circle – it was sometimes difficult to see what was happening. The WNO/SNO production handled the demands of this act far more clearly, with a huge bed with sail-like curtains. Nor was there any attempt to represent EMs sudden ageing (very effectively done, again, by WNO/SO)
So this production, while its focus on the contemporary may well attract people who are not normally opera-goers (and from conversations overheard there were definitely young people in that category in the house), confused more than it enlightened. But its musical and acting strengths redeemed the clutter.
Anna Dennis, Susanna; Matthew Brook, Chelsias; Claire Lees, Daniel; James Hall, Joacim; Dorna Ashory, Teige Bisnought, Aaron Chaplin. Pikolwethu Luke, Graciela Mariqueo-Smith, Hannah McGlashon, Yasmina Patel, Tony Polo and other Phoenix Company Dancers. Johanna Soller, Conductor; Olivia Fuchs, Director; Marcus Jarrell Willis, Choreographer; Zahra Mansouri, Set & Costume Designer; Jake Wiltshire, Lighting Designer
Another Handel oratorio/opera new to me! This was directed by Olivia Fuchs, who had also directed recently the brilliant WNO Britten Death in Venice, and, like that production (which had involved circus acrobats) this brought together singers from ON with artists from another medium, in this case a dance company. Handel composed the music in the summer of 1748 and the work had its first performance at Covent Garden in February 1749. The story is taken from the apocryphal 13th chapter of the Old Testament Book of Daniel and involves the newly wed and virtuous Susanna, her faithful new husband Joacim, and some creepy Elders who try to seduce her and then accuse her of illicit sex outside her marriage. The prophet Daniel intervenes to sort things out and the Elders are suitably punished.
The day of the performance coincided with Storm Claudia which produced 50 mph winds and 24 hours’ worth of driving rain. My normal last train from Manchester was cancelled, and I was on the point of not going to the performance when I realised there was another way of getting back, albeit with difficulty, and that I would feel feeble if I missed seeing this work, probably my only chance to experience it live. I arrived at the Lowry thoroughly soaked, dripping with rain, with 15 minutes to go before curtain up. The Lowry had a far fuller audience than I have seen for other ON performances there, and also more diverse. I think perhaps this might have been the dance element bringing a different group along.
I hadn’t heard a note of this work before seeing it live – as with almost all the Handel opera and oratorios I have come across over the last few years. It has some fine numbers – the beautiful aria “Chastity. Thou Cherub Bright” which Daniel sings, and Susanna’s ‘Crystal Streams in Water Flowing’ – and there are some splendid choruses.
It felt perhaps more than some of Handel’s oratorios a little clunky as a staged piece – there is perhaps too slight a plot for 2 and a quarter hours and it feels quite static at times – nothing to do with the direction, but simply the ratio between action moving the plot forward and da capo arias and choruses. Hence I suppose the idea of teaming up with a dance company in performing the work, to enhance the interest of what was happening on stage. This idea worked for some but not all the time. This may be in part a personal reaction – I am much more an aural person than a visual one, and have never really responded that positively to dance and ballet. At times the dancers were making an effective commentary – a writhing dancer coming out of the bath tub in which Susanna is shortly to be propositioned by the Elders was a great piece of theatre, and some of the dancing at the beginning and end – during the wedding, and the rejoicing when Susanna is declared innocent – were both spectacular and relevant. But there were sections when the dancers unaccountably disappeared – it wasn’t very clear what the logic for their being or not being on stage was. To add to what was happening, there was also a BSL interpreter integrated with the crowd, who again came and went a bit.
You can see the costumes and set designs in the following trailer/advert, and in the photos at the end – Handel’s Susanna I Trailer (Opera North and Phoenix Dance Theatre) and Susanna | Opera North. The set was functional and the upper gallery was effective, so that both Susanna’s father, Joacim, Daniel and the two Elders could be seen to be singing from a different perspective or place. Quite what the metal Christmas tree thing upstage right was doing, or why the set was so cold-looking and grey I am not sure. Costumes were vaguely modern, mostly shades of brown and grey with Susanna in dazzling white and Joacim in a smart dark suit/white shirt. I suppose the general sense was of a monochrome society, and Susanna stands out in this production not only for her virtue and ‘chastity’ but also for the strength with which she defends herself against the two Elders and the miscarriage of justice, ending up with her flooring both the Elders, kicking one of them and holding the other in an arm lock which is wratched-up ever tighter as she goes up the scales with her coloratura.
In terms of singing and acting, this was a very strong cast and performance. I was struck first by the idiomatic playing, energy, and sheer joi-de-vivre of the ON orchestra. I have never come across her name before but whoever Johanna Soller is, she did a very good job with the orchestra. The choruses were strongly sung too – everyone sounding as though they were singing loud enough for two people, and with impressive discipline. Anna Dennis as Susanna was stunning. I kept trying to think where I had heard her name before, but certainly in this performance her singing and acting were outstanding – a pure voice without much vibrato, the coloratura pinged out with extraordinary accuracy, good shading of words and music, and she projected powerfully the sense of a driven, angry woman unjustly accused of adultery. The aria “Guilt trembling spoke my doom” was spectacularly delivered (and very well played by the orchestra). James Hall, another unfamiliar name, was truly excellent as Joacim, his countertenor voice not at all ‘hooty’ but strong, flexible, and clear with, again, excellent coloratura singing and some amazingly powerful top notes – he acted very well too. Claire Lees sang beautifully as Daniel in her big aria about chastity, and all the other parts were well taken.
Altogether this is a piece I’d love to hear again.
Christine Rice, Sister Helen Prejean; Michael Mayes, Joseph De Rocher; Sarah Connolly, Mrs Patrick De Rocher; Madeline Boreham, Sister Rose; Andrew Manea, Warden George Benton; Ronald Samm, Father Grenville; Gweneth Ann Rand, Kitty Hart; Jacques Imbrailo, Owen Hart. Kerem Hasan, Conductor; Annilese Miskimmon, Director, Alex Eales, Set Designer, Evie Gurney, Costume Designer; D.M. Wood, Lighting Designer
The first night of this new ENO production received rave reviews, so I was very much looking forward to seeing it. It seems extraordinary that this was the first professional stage production of Dead Man Walking there has ever been in the UK, after 25 years of performances all over the world since its premiere in 2000. Could there have been some snobbishness that delayed the decision to go ahead for so long? A feeling that it was a bit too, well, popular…..? I hope not……Yes, Dead Man Walking is tonal, with passages of gospel music, jazz, Elvis (!) and much else. But it has a gripping story, handled with great deftness in the libretto which in different hands might have sounded mawkish or toe-curling at points. Above all it is definitely an opera and not a play with music; it has duets, a sextet even, a striking use of the chorus at points, and, throughout the characters are communicating through the music as well as through the words they’re singing. The story lends itself very well to opera’s particular ability as an art form to tackle powerfully emotional story-telling, and communicate raw feelings. Sadly I fear that the real reason for its delayed UK appearance was probably the view that any company putting on a contemporary work would risk instant financial damage (which is what happened at the performance I went to, though I hope the rave reviews and 5 stars from several newspapers would mean better audiences for its remaining performances – on November 4, though, Balcony and Upper Circle where closed, and even the Stall and Dress Circle were not by any means full). But then why was Turnage’s Festen earlier this year sold-out? It remains a mystery why more people weren’t interested in seeing this production…..
The story is a true one, albeit fictionalised to preserve anonymity, written by a nun who had befriended several prisoners on death row, and talked with them to enable them to admit finally, and publicly, their guilt. In the case of the opera the composite convict is called Joseph and he finally admits in front of the parents of the two young people he had murdered, his responsibility for the murder and rape he committed, and his hope that his death will ease their pain. The nun’s account was first made into a film and then this opera. The nun, Sister Helen Prejean (who is still alive – now in her late 80’s) was happy for Heggie to write the opera as long as the Christian message of her story was not watered down. It isn’t – and whether you accept the Christian aspects of it or not, even from a secular perspective the opera is about powerful issues everyone has to consider – taking responsibility for your actions, loving others, whatever the cost, and of course it represents a powerful questioning of the need for capital punishment (Sister Helen became a leading US advocate for its abolition for many years). The opera raises many difficult moral issues – can a crime be so extreme it cannot be forgiven, the place of compassion as against justice, are there people so completely evil love cannot reach them? – the libretto deals sensitively with them all, and Sister Helen’s (self-doubting at times) perspective on these issues is balanced by the views of the parents of the young couple and the prisoner’s mother.
Heggie’s music is difficult to describe. It doesn’t really have any motifs for different characters, as far as I could tell, though there is the composed gospel song which opens the work and recurs at points throughout, including, as a solo for Sister Helen, at the very end. For the most part, the compositional style is a complex wash of melodic fragments, nearly all as far as I could tell not repeated or developed further, that are occasionally memorable and beautiful but always working well with both the words and the singers’ voices. I guess you could call it a bit like film music but it isn’t really – there are many occasions when words and music are together giving complex messages, with the music as powerful and important as the words. Musical highlights include the prisoner the scene where Joe (the prisoner)’s mother, Sister Helen and the two sets of parents sing in the Appeal Court of their feelings, and much of Sister Helen’s role. I mused afterwards how Puccini, say, might have tackled such a libretto. I am sure his approach would have been completely over-the-top, and by comparison with what he would have made of it, Heggie’s work sounds much more restrained – and that is all to the good, for 21st century sensibilities. All in all, this was everything an engaging contemporary opera should be – powerful, dealing with big issues, being something different from a film or play with music, and very moving. It’s not a short work – about two and a quarter hours – but always gripping, and the audience was as wholly engaged as they should have been.
And….this was an excellent production and set of performances……….. The set as in the photo below was two greyish white walls of an institutional building which served as the school in the ‘projects’ where Sister Helen worked with poor children, the prison and the court room where appeals were heard. This allowed the many scenes in the opera to be deftly transitioned, often by means of characters ascending and then descending a staircase via the upper level of the walls. At the end, the execution chamber was realised in terrifying detail, moving onto the stage in blazing white light. All the characters were believable, their movements appropriate and realistic, and their reactions superbly timed and realised. Annilese Miskimmon, one of the triumvirate who runs ENO currently, deserves huge credit for her brilliant production.
There was not one weak link in the cast. All sung and acted superbly. Christine Rice not only had the ability to sing the lyrics with a beautiful and varied line, but captured in great detail a character both awkward and sensitive – moving in an ungainly way, some hesitancy at times, faltering and self-doubting. I suspect the real Sister Helen is probably a more forthright person, but this was a brilliant representation of the character. Michael Mayes, who has sung the role in many productions since 2018, was outstanding as Joe – he has a big stage presence, a resounding voice and is a large man – all these elements making him very credible in the tough but ultimately fearful prisoner role, and he sang superbly. Sarah Connolly was luxury casting as Joe’s mother, and she offered a highly convincing and touching portrayal of someone not really coping with what’s happening to her, and awkward when faced with authority. She leaves the stage still convinced that Joe is innocent, and Ms Connolly’s singing and acting was very moving. All the smaller parts were very well-done – I was particularly taken by Madeline Boreham’s account of Sister Rose. Kerem Hasan and the ENO orchestra did everything they could to realise Heggie’s music vividly and sensitively, and at the same time Hasan’s control of dynamics meant the singers were never overpowered by the big orchestra Heggie requires. Perhaps my only quibble would be the use of Southern US accents by the cast, which came and went a bit among the UK members of it.
So…..I think this was a powerful work, which we have waited too long to see in this country. I am still asking myself why, in the end, I was more impressed by Turnage’s Festen seen earlier this year. Both are works with powerful stories – in Festen’s case sexual abuse – which started life in other mediums (in Festen’s case film). Perhaps in the end the music has more character – I am not sure and need to think about it.
Klein, String Trio; Smit, Trio for Clarinet, Viola and Piano; Messiaen, Quartet for the End of Time
This concert was preceded by an hour or so with a lecturer from the Birmingham Conservatoire talking about Messiaen, with the aid of two of the evening’s players to provide musical illustrations. One of the fascinating things we learned is that Messiaen was a veritable thieving magpie among composers, constantly using and re-using segments of other people’s music. There was a brief extract from the Prelude to Boris Godunov which is used several times in the Quartet, as an example. We also heard a recording of birds singing outside Messiaen’s country summer composing house – they were extremely loud, and insistent their voices should be heard on his music! The cellist spoke about how difficult it was to sustain the long high notes of her glorious duet with the piano in the middle of the work. The lecturer pointed out how consistently Messiaen had worked on the Christian concepts of heaven, hell and eternity throughout his long life of composing, exemplifying this by looking at the Quartet, near the beginning of his career, and Eclairs sur l’au-dela, written 40 years later All in all, a very absorbing hour………..
The two compositions by Klein and Smit, who were both murdered in Nazi extermination camps., are very different in style. The Klein work was the more immediate and gripping. and i think one would feel that, even if you didn’t know that it was completed 9 days before he was transported to Auschwitz. Its writing is raw and bitter at times but it also uses Czech folk music, sometimes almost violently as though the composer is grabbing onto aspects of normal life, unwilling to let go. Smit (who was Dutch) had a more formal distanced style – it was written in 1938 – and had less intensity. I wasn’t as engaged with it.
The Messiaen Quartet i have heard several times live. The Crucible music in the round space is ideal for this work – you experience its drama at very close quarters. All four musicians conveyed the sense of both fear and bliss which any good performance of this work must have, and clarinet, violin and cello played their big moments superbly. Gemma Rosefield and Benjamin Nabarro held the audience spellbound in the quiet beauty of their playing (except for the idiot who audibly moved out of his seat upstairs before the music faded into silence at the end). I don’t find this work easy listening but somehow you know – and you could feel everybody else in the audience knew – that every note counts in this piece and you have to listen intently. There was a rare stillness in the audience [apart from the idiot at the end) and at the end, after the whisper of the violin dies into silence, stomping of approval on the wooden floor and tiers
JS BACH (arr. Alexander Siloti) Prelude in E minor BWV855; GLASS Etude 2; JS BACH Prelude in C BWV846; CPE BACH Solfeggietto H220 Wq 117; GLASS Etude 9; JS BACH Prelude in F minor BWV857 ; GLASS Mad Rush; JS BACH (arr. Alfred Cortot) Arioso from Concerto No.5 in F minor BWV1056 ; MOONDOG Canon VIII ; JS BACH Sicilienne BWV1031; MONK Railroad; JS BACH Contrapunctus from ‘The Art of Fugue’; MOONDOG Barn Dance Pastoral; GLASS Opening; JS BACH (arr. Petri Sheep) Cantata ‘Schafe können sicher weiden’ BWV208; GLASS (arr. Shani Diluka) Tyrol Concerto (mvt 2); JS BACH Prelude in C minor BWV847
I haven’t come across the Monegasque-Sri Lankan pianist, Shani Diluka, before but she is clearly a very fine pianist with a substantial track record of appearing at prestigious venues including the Philharmonie de Paris, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and the Vienna Konzerthaus.
The theme of the programme was perhaps looser than Bach & American Minimalism -more like ‘Bach and a bunch of blokes who happened to be living in New York in the 1950’s to 1970’s who all knew each other and found inspiration in their composing from Bach’. But no matter – I may know Glass’ idiom fairly well, and indeed recognised a couple of the Glass pieces (I have an excellent recording of Glass piano works by Vikingur Olafsson), but Moondog and Keith Jarrett were completely new to me, and I have never, as far as I can recall, heard much of Cage’s music before. There was quite a lot of jazzy Jarrett music which had perhaps less obvious links than the others with Bach but even then there would have been the connection of improvisation, as well as melody. Ms Diluka gave very helpful comments on the composers and their music. As an encore she did ‘something completely different’ and played something by de Falla
All in all this was a rewarding and absorbing evening. More Glass in Sheffield next week…
John Adams conductor; Mary Bevan soprano; Hallé Choir (Matthew Hamilton, choral director). . John Adams: Slonimsky’s Earbox; Debussy/John Adams Le Livre de Baudelaire; John Adams ‘This is prophetic!’ (Pat’s Aria from Nixon in China); Harmonium
I have enjoyed listening to John Adams’ music for many years, and have several recordings of his music, but all the works programmed here were new to me (I am very much looking forward to seeing the Paris production of Nixon in China in February next year). I managed to listen to some parts of Harmonium before the concert and was particularly impressed by this work. And, of course, it was rather exciting to have Adams conducting these works in person (although he fairly often visits the UK, I haven’t seen him live before). It seems astonishing that he’s now 78, still lithe and energetic on the podium, and that Harmonium was composed 45 years ago.
Slonimsky’s Earbox, the first piece on the programme, I liked very much. Although it occasionally still has the driving motor rhythms of minimalism, Adams’ music by the mid 90s had become more complex and diverse and this piece, very much a display piece (and written for the Halle almost 30 years ago during Kent Nagano’s regime) plays with all sorts of Stravinsky-like sounds, particularly the Rite of Spring. I am not quite sure what it amounted to but it was great fun. Next up was Adams’ orchestration of 4 Debussy songs. These were beautifully sung by Mary Bevan, and the orchestration sounded exquisite and fascinating, but the experience was somewhat marred by the lack of words – not even the title of the songs – neither in the programme or on the surtitles screen (which was used for Harmonium’s poems). This was disappointing.
After the interval we had Pat’s aria from Nixon in China – a rather beautiful setting of some very thoughtful and resonant lines from the clearly excellent libretto by Alice Goodman. , again sung by Mary Bevan. Adams joked before about his problems with an American president – at which everyone laughed, thinking he meant Trump, but in fact he was referring to Nixon and Adams being drafted – or not – to Vietnam. There was warm applause when he talked about Pat’s aria’s words as intending to express something of what is good about America.
Harmonium is a most impressive work and I am amazed that I’ve never come across it before. It was written early in Adams’ career and though the motor rhythms are omni-present, the quality of the choral writing already indicates an individual voice very different from the world of Phillip Glass or Tim Riley’s In C. It’s a setting of three poems by Donne (Negative Love) and Emily Dickinson (‘Because I could not stop for death’ and ‘Wild Nights’. I thought it a very fine piece for the following reasons:
The choral writing is sensitive to the words and texture of the poems. In particular the first Emily Dickinson setting in its colouring clearly evokes this mysterious dream-like journey with death. The mad ecstasy of Wild Night is extraordinarily effectively conveyed by the choral writing, and the gradually increasing tension of the Donne poem is enhanced by the way the words are tossed around the choir
The three chosen poems work very well together in offering 3 different kinds of quasi- mystical experience. It is a piece which creates something more than the sum of its parts
The orchestral music is beautifully attuned to that sense of unworldly experience – the orchestral transition from the second to the third movement is remarkable in the way it moves from the icy stunned stillness of the first Dickinson poem to the momentum gradually gathering into the explosion of energy of ‘Wild Nights’
At the end the audience gave Adams, chorus and orchestra a completely justified standing ovation. The choir sung what must be very difficult music to get your vocal chords around and coordinated with the orchestra and conductor magnificently. Some get a bit sniffy about Adams, but for me – Harmonium particularly – this is just great music. Sadly I can’t go to the other concert Adams is giving, with a world premiere. A great pity…….
Bach: Sonata No.3 in C; Partita No.3 in E; Benjamin Nabarro, violin
I have been reading a fascinating book by Kate Kennedy called ‘Cello’, about the passion and the closeness of the relationship between instrument and player, as exemplified by four historical/ contemporary figures. Amongst many other topics, she muses on whether, in the same way as players gain muscle memory, so might instruments gain a sort of body memory of how certain players have played certain pieces on them in the past. I wondered, as Benjamin Nabarro played the Bach pieces, what sort of relationship he had with his instrument that allowed both to produce the extraordinary multi -layered polyphonic texture of these works, pushing the violin and violinist to extremes.
The Partita is a more accessible work than the sonata – essentially it is a dance suite, with the very famous Gavotte at its heart. Nabarro and his violin produced variation and shade in the sometimes-overwhelming spray of notes. The sonata is particularly severe, with a central fugue which sounded a nightmare to play. The sheer energy and focus needed to play these works is extraordinary, and yet at the same time performer and instrument have to convey the essential gravity and melancholy of Bach’s world, where death comes too frequently and the memories of the Thirty Years War are still strong. This performance was utterly convincing in capturing both these elements. And he has to do the same thing this evening………!!!
An hour after the performance. I went back to the Upper Chapel for an intriguing experience – Music in the Round had set up 8 speakers in the church, which seem to have programmed in some way to broadcast different strands of several of Bach’s pieces for violin, again played by Nabarro. For each movement played, we heard first a straight rendition, in surround-sound, but then, whether automatically generated by AI, or played with by someone, several of the strands in the different loudspeakers started to repeat, to be taken apart, so that what had begun as Bach began to sound like something by Philip Glass or John Adams. It was an eerie oddly compelling ¾ hour or so that I spent listening to these performances and their reworkings. This connects with next Friday’s MITR concert which indeed is precisely about Bach and American minimalism
Mozart, String Quintet in C K515; String Quintet in G minor K516
This was a superb concert. I have listened to these two works a number of times but have never heard them live and therefore haven’t ever, really, given them the full, deep concentration I find I can only give at a live concert. I also don’t think I have ever heard the Takacs Quartet live before (though maybe I have a brief memory of Beethoven quartets at the RFH in the early 2000’s). I enjoyed reading Edward Dusinberre’s book about the life he has led with the Quartet so it was a bit of a thrill to hear them live, and at the Wigmore Hall – and playing Mozart!! They had also played some of the other quintets the previous evening, but as you will have seen , I was elsewhere……a great pity I wasn’t able to get to this first concert…….
There was an unusually good programme note, by Richard Bratby, which quoted at length a letter Mozart wrote to his father not long before the latter’s death. I’ll quote a bit of it here – it’s dated 4 April 1787: ‘…….. Since Death, if we think about it soberly, is the true and ultimate purpose of our life, I have formed during the last few years such close relations with this best and truest friend of mankind that its image holds nothing terrifying for me any more, but is indeed very soothing and consoling! And I thank God for graciously granting me the insight (you know what I mean) of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness. I never lie down at night without reflecting that perhaps, young as I am, I may not live to see another day. And yet no one who knows me could say that I am morose or dejected in company – and for this blessing I thank my creator daily.’ While you could read this as a set of messages to keep his Dad content, and make him feel Wolfgang was leading a virtuous life in Vienna, to me, as it does to Bratby, it seems a profound statement of Mozart’s sense of his own mortality, and of the depth of his faith, which makes us understand how light and shade alternate so much in his writing, and in these quartets, one in C Major and one in G minor.
What struck me so much about this current version of the Takacs Quartet was the lightness and deftness of the playing. Some of this was clearly emanating from Dusinberre, who led some wonderfully wispy (yet rhythmic, with a kick) playing in the finale of the G minor, which makes the Amadeus Quartet in the recording I have sound quite leaden by comparison, but there were moments when the same could be said of other players – such a lightness of touch…….. In addition to the lightness there was delicacy, bounce and clarity – a sense of an intricate interweaving of parts, all making a greater whole, but never mechanical, never anything other than a sensitive and musical listening to each other. The darkness juxtaposed against the light in the first movement of the C Major, the joy of its finale, the sadness and hope of the G Minor quintet’s adagio, the passionate darkness of the opening of its finale, and the hope and energy of the rest of that finale once the prelude is passed – all were wonderfully realised.
I do hope I can hear this quartet again playing other Mozart, Beethoven (or indeed anything!)
John's musical journey 