Critic’s Notebook: Haydn as the Highlight with the Concentus Musicus

Also published in Die Presse: Concentus Musicus im Musikverein: So wird Haydn zur großen Unterhaltung

W.A.Mozart, Sinfonia Concertante G.Kremer/K.Kashkashian N.Harnoncourt / WPh DG

J.Haydn, Symphonies No.103/104 N.Harnoncourt / RCO Teldec

Splendid entertainment courtesy of the "Drumroll" Symphony. The double concerto? Less so.

A proper classical evening at the Musikverein: Mozart overture (The Magic Flute), Mozart concerto (Sinfonia Concertante), and a Haydn symphony ("Drumroll") — performed by the Concentus Musicus in the sunlit Golden Hall of the Musikverein. A fine concert that even a — to put it mildly — rather dicey performance of Mozart’s double concerto couldn’t derail.

It’s a tricky piece, the Sinfonia Concertante. Superficially charming and “pleasant” — but don’t be fooled. It demands vigilance. The viola part in particular (especially if, as was commendably done here, one adheres to the original “scordatura” tuning — up a half-step) is rife with pitfalls. Add to that the fact that the Sinfonia Concertante is not exactly a box-office draw, so you rarely get actual soloists (i.e. the expensive kind). Instead, it becomes an occasion for the section leaders to step out of the orchestral shadow every once in a while.

More often than not, that goes sideways. And so it did here: Cohesion among the soloists, intonation, even the basic tonal quality — all were wanting. The first movement, in particular, was limp and mewling; the third showed marked improvement, but not enough to erase what came before. No matter: the audience, especially and understandably fond of the longtime concertmaster for his decades of musical trailblazing, responded with cheers that masked the crooked playing.

Before that, and fittingly rare in this setting, came the Magic Flute overture: lively strings and spirited winds, ably held together by the deputy concertmaster in a performance that sounded fresh and spontaneous.

And then there was Haydn. Symphony No. 103 — unmistakably the highlight of the evening. As it should be, and as it was. Granted, it remains an unfortunate quirk of Vienna — the classical music city par excellence — that Haydn must be sought-and-found in period-instrument subscription series rather than in the main symphonic concerts (Wilhelm Sinkovicz quite rightly lamented this recently in Die Presse: “Die Musikstadt Wien verliert nach und nach ihre Klassiker”). Still, one takes what one can get — especially when it's done as well as here: Snappy and incisive in the first movement, bold accents confidently absorbed. The slow second flowed with life (though marred by an extended solo passage for the erstwhile soloist, now returned to his concertmaster post). The minuet was cheeky, and the finale pulsed with a driving, unhurried, and delightfully agitated energy — culminating in a result both thrilling and gloriously tumultuous.

This is Haydn as high entertainment.


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Critic’s Notebook: A Dreamboot Rheingold in Vienna

Also published in Die Presse: „Rheingold“ an der Wiener Staatsoper: Ein Sternstundenabend

R.Wagner, Das Rheingold H.v.Karjana / Berlin Phil DG

R.Wagner, Das Rheingold M.Janowski / RSO Berlin Pentatone SACD

R.Wagner, Das Rheingold P.Boulez / P.Chéreau / Bayreuth FO Unitel DVD

A harmonious, resplendent, and thoroughly entertaining cast delivers a thoroughly glorious Rheingold at the Vienna State Opera.

That E-flat major chord at the start of Das Rheingold: every time it appears out of nowhere, it stirs something in you: a journey begins. And what a journey it is: a deceptively calm opening that soon gives way to one of the most brisk, action-packed, and downright funny operas in the repertory—two and a half hours that sail by in a steady current. Sven-Eric Bechtolf’s production has been on the books at the Vienna State Opera for nearly two decades, and yet it remains captivatingly fresh. The staging is classically timeless: each scene a sparsely furnished tableau that sparks the imagination rather than smothering it. Add a cast this breathtakingly good—as it was on Wednesday night (May 27th)—and the result is pure delight.

As always, all good things begin with three slinky ladies. The sleek, sinewy water nymphs—Iliana Tonca, Isabel Signoret, and Stephanie Maitland, in clingy green algae-gowns—formed a sonorous, well-blended trio that gave Jochen Schmeckenbecher’s convincing bad-boy Alberich quite the hard time.

“Deiner Hand, Donner, entsinkt ja der Hammer!”

A good example of the production’s thoughtful, cheeky staging: the scene where the giants pay their visit to the gods. Wotan and company strike picture-perfect deity poses—Keeping Up Appearances, Wagner-style. Or the moment when the spears of Fasolt and Fafner (Ilja Kazakov and Kwangchul Youn, dressed like the boulder-beasts from The NeverEnding Story) start heat up as Loge lays a hand on them. Daniel Behle’s Loge, in a performance that would have made Heinz Zednik proud, combined sharp-edged delivery with youthful zing.

Donner’s hammer, housed in a Swarovski-encrusted instrument case, still elicits an inner chuckle. That he was sung by Martin Hässler—fresh-faced, cocky, and with a whiff of Falco—only made it better. (When his hammer slipped from his grip—not in Scene II, as scripted, but in Scene IV—it caused a brief moment of audience amusement, but was professionally played off.) There really wasn’t a whole lot one could have wanted more, cast- and acting-wise, though Freia’s dutifully serious “Dünkt euch Holda wirklich der Lösung werth?” (“Are you certain I am worthy the ransom?”) might have benefited from a hint of sarcasm.

Wotan, head of the celestial household, was sung by Scottish bass-baritone Iain Paterson, making his role debut at the house. There have been louder Wotans, or nobler ones—but few as articulate. Paterson’s flawless diction, extraordinarily sensitive phrasing, and text-driven intensity were a constant dramatic asset. A strong match: Monika Bohinec’s commanding, penetrating Fricka—mature, but (just) not yet overripe.

Michael Laurenz’s young, wild Mime, decked out in a mechanic’s jumpsuit, was a casting luxury—proof that this role doesn’t need to be handed to a wheezy character tenor. If one were inclined to quibble about Regine Hangler’s sonorously squeaky Freia—more siren (the maritime, not homeric kind) than goddess—well, that would be nitpicking at a very high level. Contributing to that level of luxury was Anna Kissjudit, making her house debut. She’d already made an impression as Mary in The Flying Dutchman in Budapest; as Erda—earthy and with a distinct vocal hue—she was even more convincing and earned a round of special applause.

The orchestra held up remarkably well through it all. The scenes involving the Ring’s powers burst out with sharp, overwhelming force. The unstable-sounding brass during the prelude was submerged in the the surging musical waves—and soon regained their footing. The anvils, alas, clanged on irritably: too loud or too tinny—probably both. Philippe Jordan’s conducting, strict but ever-forward-flowing, was a far better fit here than in his unsensual Tannhäuser. One could argue about Jordan’s Wagner—but who wants to quibble after an evening like this?


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Forget if Frankenstein was the scientist or the monster - it's all about Elizabeth

Rebecca S'manga Frank as Elizabeth in Frankenstein, Shakespeare Theatre Company.
Photo: DJ Corey Photography

Emily Burns is familiar to theater-goers lucky enough to experience last spring's Macbeth, starring Ralph Fiennes. After adapting Shakespeare's text for that production, the London-based playwright has updated Mary Shelley's Gothic novel for her own direction at Shakespeare Theatre Company, seen Saturday evening at the Klein Theatre. Adaptations of Frankenstein abound, as recently as last year's uneven film version, Poor Things. Burns has also pursued a feminist reading of the work, not by feminizing the monster but by viewing the entire story through the character of Elizabeth, given "the agency of a contemporary woman," as the program note put it.

If it's been a while since you read the novel, Elizabeth is the girl adopted by Victor Frankenstein's parents. Mary Shelley made changes to the character as she revised the book: in the original version, Elizabeth and Victor were cousins, but in later versions she was an unrelated foster daughter. In both cases she is betrothed to her step-brother, but their wedding night turns bloody when the monster that Victor brought into the world, in a fit of jealousy, murders Elizabeth. (The character, who never knows her biological mother, has much in common with Mary Shelley herself, raised by a stepmother not as kindly disposed to her at all.)

(Spoilers ahead) Burns centers the action in the Frankenstein family home, near the end of the novel. Victor Frankenstein has returned from his studies in Ingolstadt, but he is not being at all truthful about what happened there or why his father had to nurse him back to health. Disaster strikes when Victor's younger brother, whom Elizabeth raised almost like a child, is murderered, and the family maid, Justine, is arrested and executed for the crime. Burns alters the ending significantly: rather than the monster murdering Elizabeth, there is a somewhat nonsensical story about her and Victor's child, left to an orphanage and somehow raised by the monster.

Rebecca S'manga Frank made a striking STC debut as Elizabeth, a 19th-century waif transformed by a modern sense of independence and frankness. As the downtrodden Justine, Anna Takayo made an equally worthy debut, bringing a remarkable range of emotion to the role, from outrage to tragic resolve. As a fast-talking Victor with a malleable sense of the truth, Nick Westrate never quite convinced, although Burns's adaptation was perhaps more to blame for making him a far less sympathetic character. With his entrance delayed to the final scenes, Lucas Iverson had even less of a chance to make an impression as the Monster, frightening only in a few flashbacks and voice-overs.

The decidedly 21st-century idiom of Burns's language in the adaptation is off-putting, given the 19th-century setting established by the shadow-filled Gothic set (scenic design by Andrew Boyce, lighting by Neil Austin) and romantic-period costumes (Kate Voyce). Music and sound, designed and composed by André Pluess, are responsible for most of the chills, such as they are. The most faithful parts of the novel to be reproduced are the voice-overs, mostly taken verbatim from Shelley's text.

Frankenstein has been extended through June 29. shakespearetheatre.org.

A Survey of Nielsen Symphony Cycles

► An Index of ionarts Discographies

Continuing my discographies, this is a survey of — hopefully — every extant recorded cycle of the Carl Nielsen symphonies. They are listed in chronological order of completion. This should include all cycles, whether they were issued as such or not, including those where multiple conductors were at work on it. I have heard many of these and possibly at least some symphonies of most of them, but hardly all of them. Comments on what you like or dislike about any given cycle are very much appreciated — be it below (where they might take a while to be noticed) on Twitter, or best: in both places.

On a personal note: It has taken me long – far too long – to really get into Carl Nielsen’s music. Especially his symphonies. I have attributed this to taking the wrong approach, namely to think of Nielsen as a southern cousin of Sibelius (see also: A Survey of Sibelius Symphony Cycles), expecting his symphonies to do some of the same sort of magic, spell a similar, vaguely “nordic” web of enchantment. On this count, Nielsen fails. He is not “Sibelius 2.0”, in fact, he really isn’t anything like Sibelius. No more, anyway, that Richard Strauss is anything like Sibelius, despite also being a sumptuous romantic composer of the 20th century. Tempting so it may be to hope for it, there are no swans in Nielsen, figure-skating across frozen lakes on a winter’s daybreak. The most prosaic picture you’ll be lucky to wrestle from Nielsen might be – and I’m winging it here – a frog hopping away in the woods. Nielsen himself – allegedly – told Sibelius once: “I don’t reach as high as your ankles.” (If you can find a source for that quote, do let me know!)

The composer who paved my way towards greater, more intense Nielsen-appreciation happened to have been Bohuslav Martinů (see also: A Survey of Martinů Symphony Cycles). It turns out that his six symphonies have much more of a kinship with Nielsen’s than do Sibelius’… if for no more profound reason than both of them working off rhythm and propulsion as their main ingredients. Once I came to Nielsen thinking “Martinů”, not “Sibelius”, I found them far more intriguing and the listening-experience was no longer tainted by disappointment but by a newfound state of wonder at the many things Nielsen does offer. It speaks to the enduring qualities of the composer that he is so well served on record – quantitatively, at least. This survey currently lists 28 symphony cycles by the most liberal count and still 17 if you are stingy (counting only single conductor/composer cycles that are available boxed). Compare that to just seven for Martinů, 14 for Vaughan Willians (see also: “A Survey of Vaughan-William Symphony Cycles”), or 20 for Dvořák (see also: A Survey of Dvořák Symphony Cycles), even it can’t compare to the 50+ that Sibelius has to his name).

Qualitatively is another matter; Nielsen is hard to pull off, even to those ears that take more readily to him than mine did. For his symphonies to really grab you by the lapel and draw you in, a lot of ingredients need to be right. It’s hard to draw general conclusions about what works and what doesn’t, but I think it is fair to say that finesse and delicacy are not two ingredients on which the success of good Nielsen depends. Better a bit more brash than reticent in this music, bold rather than refined. As such, I like the gruff Ole Schmidt, the vividly-vital Bryden Thomson, the sumptuously grand Alan Gilbert, and the carefree abandon of Adrian Leaper. As you might imagine, Leonard Bernstein has a lot to bring to Nielsen – and indeed his Fifth (especially) is one of the great Nielsen-recordings there is. With the same sweeping gesture, I condemn high-profile cycles to the dustbin of civilized boredom. Among them Blomstedt (at least the EMI recordings), Davis, Saraste, Schønwandt (the cycle I started out with – and I might be wrong about it; others love it), and even Vänskä. [Actually, not so fast: Vänskä proved to have distinct merits, on third hearing.] If you are already into Nielsen, I am sure you have your favorites and “Mehs” already, yourself. Curiously, it seems like it is always the same labels that tend towards Nielsen: Chandos, BIS, and (understandably) the Danish Dacapo-label each have three cycles on offer and Chandos already has a fourth (Gardner) in the making. (The fact that DG now has two cycles is probably owed more to the Luisi-cycle having been offered for free to them, than DG having had any designs on adding to Paavo Järvi's cycle from the early 90s.)

I am sitting on the data for several new discographic entries under work. Ring cycles, Mahler, Mendelssohn, and Beethoven symphony cycles, Mozart Piano Concerto and String Quartet-cycles, among others. They take an awful lot of time to research, however, and even more time to put into html-presentable shape. And even then they are rarely complete or mistake-free. Neither will this one be, and every such post is also a plea to generously inclined readers with more information and knowledge of the subject than I have to lend a helping hand correcting my mistakes or filling data-lacunae.

I am explicitly grateful for any such pointers, hinters, and corrections and apologize for any bloomers. (Preferably on Twitter, where I'll read the comment much sooner than here, but either works!) Unlike some earlier discographies, this one does intend to be comprehensive. So I am especially grateful when I have sets that I have missed (such that only ever appeared on LP, for example) pointed out to me. I have not listened to them all, but favorites are indicated with the "ionarts choice" graphic. Ditto recommended cycles by ClassicsToday/David Hurwitz. Links to reputable reviews are included where I thought of it and could find any. With hundreds of links in this document, there are, despite my best efforts, bound to be some that are broken or misplaced; I am glad about every correction that comes my way re. those, too.

Enjoy and leave a comment in some form!


(Survey begins after the break, if you didn't land on this page directly)

Critic’s Notebook: Eric(h) Zeisl’s Requiem Ebraico – An Exile’s Synthesis

Also published in two parts in Die Presse: Concert review: Begeistert und begeisternd: Zeisls „Requiem Ebraico“ im Musikverein & Zeisl-primer with exhibition notice: Ausstellung zu Erich Zeisl: Ein vertriebener, verlorener Sohn der Musikstadt Wien

A.Zemlinsky, Psalm XIII R.Chailly / RSO Berlin Decca

Eric(h) Zeisl et al., Requiem Ebraico ++ "Remembrance" J.Neschling / OSESP BIS

Gustav Mahler, Symphony No.1 P.Boulez / Chicago SO DG

Eric(h) Zeisl dropped the “h” fleeing the Nazis at Ellis Island — but at heart, he always remained a Viennese composer.

What would 20^th-century classical music have sounded like if it hadn’t been interrupted by the all-consuming catastrophe of the Second World War? We’ll never know. But there are traces. Among the lost currents of “disappeared” music is a post-Stravinskian branch: spiky but tonal. You catch glimpses of it in the works of Wolfgang Fortner, Boris Blacher, Viktor Ullmann, Werner Egk, Karl Amadeus Hartmann or Harald Genzmer. Alongside that stood a more romantic strain – one more in the tradition of Richard Strauss. That’s where you’d place Erich Korngold, Franz Schmidt, Joseph Marx – and Surprised-by-Beauty-composer Eric(h) Zeisl.

Some of these composers escaped physical destruction. But their works didn’t survive the postwar shift in listening aesthetics. State and institutional support overwhelmingly favored one very specific kind of modernism, cementing the divide between “safe” repertoire and contemporary music. Tonal composers were looked down upon – vaguely associated with Nazi-aesthetic tastes, even those the Nazis had labeled “degenerate” and persecuted. These composers were caught between two worlds. Zeisl especially.

Erich Zeisl was born in Vienna in 1905 to the owners of Café Tegetthoff, with Jewish-Hungarian roots. He began composing at 14, entered the Conservatory at 16, and won the Lili Boulanger Prize at 20. His early songs were picked up by the great bass Alexander Kipnis, among others. His opera Hiob – based on the novel by Joseph Roth – was submitted to the Austrian Music Council. The verdict was unanimous: not modern enough.

When the Nazis marched into Austria in 1938, Zeisl fled to Paris, then to the United States. In Hollywood, his career didn’t take off or crash – it just moved sideways. He worked as an arranger and composer for MGM and Warner Bros., writing uncredited music for films like Lassie Come Home, Money, Women, and Guns, and others. No breakthrough, no fame – California led Zeisl not to career heights, but to a musicological footnote.

ExilArte, the Center for Persecuted Music in Vienna, just between the Konzerthaus and the Akademietheater – is trying to nudge him back toward the repertoire. Help came from attorney Randol Schoenberg, grandson of Arnold Schoenberg – and of Zeisl. Schoenberg brought Zeisl’s papers and music back to Vienna, where they are now housed at ExilArte. The aim: to let young, unencumbered students at the MDW discover the extraordinarily fine music of Eric(h) Zeisl – who may have dropped the “h” in America, but who remained, in his musical heart, always a Viennese.

One chance to discover Zeisl’s music came on the following Sunday, when the RSO Vienna performed one of his best-known works, the Requiem Ebraico, at the Musikverein.

One of the RSO Vienna’s core responsibilities is to enrich Vienna’s concert scene with interesting programs – programs the other orchestras often lack the courage or will to offer. This includes music that, once introduced, audiences actively want to hear and possibly hear again.

Sunday evening’s concert was a textbook example. Granted, Gustav Mahler’s First isn’t exactly a revelation – but hey, even the Golden Hall doesn’t fill itself. Mahler draws a crowd, Alsop loves to conduct him, and programmatically it all dovetailed with Alexander Zemlinsky and Eric(h) Zeisl. And you can’t really go wrong: Just play loud enough and fast enough and the audience will be awed into laudatory submission by the sheer force of sound. The shrill strings? Forgotten. . The out-of-sync basses? Forgiven... The absence of any dynamic below mezzoforte? Well, that was a pity. But even within this gleeful sonic bludgeoning, there were fine moments: the rustic launch of the second movement, the tipsy staggering towards the fourth movement. The audience pre-emptively gave Marin Alsop a standing ovation – a warm-up for her farewell appearance this Thursday, when she’ll conduct her final program as RSO Chief Conductor (Mahler 2).

Zemlinsky’s grand, even glorious setting of Psalm 13 for chorus, organ and large orchestra opened the evening with weight and passion. Doubt and resistance rendered into stirring – but never shallow – music. But the secret centerpiece was Zeisl’s Requiem Ebraico. Zeisl wrote more immediately appealing and coherent works, but none that so deftly fused the different strata that exile imposes – Vienna and California, modernism and romanticism, secularism and Judaism – into one frame, without stooping to the lowest common denominator. The sharply articulated solos and the Singverein – unintelligible, but enthusiastic – gave the piece the intensity it needs.

Stripped of his cultural German identity and his Austrian homeland, Zeisl’s Requiem is an attempt to situate his European, Jewish, and American self in music. The synthesis was, in 1944, ahead of its time: too European for Americans, too American for Europeans, too Jewish for Christians, too Christian for Jews, too modern for conservatives, too conservative for modernists – and yet always beloved by audiences. The Musikverein was no exception. A moving, compelling, and captivating glimpse into a world that never got to exist.

From May 14, the ExilArte Center presents the exhibition Erich Zeisl – Vienna’s Lost Son in Exile.

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Critic’s Notebook: Debbie Does Vienna - A Belated Handel-Premiere* in Vienna

Also reviewed for Die Presse: „Deborah“ im Konzerthaus: Händels Chöre reißen mit

G.F.Handel, Deborah Y.Kenny, S.Gritton, J.Bowman etc. The King's Consort / R.King Hyperion

Handel’s Deborah gets its long-overdue Vienna premiere at the Konzerthaus

There are still first times — even for a composer as well-known and well-loved as Georg Friedrich Handel. His oratorio Deborah finally had its modern* Vienna premiere on Sunday night at the Konzerthaus — just shy of 300 years after its debut in London. (*A little further research showed that t had actually been performed at the Musikverein in 1916!)

A rarely performed and seldom recorded work, Deborah has had a knotty reception history from the start: Handel’s second English-language oratorio was a flop at its premiere, and the libretto — not without some justification — was mocked as sub-par. Later, the piece was dismissed as a pasticcio, given that Handel, unusually even for him, recycled a remarkable number of earlier pieces: only about 32 percent of the score is newly composed. As a result, Deborah has always sat awkwardly between Esther (his oratorio breakthrough) and his early oratorio blockbuster Saul.

And yet it has its undeniable charms: a grand-scale cast and loads of glorious choruses. These delights were put to vivid use in the Grosser Saal by the Amsterdam Baroque Choir & Orchestra under their director, Ton Koopman.

In the title role, soprano Sophie Junker impressed with a bright, velvety, powerful — if surprisingly vibrato-heavy — voice, which came into especially moving focus in the aria “In Jehovah’s awful sight.” Opposite her, Jakub Józef Orliński, a rising star among countertenors, sang the role of Barak. He started off solidly and only got better from there: his focused, clear, and piercing tone — mesmerizing especially at full volume (and it gets very loud) — had undeniable charm. Think Andreas Schager, but for the Baroque and with better intonation.

That said, not everything sparkled. Koopman’s own organ playing was occasionally smudgy, the violins had their patchy moments, and the chorister doubling as the high priest of Baal was, frankly, out of his depth. Still, another chorister, Kieran White, made a convincingly vivid herald, and Amelia Berridge was delightful as Jaël, especially when merrily recounting how she nailed Sisera’s head to the ground with a wooden tent stake.

Granted, the ABO doesn’t currently play at the level of the Ensemble Pygmalion — but when the 26-head strong choir let rip with “O Baal, monarch of the skies!” you could see feet tapping along in the audience rows. Rightly so. Especially given that they performed a whole lot better than any such local ensemble could reasonably have been expected to do, the singular boo that rained down was rather inexplicable.


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Critic’s Notebook: Vienna Symphony Back in Form under Petr Popelka

Also reviewed for Die Presse: Konzerthaus: Die Symphoniker wissen, wie Schlagobers klingen muss

L.v.Beethoven, Overtures C.Abbado / WPhil DG

Korngold *(+ Barber), Violin Concertos G.Shaham, A.Previn, LSO DG

Richard Strauss, Rosenkavalier Suite et al. A.Previn / WPhil DG

The Vienna Symphony, under their chief conductor, back in buoyant form

Beethoven’s overture for the Consecration of the House is one of those pieces you rarely catch live — and all the more welcome for it. After all, it's late Beethoven, yet breezy, pretty chipper, gratifyingly succinct, and most importantly, on Saturday evening, it was played with exactly the kind of vitality it needs by the Vienna Symphony under their boss, Petr Popelka. That seemed necessary, after last week's deadly boring outing.

That elegant opener was followed by Korngold’s Violin Concerto. Long sniffed at, the piece has — justly — found its place in the core repertoire. Its combination of lush rhapsodic and lively bite puts it just behind the genre’s most beloved entries. Still, it requires both soloist and orchestra to tread a fine line: too much in either direction, and it risks sounding sappy or aimless.

Renaud Capuçon, ever the solid violinist, seemed a bit unsure on the interpretive front — especially in the first two movements, which gave him more trouble than expected. The orchestra, however, played with clarity and nuance, bringing its signature composure to the table. But of course Capuçon has the sufficient je ne sais quoi, the commanding presence and enough routine, and that air of being above small matters in general, that he can still score with the audience. An improved third movement didn't hurt, either and his encore—Massenet’s Méditation, with harpist Volker Kempf hit the populist bullseye.

The connections between Josef Strauss’ Dynamiden Waltz and the 'Rosenkavalier-Waltz from Richard Strauss’ opera (played as part of the Suite) may be obvious on paper or to Popelka (who cleverly programmed these pieces on the second half), but by the time the latter appears, you’ve long since forgotten the former. That's not the least because Popelka led the 'Richard' with an exuberance that would have befit Salome, gripping, and flexible like a juvenile rubber band. See? It can be done.


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Critic’s Notebook: Drop-dead gorgeous: Pygmalion plays Shakespeare — en français

Also reviewed for Die Presse: Zum Sterben schön: Ein Requiem für Ophelia mit Pygmalion im Konzerthaus

G.Fauré, Requiem (v.1900) K.Battle, A.Schmidt C.M.Giulini / Philharmonia DG

G.Fauré, Requiem (v.1893) A.Mellon, P.Kooy P.Herreweghe / La Chapelle Royale Harmonia Mundi

A.Thomas, Hamlet T.Hampson, J.Anderson, S.Ramey, D.Graves A.De Almeida / LPO EMI/Warner

The French ensemble’s musical Hamlet-synthesis culminated in a heavenly Fauré Requiem

Music-as-theatre — that’s a concept Raphaël Pichon and his Ensemble Pygmalion have been embracing for a while now. By threading a dramatic arc through a series of thematically and musically connected works, they often bring lesser-known pieces out into the light. They’ve done it with Bach (Köthener Trauermusik), resurrected early Mozart (“Liberta!”, both Harmonia Mundi), and in Salzburg this summer they will give Mozart’s unfinished stage works an outing, propped up and united by some dramatic scaffolding (Zaide, or the Way towards the Light).

Saturday night at the Konzerthaus, it was Ambroise Thomas’s grand opéra Hamlet and Fauré’s Requiem, joined by rarely performed Berlioz (Tristia, Parts 1 and 3, but not “La mort d’Ophélie”) that formed a full-length program under the title/theme: Requiem pour Ophélie.

Since Thomas’s Hamlet is a rare guest at the opera house (last seen in Vienna in 2012, also with Stéphane Degout) and comes with its longueurs, hearing its best scenes in this concentrated form was a treat. Sabine Devieilhe—with her agile voice, secure high notes, and dramatic punch—lent the music a quality bordering on outrageous and made an Ophelia to die for. Degout: powerful, open, warm, sonorous, and without a trace of nasality. What more could one want?!

Still more, as it turned out! Fauré’s Requiem — unquestionably one of the most beautiful of its kind — offered everything the heart could desire. The orchestra, with its colourful, rich yet pliant sound, a sublimely musical harp, and a harmonium that chimed in (in the best sense) like a cross between synth and accordion, was sheer joy. The superbly blended, earthy-sounding chorus was its equal in tonal and executive quality. And by the time Devieilhe reached her “Pie Jesu” and “In Paradisum,” all that was left was childlike wonder and quiet bliss. It’s hard to hold back the tears, when faced with such beauty.


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