Ivo Pogorelich: Phoenix or Swan Song?

F.Chopin, Preludes, Ivo Pogorelich DG

Other Reviews: Donald H. Crosby, Pianist Ivo Pogorelich, Unsettling Old Scores (Washington Post, November 3) Joshua Kosman, In the 11 years since his last local recital, pianist Ivo Pogorelich has distilled his idiosyncratic approach (San Francisco Chronicle, October 26)

When Ivo Pogorelich's playing is called "unique," it isn't always in the most flattering way that this description is employed. He is certainly a willful pianist and his playing can be mannered. I, for one, rather like his Chopin Preludes and Liszt Sonata in B Minor, and his recording of Scarlatti Sonatas is downright sublime because rather than being gratuitously eccentric he's got something to say, musically. I am sure he also wanted to say something in op. 111, Beethoven's last piano sonata and according to Thomas Mann's Wendell Kretzschmar in Dr. Faustus, "a farewell to the art form of the sonata in general." Just what that was, however, I could not discern. After the fierce passion of the momentous Allegro con brio ed appassionato (played just that way!), Pogorelich caressed the moving, gentle opening of the 2nd movement with its famous C-G-G, D-G-G notes out of his Hamburg Steinway. But as he took his time to devote attention to detail in the following variations, the coherence of the work was lost to waywardness and the sonata's end sadly fell apart like a flower's petals after bloom.

Before that, he showed why Sonata No. 24, op. 78, really is one of Beethoven's best works in the genre. Two movements, lovingly played (with plenty of attention to the "emotional" part, for those who need that in Beethoven) linked it wonderfully to op. 111. The standard set by Maurizo Pollini's rendition at the Kennedy Center last Wednesday (see ionarts reviews, from October 31) was not quite reached, though.

The Croatian Pogorelich, who became instantly world-famous when he was eliminated at the International Chopin Competition in 1980 (causing Martha Argerich to leave the jury in protest), was the Lang Lang of his time. Now, nearing 50, playing to a half-filled and dimly lit Center for the Arts at the George Mason University in one of his first concerts in some time, he comes in darker, more subdued hues.

In tails and with his head shaven, he looked eerily much like Rachmaninov himself, whose Moments musicaux, op. 16, no. 1, he presented at the beginning of the second half. Under the soft touch of his huge hands, the work turned into fragile Whistler-like nocturnes. Alexander Scriabin's Sonata-Fantasy, another two-movement work, drifted and murmured about—not inappropriately for a piece that is to reflect the sea—until he picked up force towards the end. Visibly uncomfortable with applause, Pogorelich was busy getting right back to the piano and Franz Liszt.

While the performance had already become better from Beethoven to the Russians, it was in the Hungaro-German's three Etudes d’exécution transcendente that Pogorelich excelled. Since they were perfectly suited to his playing and musical personality, he mastered the exercises with panache. Precision and Romantic vigor were showed off in unforced flashiness. He simply ignored applause between the pieces and plowed right through Feux follets, Wilde Jagd, and Appassionata. His offering of a staggering palette of pianos and pianissimos was unlike I have heard from any pianist before.

Just to curb the frenetic applause, Pogorelich threw in another Liszt étude as a most substantial encore that, despite the evening's persistent sense of an odd mis-communication between artist and audience, brought the house down. A few shy, acknowledging nods later, he was gone. The aftertaste was peculiar puzzlement: was the dazzling Liszt the sign that this pianist was storming back to once-held acclaim, or was an obstinate Beethoven an explanation for his step out of the limelight? If presumably neither, the concert certainly was distinctively Pogorelich—an attribute that will continue to repel distractors and lure fans from all over the country.

The Devil Perks Up

Two Saturdays ago, the Göthe Institut wrapped up a two-day event on the topic of Faust, the German's favorite subject. More than two dozen participants—most of them German or German-speaking—were left by the time the final act of that "Faust Fest" commenced. Just looking at the program, it also seemed the real highlight: a talk by the lovely Ted Libbey on "Faust in Opera."

After Kaffee und Kuchen (my third chance in barely a fortnight to compare Hildabrötchen from Austrian, Swiss, and now German sources), Irmgard Wagner of the Goethe Society introduced Ted Libbey, who wondered how to fit all that he had to say, play, and show into two hours, not unlike every composer who ever tried to take the Faust material and turn it into an opera.

F. Busoni, Faust, Leitner

Among the composers who were inspired by Faust—not just Goethe's version, but also the original 1587 Historia von Dr. Johannes Fausten and Marlow's Dr. Faust—are Mendelssohn (the Scherzo in his Octet is inspired by the last lines of the Walpurgisnacht, Walpurgisnacht Oratorio)—who got to meet Goethe through his teacher Zelter—Beethoven ("Come Sea and Prosperous Voyage"), Schumann (setting "Alles Vergängliche..." from Faust II), Liszt's Faust Symphonie, Wagner (Faust Overture), J. Strauss (no relation to the other Strauss, with "Aus Faust's Leben und Werken"), as well as Boito, Busoni, Gounod, Berlioz, Schnittke, Riehm, Mansoni, and a league of others.

Ted Libbey started with Busoni, the German-Italian and his Baroquish-Romantic Faust, explicitly based on the puppet play. Atmospheric, with a tiered structure, the opening Sinfonia sets the mood. A delicious recording with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau under Fritz Leitner from 1969 shows this beauty from its best side.

H. Berlioz, La Damnation de Faust, Sir Colin Davis

C. Gounod, Faust, Rizzi

Berlioz, who knew Faust through its French translation and introduced Liszt to the work, created La Damnation de Faust, and Gounod's Margarethe (as his Faust is known in Germany) turns it into Grand Opera, including love-stories, choruses, ballet, and all.

Schnittke's work, based on the old history (he, too, was daunted by Goethe's work?), is a load of fun if you don't mind modern music. His Historia von D. Johann Fausten is spun out of his Faust Cantata and full of eerie effects, including musical saw.

Finally—because it is as close to an operatic treatment as Faust II comes in music—Mahler's 8th was on the menu. My favorite version, with Ozawa at Tanglewood (sadly NLA, though possible to get used at Amazon), is ethereal in the most magnificent ways. (The legendary Solti recording is completely lost on me: I cannot but assume that its status is the lore of hype.) The last movement is, even though Mahler purists wince, one of the most sublime moments in music. Imagine between 350 and 1000 participants making music in subtle pianissimo tones... shudders of delight!

Informative and fun, thanks to Mr. Libbey, this talk was a delightful way to spend a Saturday afternoon in the everlasting striving for education. Faustian, almost, only we got to keep our souls.

High Strung at the Swiss Embassy

If you thought the German Embassy was ugly, you owe yourself a trip to the Swiss Embassy on Cathedral Road. But on the night the Embassy Concert Series presented the Zürich String Trio (on October 21)—consisting of the Brothers Livschitz and the young Armenian cellist Maikael Hakhnazarian—it was what was on the inside that mattered.

When the program notes quote Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Christoph Eschenbach (soon to be at the Kennedy Center with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Nadia Salerno-Sonnenberg [go here for more information]), and Jean Pierre Rampal with high praise for the group, it feels almost difficult to report that in the Mozart-arrangement of Bach's Preludium & Fugue, KV404a, they were a big disappointment. Boris Livschitz's tone on violin was muffled, thin, and squeaky (though loud, when necessary), with his brother Zvi on viola only marginally better. Mr. Hakhnazarian, I thought, fared best, though troubles, including some with intonation, remained.

The piece itself is a prime example of two geniuses at work creating something far lesser than the sum of its parts would suggest. The beginning is almost unidentifable as Bach, and not to its benefit.

The Adagio of the early Beethoven String Trio in C Minor (op. 9, no. 3) had them produce some beautiful music. The attendees were so charmed, indeed, that they lavished each movement with applause... not generally a practice in performances since early last century (though Beethoven, of course, would not have known it any other way...). By the time the finale (Presto) came around, either Boris's instrument or he himself had warmed up a little as the tone became more pleasing, if still far from ideal.

The intermission was skipped (perhaps to heighten the anticipation for the Swiss sweets on offer afterwards), and the Beethoven Duo for Viola and Cello (with a subtitle that was utterly declarified by confusing and seemingly haphazard or incomplete program notes) came upon us. Ziv Livschitz's playing was fraught with the same problems his brother had displayed, while the cello again stood out with a better, fresher tone. Applause and the concluding Menuetto were heartfelt.

Ernst von Dohnanyi, J. Brahms, Serenade in C, String Sextet No. 2 in G, arr. for string orchestra

Ernst von Dohnanyi's Serenade in C Major, op. 10, is a gorgeous thing from a sadly underrated composer. It seems that the Embassy Series, presenting a generally conservative program, always (and laudably) manages to squeeze in one (or two) off-the-beaten-path pieces in the program... even if the Serenade in particular isn't entirely obscure. Its version for string orchestra, arranged by Dmitry Sitkovetsky, is a particularly luscious musical experience.

The fourth movement from Beethoven's Trio, op. 9, no. 3, was thrown in as an encore and kept me from the reception: Cecelia Porter, covering for the Washington Post [see her review], didn't let that get between her and the homemade sweets and other little Swiss delicacies, though.

It might seem a trivial point - but it isn't: The Swiss Embassy and the Embassy Series are to be highly commended for their use of real glasses for the Swiss vino. That's how it ought to be, and it was good to see them set the standard for other such events.

Talking to Boris Livschitz, who went to some length to make sure I understood he did not mean it to be an excuse, shed some light on the problems with the sound he had produced: his fingerboard had been too low for some time and he had it just replaced. In that process the bridge had also been replaced. Not liking the new bridge, Mr. Livschitz put the old one back in, which was better, but now the strings are far too close to the fingerboard. That—and perhaps exhaustion from travels?—is good enough for me. Aside, all but one other attendee whom I talked to loved the concert plenty.

If that was the least satisfying event the Embassy Series has to offer, it need not worry in the least about its offerings and wonderful mission of working in the trenches of public diplomacy.

This Sounds Like a Job For...

...the Library of Congress. An article (Home sought for composer's works, October 31) from BBC News reports that an unusual collection of Shostakovich materials is in danger of being lost:

A new home is being sought for thousands of recordings and manuscripts of the works of renowned Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich. The collection was owned by conductor Roman Matsov, a close collaborator of Shostakovich. The recordings are stacked in the Estonian apartment where Matsov lived before his death in 2001, aged 84. Matsov's son, Mark, is having trouble paying rent on the flat and fears the collection could lose its home. Yevgeny Pasternak, son of Nobel Prize-winning Russian writer Boris Pasternak, warned that if the archive was not saved "one of humanity's most important cultural legacies will perish".

That sound you hear in the background is me wincing in pain. If no one at the LOC answers my call, I know that Alex Ross has some experience with storing recordings.

Whew!

Anthony Tommasini's article today (Whither the Met's Artistic Priorities? It Depends Who's Doing What, November 1) for the New York Times informed me that Peter Gelb, an executive from Sony Classical, will succeed Joseph Volpe as the general manager of the Metropolitan Opera in 2006 (thanks to ArtsJournal for the tip). This was a relief, since I chewed my fingernails in public here about Plácido Domingo's name being on the Met's short list. Maybe Mr. Gelb can get Sony to come through with the funding to keep the Met broadcast on the air. Mr. Tommasini asks some questions that I agree it will be interesting to see how the Met answers.

UPDATE:
Although I missed it, Tim Page did write about this news (Gelb Is Named Met Opera GM, October 30) in Saturday's Washington Post (thanks to rg for pointing that out).

Baroque the Vote

A brief suspension of the Ionarts rules, to make an announcement that is a) political (see the Ionarts motto in the upper-right corner) and b) pertinent only to Americans. All those who read this and who can vote in tomorrow's election here in the United States: please vote (always, but especially tomorrow). It doesn't matter to me if you vote for Maurizio Pollini, Maurizio Cattelan, Marcel Proust, or your dog. Choose your poison as you will, but be a good citizen.

We will now return to our regularly scheduled programming.

Pelléas in Berlin

As mentioned before (see Preview of the Opera Season, 2004–2005), many opera houses are mounting productions of Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande. (Ionarts has a similar consideration of the revival of Robert Wilson's production in Paris.) The new production at the Deutsche Oper Berlin premiered on October 10.

From Manuel Brug's review (Ein Boot - und viel Beton, October 12) for Die Welt:

A Boat – And Lots of Concrete

The Deutsche Oper Berlin glows with Debussy. Marco Arturo Marelli moves "Pelléas et Mélisande" into the Bunker

Is it really so difficult? A perfect cast, an intelligent conductor for a willingly cultivated orchestra, a well done–even tasteful–direction that doesn't know everything better. Dramma per musica that is alive and at the highest level—as an event professionally kept subtle, without the need for 'message' and foaming from the mouth... but one that wants to touch, entertain, and be liked. In Berlin, the city that still has three opera houses, that seems to be the exception. And then there comes Claude Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande to the Deutsche Oper, [...] 102 years old already, a bewitched musical fairytale, poetic, sound-sensitive and overflowing with riches but far from being blockbuster—and everything is right: a thankful audience applauds itself into a frenzy of ovations. [...]

The production team of Marco Arturo Marelli and Dagmar Niefind (Costumes) are known as finders of pretty pictures with little depth. But this Pelléas, told without symbolic riddles and enigmas, seems to be dear to their heart, even though they were, after original producer Michael Thalheimer quit, only second choice. They never topple Maeterlinck, they play his dreamy, unexplainable story of Mélisande (found in the woods by Golaud, falling in love with his brother Pelléas who in turn gets killed by Golaud) just as it is written in the libretto and very concretely.

There is a location for this nightmarish play: [Note: Either Die Welt or Mr. Burg himself spells the corresponding word (Albtraum) with a "p" – a surefire sign that ultimately, the publication or its author lacks any and all sophistication. That many encyclopedias also make the same mistake is no excuse; the etymology takes 30 seconds to establish and make nonsense of the version with "p."] It is an old bunker, half submerged in water, somewhere at the Atlantic Line—an irregular hall of concrete, cold and eerie. Here lives the royal family of the sinister land of Allemonde, grey in grey, where Men and Animals or move away from, without a future and devoid of hope. In a barren room lies the more or less mute and ill father of Pelléas; later his dead son is laid out in the same space. The old King Arkel (Reinhard Hagen) sits blind in a wheelchair with an intravenous drip in his arm. Geneviève (Claire Powell), mother to both half-brothers, is a nurse, not ruler.

And yet the elf-like Mélisande of Véronique Gens—who spins out soprano lines of pure silver—brings poetry and beauty into this dreariness. The light of her blossoming feelings for Pelléas reflects in blue from the dancing reflections off the water in the grotto and the scene at the tower. The white boat on which she, like Hans-Christian Andersen's Mermaid in Copenhagen, sat at the shore in the beginning, becomes a symbol of their love—a protecting skiff, bobbing on the waves, pulled by Pelléas. But he is also stabbed in the same skiff—the boat then lying on shore—and it becomes the deathbed of Mélisande, on which servants of the white light pull her to a Böcklin-like Isle of the Dead.

[Richard Croft was a softly insistent but ultimately weak Pelléas in Duffle-coat and sneakers. Larent Naouri’s Golaud was the true winner, making for a broken, pity-evoking figure and the discovery of the production. He murders not because he wants to, but because he feels he must. He does not succeed in love because the object of his desire escapes via death. In the icy universe of Golaud we shiver with him. The wonderfully clear conducting of Marc Albrecht was a sensibly sensuous compromise between oft-employed radical choices. His dreamlike reactive, French-sounding orchestra makes for a wonderfully poignant Debussy.]

Additional Commentary by Charles T. Downey In addition to the review translated here, here are some more reviews: Klaus Geitel (Auf Wellen gebettet, October 12) for Berliner Morgenpost: Conductor Marc Albrecht "should be named the new music director of the Deutsche Oper. He leads his orchestra on quiet feet through the multichromatic score: this palette of wondrous sound, which is unfolded with care and serendipity." Tobias Wolff (Nachtblaue Liebesszene inmitten grauer Trostlosigkeit, October 12) for the Leipziger Volkszeitung: With over 120 light settings, director and stage designer Marco Arturo Marelli produces innumerable gray tones on the naked surfaces, plays with the reflections of the water, with the darkness, with the shade of the sharp edges and projections. In the night-blue of the sweet scene between Pelléas and Mélisande an unbelievable warmth radiates. And at the conclusion Mélisande finds the way out only through death, with the boat led through a gate . . . by women in spring-like colored dresses (costumes: Dagmar Niefind). There are rarely opera performances in which the general impression is as powerful as this one, because in his production Marelli has formed each small detail of the characters consistently." Ulrich Amling, (Der Untergang, October 12) for Der Tagesspiegel: "A gigantic bunker fills the stage, a dead concrete island, into whose narrow space a faint light penetrates only rarely. Here lives the unfortunate king house of Allemonde, with whose troubled family the curious Mélisande becomes involved. There are also 85,000 liters [18700 gallons] of water that has penetrated this inhospitable area, enough to turn around a boat on or wade into up to the knees. This enormous wet space is the leading actor in Marco Arturo Marelli's production. The Swiss stage designer noticed that Debussy's masterpiece has water running through its veins. Truth does not flash here in rivulets of fake blood, but in the play of the colors on the water surface, which represent the feeling on the sea of the soul." Georg Friedrich Kühn ("Pelléas et Melisande", October 11) for Deutschlandfunk (DeutschlandRadio Berlin): "Véronique Gens is a marvelously well-articulated Mélisande . . . Laurent Naouri is the brutal Golaud, who attacks and humiliates his Mélisande when she is dying in her bed." Laura Naumburg (Zwölf Arten, das Wasser zu beschreiben, October 12) for Neues Deutschland: "Mélisande has never died as beautifully as in Marco Arturo Marelli's production. Water has never shone more seductively than in Marco Arturo Marelli's scenery. Watery music has never murmured, breathed, or rushed more beautifully than in Marc Albrecht's hands at the orchestra podium of the Deutsche Oper Berlin." Axel Brüggemann (Wer Oper liebt, gewinnt, October 17) for Die Welt am Sonntag

George Crumb Ensemble at the Library of Congress

One of the concerts I was really looking forward to attending this year (see my Washington Fall Music Preview, to be supplemented by Jens's recent post on Upcoming Concerts), in the series of free concerts at the Library of Congress, was the Founder’s Day Concert this past Friday (October 29). The George Crumb Ensemble, on the composer's 75th Birthday Tour, appeared at the library, with the Crumb himself on percussion. Sadly, the former Archbishop of Washington, James Cardinal Hickey, passed away last weekend, and much of the past several days, including Friday night, my time has been taken up by singing, with the choir of National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, for the Cardinal's funeral services. So, I have to send you to someone who was actually there Friday night, Gail Wein (Revisiting Composer G. Crumb, November 1), who reviewed the concert for the Washington Post:

Thirty-odd years ago the Library of Congress's Coolidge Auditorium was the venue for premieres of two of George Crumb's now-famous works: "Ancient Voices of Children" and "Voice of the Whale." Friday night the 75-year-old composer, one of the fathers of American classical music, returned to the Coolidge stage with an ensemble for a program of works that spanned his entire career.

From the first notes of "Three Early Songs," written when Crumb was a teenager in 1947, soprano Tony Arnold's phenomenal talent was apparent. Arnold delivered Crumb's setting of sentimental texts by Robert Southey and Sara Teasdale with a clear tone, clean diction and an understated earthy quality. The piano accompaniment by Robert Shannon was simple, at least compared with Crumb's later works. There was none of his atonal, angular signature style; instead these works harked back to Rachmaninoff and Debussy.

Read the whole thing here.

UPDATE:
Another person who was at the Library of Congress that night adds the following observations:

The Coolidge Auditorium was packed for a celebration of George Crumb's 75th birthday. His wife and ensemble had come along in a presentation of a program that began with Eine kleine Mitternachtsmusik, an "interesting" piece with lots of banging and plucking on the piano and riffs on Thelonious Monk and notes of Miles Davis. The second piece, an early, old song felt sort of like "being in a victorian mansion." Soprano Tony Arnold had a very big, round voice. The third piece was set to a poem by Walt Whitman, also in an older style and less interesting that the preceding piece. The fourth piece was inspired by the composer's dogs and provided the impetus for Crumb to learn to play the percussion instruments on which he performed. That includes an impressive, hugely reverberant "water-gong."