Critic’s Notebook: Daniel Harding brings a touch of Sweden to the Konzerthaus

Also reviewed for Die Presse: Hugo Alfvén muss man entdeckt haben: Hinreißende Schweden-Romantik im Konzerthaus

Hugo Alfvén, Complete Symphonies, Suites & Rhapsodies var. Orch., Niklas Willén Naxos

G. Mahler, Orchestral Songs C.Gerhaher, K.Nagano, OSMontreal Sony

Swedish bonbon and Gerhaherisms

The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra’s gig at the Vienna Konzerthaus was notable for its inclusion of Hugo Alfvén on the program, and Christian Gerhaher (who loves working with Harding) singing Mahler’s Rückert songs. Less attractive on paper perhaps was Also sprach Zarathustra lurking on the back of the program, which, of course, features one of the most memorable openings in all of classical music… followed by thirty minutes of tedium. But “Strauss” sells tickets, is fun, and already in the repertoire of the orchestra, whereas something really cool, romantic, and Swedish – say, the Viola Concerto of Allan Petterson or a Symphony by him or by Erland von Koch, Wilhelm Stenhammar, or Kurt Atterberg – would admittedly have been box office poison. Sånt är livet.

Incidentally, it was a pretty good Zarathustra, that Harding and his Swedes (he’s been their MD since 2007) delivered. Listening closely, you could hear how Strauss, in 1896, opens almost all the doors to his future works: In the octet of first desks (very nicely played!) we have premonitions of the Capriccio Sextet. Further down the road, there are glimmers of the Alpine Symphony, in those somewhat meandering, intertwining musical strands. And for the “Tanzlied”, a waltz on near-infinite loop, Harding mercifully took the reins tight, as a result of which the precision suffered, but at considerable benefit to the work.

The opening Alfvén (who should, but unfathomably does not, have a chapter in Surprised by Beauty) was En skärgårdssägen, op.20. Naturally the first-ever performance in the Konzerthaus, much like a visiting Viennese orchestra would probably be the first, if they played a Robert Fuchs Serenade on a visit to Stockholm. As the ear clamors for familiar references in this 1904 sea-themed tone poem about the group of islets outside of Stockholm, it finds them in Debussy during the impressionistic heaves, in Zemlinsky when the flame begins to lick in the strings, or even in Wagner, when the brass and timpani get going.

In between Hugo and Richard, it was Gerhaher to impress with his usual, unparalleled ‘intoned parlando’ in the Mahler. The fact that you have to listen closely, sometimes, when he drops the color from his voice (one of several trademark Gerhaherisms), is easily put up with; in fact, it probably enhances the experience – though Harding and his lustily playing orchestra didn’t exactly help out, either. The cries of nocturnal pain in “Um Mitternacht” were harrowing, and “Liebst du um Schönheit” was, interestingly, stripped of any overt cynicism. Mahler didn’t know it, when he composed it, but he custom tailored “Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen” to Gerhaher’s style. Hearing him suffer, while simultaneously exposing the vanity in the lines “Nor am I all that much concerned / If she should think me dead”, by not so much intoning rather than de-toning them, was as touching as anything.

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Ionarts-at-Large: Widmann's new Viola Concerto

The Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra beckoned last week with an interesting fare of the new and the rare: Jörg Widmann’s Viola Concerto (the German premiere, after it received performances from the co-commissioning Orchestre de Paris conducted by Paavo Järvi in late 2015 at the Philharmonie de Paris) and Elgar’s Second Symphony.

The latter is a rarity in central Europe, where Elgar is treated with a certain amount of skepticism if not outright condescension. So much that I was surprised to find that the BRSO had actually performed Elgar’s Second quite recently… in 2008 under another Brit on missionary Elgar-tour: Sir Colin Davis (coupled with a Mozart Violin concerto; ionarts review here.) Then again, to think of eight years as “quite recent” shows something about the state of Elgar across the channel. I dare say that his status did not improve after this performance. Granted, the brisk first movement (I loved how the very opening of it was shaped)—bordering wild, for Elgar’s standards—had the orchestra right in lock-step with Harding. The second movement had a jolly let’s-have-fun-performance quality. “Don’t think too much about it”, he seemed to suggest and just dig in and be carried away. (Only that the carrying-away didn’t arrive very notably.) But there loomed buts.

E.Elgar, Symphony No.2, G.Sinopoli/Philharmonia DG J.Widmann, Violin Concerto, D.Harding/C.Tetzlaff Ondine

Too loud, thick in texture (arguably Elgar’s fault, in part, and also noted after Davis’ performance), and incoherently argued, the symphony still ended an episodic mash of sound with nice moments, hardly connected to—much less held together by—the rest of the music. And with little by way of noble English demeanor, a stereotype which Elgar’s music rather befits. It would be easy to blame the orchestra for not getting an inflection or style with which it is not familiar. But not so the BRSO, even with plenty substitute players as eager a group of quick learners (with technique to match) as three is on the orchestral scene.

And so I was reminded that Daniel Harding, that youngish conductor who seems to tick all the right boxes, has all the right connections, and a pedigree to match (Abbado- and Rattle-disciple) has been the only conductor that I have ever heard a bad concert with the otherwise unflappable BRSO*. Something always seems to not quite gel when I hear Harding. Anyway, dwelling on unlucky Elgar is needless when a highlight can still be reported, namely said Widmann Concerto. The work startles the uninitiated, beginning with the unusual setup: sparse strings, sitting in a semi-circle with plenty of room and several lonely music stands between them. Then the soloist enters from off stage as the concerto is already under way, (ab)using the instrument as a tam-tam. The soloist—Antoine Tamestit—half dances his way to the music stand nearest him and from there begins to make his way in concentric circles around the orchestra until he finds, for the finale, the conventional soloist’s position next to the conductor.

This he does by way of acting and interacting with musicians en route. For example an angry tuba that barks at him loud enough to make him jump. Tamestit answers with a vigorous pizzicato (I didn’t look which finger he used), the kind of which he had already delivered in the first five minutes with such vigor that I was afraid his hands might start bleeding. Perhaps Widmann had speculated with a guitar concerto for a while before settling on a viola concerto when the initial commission fell through. Amid sparse strings, pizzicato orgies, shivering glissandi, and further experiments in sound—some pointillist others with a metallic ring to it—a voice emerges that one might half expect in something influenced by Messiaen. It’s ten minutes into the concerto and Tamestit hasn’t had a bow in his hand yet. When he first does, it is still only the bow’s button which he taps on strings. It’s certainly a work that makes Widmann’s powerhouse Violin Concerto look ultra-conventional.

If this all sounds rather naff, well, it might easily have been. But for the poise and style and earnest beauty with which Antoine Tamestit performed the concerto, it came across as interesting, indeed captivating instead. I certainly was alert for every second of it—and easily so—which is more than I can say about most concertos. And not just I, by all appearances:

The audience, partly due to self-selection, partly because it is one of the keener, more interested symphonic audiences, listened to the stereophonic going-ons in silence which I am tempted to describe as “rapt”. Admirably few coughing salvos disrupted the shape-shifting, character-switching, landscape-altering concert. There, Omar Khayyam suddenly popped up, courtesy of the winds! Repetitive motions of buzzing sound create a surprisingly catchy rhythmic urgency of near-Bartók-String-Quartet proportions. A Scream… and the orchestra sounds like it is falling down a massive stairwell. One more massive glissando and Tamestit finally in ‘finale-position.’ Here he doesn’t take off and deliver a relentless, powerful final run to the finish, as I imagined, a final-stretch tour de force of violistic [sic] rampage. Instead there reigns quiet and a newborn tenderness, sweet and with shades of innocence.

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* It was Beethoven’s Grosse Fuge arranged for orchestra followed by a Bruckner Mass; I must have elected not to review it then. But I’ve also heard Harding in excellent Bartók later that same year with the same orchestra. Otherwise memory serves up more ho-hum experiences than ecstasy, though. Then again, one of the very few musicians I adore happens to think very highly of Harding and so I assume the fault is entirely mine and try to suspend judgement… even if I am more and more tending toward the conclusion that for all the qualities so obviously there, something is missing with Harding (as of yet). Perhaps another decade of daily grind with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra will fix everything, if anything needs fixing.

Mahler Festival Leipzig: Harding - Mahler Chamber Orchestra - Fourth Symphony

There are many reasons why a Mahler performance might not touch one in concert; Mahler-fatigue being among the more realistic after such heavy exposure in so little time as the Mahler Festival Leipzig offered. I was at or near that point, last Wednesday… and that despite skipping three performances; sadly missing the opening and closing concert of the Gewandhaus under Chailly—M2, M8—and the Vienna Philharmonic in M9. [You can watch these performances for a few days on MDR’s dedicated website.] Either that, or something was off with Daniel Harding and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in Blumine, the movement Mahler soon chucked out of the First Symphony, Des Knaben Wunderhorn songs with soprano Mojca Erdmann, and especially the Fourth Symphony.

In my venture to hear Mahler from all sides, I had sat in different spots in the Gewandhaus for every concert, and this time I opted to sit behind the orchestra; right on the corner between the chorus stands under the organ and the lobster claws that reach around the left and right side of the orchestra.

G.Mahler, Symphony No.4, 5 Songs from Des Knaben Wunderhorn, D.Harding / D.Röschmann / MCO EMI (R.Chailly's favorite) G.Mahler, Symphony No.4, Haitink / C.Schäfer / RCO RCA

The all around excellent acoustic of the Gewandhaus held up here, too…with Blumine—in a succession of lovely moments strung together—coming through as nicely shimmering, with silver violins, great detail, and no section unduly muffled or exaggerated. But once voices come into play, matters are different. Mojca Erdmann could not be heard, or to the extent she could be heard, it was cavernous reverb that gave one only the vaguest idea of what earnest Mlle. Erdmann was singing about. The little that came through, despite the ever-keen attention that Daniel Harding lavished on her, sounded like pouty-mouthed naïveté, pseudo-innocent, and shockingly banal. Clearly an unfair judgment to make on such distorted evidence, which is why I opted for a prime, elevated orchestra seat in the second half, so that I may hear more of her, and hear that better.

That I wouldn’t hear much more revealed the petite size of her voice… but at least her perfectly honed, bell-like tone now came through. The clear, even naïve element worked much better in the angelic “Wir genießen die himmlischen Freuden” than the other, earthier or ironic Wunderhorn songs… but it was still brought down by a uniform blandness that seemed over-pronounced and micromanaged… in other words: too consciously done well: damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

The technical aplomb of the orchestra, which each section in itself offering something impressive (the horns a little less, the trumpets a little more, the winds a little shrill), its transparency, and fine solos (from the first violinist in particular), were too heterogeneous to ever quite come together. Moments of true individual wit amused… but a less generous instinct within me thought them rather self-conscious. The third movement, gorgeous music gorgeously played, lacked the tension to make it even more compelling, and as a colleague aptly quipped afterwards, the whole show, though first-rate, felt a little like a Ländler as performed by the Aristocats… very, very dainty and well-bred. A little more grit and grime would have suited Harding’s Mahler well… but then a little more grit and grime would suit almost anything Harding does well.

Mahler Festival Leipzig: Salonen - Dresden - Third Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Märkl - MDR SO - Tenth Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Nezét-Séguin - BRSO - Seventh Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Luisi - Concertgebouw - Das Lied von der Erde
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Gergiev - LSO - First Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Gilbert - NYPhil - Fifth Symphony
Mahler Festival Leipzig: Zinman - Tonhalle Zurich - Sixth Symphony

Ionarts-at-Large: Hélène Grimaud's Ravel and London Strauss

Richard Strauss’ Don Juan is a wonderful little firecracker to get a concert started. Especially when the dry timpani whacks hit you right in the face and the xylophone rings clear and loud as if the executing percussionist sat on your seat-neighbor’s lap, not diagonally across at the very back of the Barbican Concert Hall.

Daniel Harding conducted this tone poem as an orchestral exercise in the spectacular, not with a lingering and luscious take on it. Choosing effects over flavor is a perfectly legitimate choice, of course, and in that the performance succeeded unreservedly. When it came time to wax lyrically, his players—the oboe above all—did that famously, too.

Maurice Ravel’s attitude about his Piano Concerto sounds just as healthy and agreeable as the work itself: “What is my opinion of this Concerto? A rather good one, actually…. I think that I found what I was looking for. Well, almost, at least. You never find exactly what you are looking for. […] And if, one day, I did, I fear that would be the end of me. Anyway, this Concerto strikes me as one of the works in which I was able to shape the content and form that I sought, in which I was best able to assert the dominance of my will.... Am I being too partial to my newborn? […] For the most part I’ve not yet succeeded in finding what I want. But I’ve still got some time…. That’s if I spend it laboring away at Montfort (I can’t get anything done in Paris), since I’m not one of those who can compose quickly. I don’t trust facility. I [like] constructing a work with solidity, seeking the purest material, and consolidating that properly. The concert [for example] cost me two years of labor.”*

M.Ravel, Piano Concertos, Zimerman / Boulez / Cleveland, LSO - DG

R.Strauss, Also Sprach Zarathustra et al., N.Järvi / Scottish NO - Chandos (2CDs)

Hélène Grimaud is wonderful to hear in Ravel’s Piano Concerto; all classical lightness one moment, Gershwinesque brusqueness the next, and always coy, never too serious. There’s much to admire in that level-headed playing of hers, which has never disappointed me yet (though admittedly never thrilled, either).I equally admire that she does not succumb to sentimentality even in the perfectly sentimental solo opening of the slow movements—one of the highlights of the 20^th century concerto literature. The LSO played along with robust eagerness, car-horn-honking its way to the happy conclusion like a gaggle of excited motorists.

Also Spoke Zarathustra—more Richard Strauss—began with a recitation of Nietzsche’s introductory words from his famous, famously misunderstood tome. Between the stodgy translation (not Walter Kaufmann’s) and the preachy and ceremonial delivery, this was extraordinarily off-putting. If anyone actually bothered listening, they were treated to that all-too-common cartoonish misrepresentation of Nietzsche that makes him to be a melodramatic bloviator instead of quick-witted Dionysian. Luckily all that was forgotten as soon as the double basses started scrubbing away at their instruments to impressive and sonorous effect.

It’s really a feast for the ears to be treated to this grand (possibly great) work in a concert performance. Engulfed completely in sound (M21 being the seat in this particular case), the body throws overboard all resistances and allows the waves of music to take you in completely and (in the moment) uncritically. The critical ears might have been pricked, on this occasion, by the directionless stammer in the double bass and cello episode, or a subsequent trumpet howler, but Strauss so quickly proceeds to fire up the Quattro a few more times that those become mere footnotes in the perception. I don’t care much for the pretentious silence forced on audiences by conductors that will retain their arms in the air for seconds after the last notes have gone; no more, in any case, than I do for eager early clappers… but I suppose if it weren’t for that pompous gesture, the same people who merely cough awkwardly after the first movement (where the composer surely desired applause) would establish their musical acumen by clapping right into the last bar. Ah, the best of all worlds clearly isn’t identical to a perfect world.


* Nino Frank, “Maurice Ravel entre deux trains”. Candide, May 5^th, 1932. Quoted in Arbie Orenstein’s Preface of the new Eulenburg edition of the Ravel Piano Concerto


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Ionarts-at-Large: Paul Lewis' Beethoven Overshadowed by Bartók's Bluebeard

LvB, Piano Concertos, Paul Lewis / Bělohlávek / BBC SO Harmonia Mundi

B.Bartók, A Kékszakállú Herceg Vára, Zhidkova, White / Gergiev / LSO LSO Live

B.Bartók, A Kékszakállú Herceg Vára, Kallisch, Fried / Eötvös / SWR RSO Stuttgart Hänssler

Liverpudlian pianist Paul Lewis and Oxfordian conductor Daniel Harding teamed up with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra for Beethoven’s Fifth Concerto—part of the whole cycle of Beethoven’s five concertos the BRSO plays this season. (Francesco Piemonetsi, stepping in for Murray Perahia has already played the Fourth; András Schiff, Maria João Pires, and Mitsuko Uchida have yet to appear.) From one of the most talented and tasteful British musicians—judging, until now, only from his many fine recordings for Harmonia Mundi—it is difficult not to expect more than was delivered, though. However tenuous the idea is, one expects a sense of occasion, something ‘special’… something more than a performance that admittedly impressed with unfussy, very fluent playing (occasionally banged notes of exaggerated contrast aside), but also threw in two parts out of three autopilot.

Part of the frustratingly ambivalent experience was Paul Lewis’ extraordinarily dense sound for anything forte and above. Like a recording with a compressed dynamic range, there was no air around the notes, no room for true peaks to kick in. A strange mix of very good and perplexingly unpleasant proceeded from this, not much helped by Lewis constant grunting and Harding’s squealed breathing and singing. The outright beautiful second movement was a relief of cool nuance, with Lewis’ strengths that evening coming out best and the oddities least. The sound image of the orchestra meanwhile was nicely detailed, with a few moments of faux surprise thrown in here and there.

Not an ideal start into the night, but better things were in store. It started with Paul Lewis’ encore: an angry Schubert’s Allegretto in C minor, played as if it were Beethoven, with playfulness, brutality, coyness, and daring moments of dissonance all in direct proximity. And then there was Bela Bartók’s “Bluebeard’s Castle”, of course. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a bad performance of this, but that largely speaks to the efficacy of Bartók’s writing, which is—if you can get accustomed to the thorns—evocative, bordering lush, and cinematic like no other work of Bartók’s. And it works equally well staged or as a concert performance (not that much difference, really).

The last performance I heard—with the Munich Philharmonic under Hartmut Haenchen (Lioba Braun, Rudolf Rosen) in June of 2008—was probably the best so far, but this came very close. Where the orchestra and singers then offered warmer hues and more color, the BRSO under Harding (the first performance of his I found unequivocally excellent) and soloists (mezzo Elena Zhidkova and baritone Gábor Bretz; Pál Mácsai was the speaker) were made of sterner stuff. Especially Mme. Zhidkova—willowy, lithe and tawny— reminded me of the time I first heard Ekaterina Sementchuk. Her voice is not just huge and immediately present at any dynamic level, but is so without any sense of pushing. There was a determined ease about how she filled the Herkulessaal with that sonorous voice that works within many shades of one color. Not unlike her healthy dark baritone colleague Bretz, but bigger. It was the kind of performance that will have made a couple new converts to Bluebeard, and perhaps Bartók generally.

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