Thursday & Friday 3rd & 4th June, 1999 Victoria Concert Hall |
Gala Concert with Anne-Sophie Mutter |
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Anton WEBERN Six Pieces for Orchestra, op.6 Gustav MAHLER Adagio from Symphony No.10 Ludwig van BEETHOVEN Violin Concerto in D, op.61
Anne-Sophie MUTTER violin |
OVERALL NOISE RATING:
1 (quite deathly silence; some violent coughing in Webern on Thursday.)
The Noise Rating Index is a partially-objective measurement of pager and handphone blasts, 9pm and 10pm watch beeps, coughing-during-the-pianissimo-bits, intra-audience conversation and other mind-bogglingly inept noises emitted in the concert hall during actual performance of music. It is measured on a scale of 0 to 5, in increasing annoyance.
This review has been kindly sponsored by the Singapore Symphonia Co. Ltd
by Derek Lim
Webern's style was one of compression, at the same time using his compatriot Schönberg's ideas to approaching tonality. One has to remember that Webern was not a very worldly person, in fact rather provincial. How, then, to perform the music of this misunderstood, nervous figure?
The chamber textures in this piece are very important, and the solo contributions from the concertmaster (3rd piece), clarinet (first piece and more later), viola (third piece) worked their magical touch, providing the 'sparks' of orchestral colour (Klangfarbenmelodie) that Webern may have wanted. Webern's language may seem austere and academic, but how can anybody resist the Mahlerian touches (Webern conducted Mahler as often as he could while in London) - the strained cry of anguish, for example, at the end of the fourth piece, the lonely viola (Webern himself played viola, as I recall) opening the third piece? When you remember that he was shot dead by mistake in 1945, it is simply too poignant.
That having been said, I do not believe that this is the best-prepared the SSO can do, nor that it was a totally stylistic performance. If one listens to Webern's performance of his friend Berg's Violin Concerto, and compares it with modern performances, one can sense a gulf in terms of difference in interpretation. Webern (right) himself would have taken enormous liberties with rubato, and also would have liked swooping portamenti, the likes of which are never heard nowadays, to imbue "meaning" into his music and make it more palatable for the listener.
Which is to say that these were absent from the two performances. A better rehearsed performance, more shaping and phrasing, with the musicians familiar with every note would yield twice the results. As it is, many orchestra members seem preoccupied with note-reading and not following Shui Lan's urgings. Yet there were moments, as I said, of the most beautiful sounds.
More importantly, Mahler may have been religious, but the superstitiousness commonly attributed for not calling Das Lied von der Erde a symphony can be safely said to be a Schönberg import and a myth. Okay, I've said it!
I must say I like Shui Lan's style of introducing the various themes (though calling the D-flat major theme a "love" theme may have been stretching things a bit) and these definitely made things easier for the audience to understand the sprawling nature of this piece (in 'modified' sonata form). The Viennese waltz description was something I didn't really agree with - this aspect is comparatively little compared with the numerous Ländler Mahler composed. Nevertheless, I applaud such pre-performance talks, and I would like to hear more in future.
Shui Lan started the peformance with a rather middle-of-the-road tempo. I particularly liked the way he stretched the last note of the viola theme, and brought in the glowing second theme, which was almost luminous with beauty, courtesy of the SSO strings. Ravishing also was the way he moulded the theme to its Tristanesque climaxes - raw passion.
The third theme (the 'dance' theme) was not flowing enough, I felt but oddly in this section the imperfect intonation in the strings (mainly the 1st Violins) brought out the state of mind - the nearly hysterical quality of the music with the notes veering on the completely atonal, very realistically. Strangely I feel that the unprepared nature of the performance lead the SSO to put out all they had in some sections, to good effect.
Elsewhere, Gary Peterson's excellent trumpet solo note flanked by the 9-note dissonant chord made me wonder where we should find a trumpetist of his calibre. Overall the performance made a very touching balance between structure and emotion; on both nights by the time we reached the coda, the translucent textures coaxed out of the SSO drifted me into gentle Heaven, making me think of that blessed Wunderhorn Lied which ends Mahler's Fourth. The SSO when playing Mahler is fine clay, waiting to be moulded.
Latest updates tell us that the SSO will play Mahler's 9th in the next season (done: reviewed here). I eagerly await.
I expected the SSO to be ragged after such a taxing first half; they were. I'm not sure that Shui Lan is totally comfortable with this concerto - it doesn't seem to totally suit his temperament. His orchestral exposition was matter-of-fact, and I found it lacked touches of imagination which make this concerto the Olympian touchstone it should be. Beethovenian accents were washed over and somehow by the time we reached the solo entry I was just a tad disappointed.
The audience received Mutter on both nights by anticipant applause. Amazingly she looks every bit the sophisticated lady she seems on the covers of her CDs. Not for Mutter the subtle "contained dignity" of Menuhin on the rising arpeggio-octaves, rather a more large-boned approach. In the first movement, Mutter delighted in big-phrased rubatos, which Shui Lan seemed uncomfortable to counter with flowing orchestral responses. I feel the chemistry between the conductor and soloist was not the best.
Nevertheless one could find beauty in much of Mutter's playing. She seems to reinvent some parts of the concerto and offer very different point of view from the "traditional" interpretation. For example, she largely eschewed glissandi á là Kreisler, but had some wide vibrato in places which made it hard to classify her playing - if anything it comes across as a very individual approach. "Emphatic" would be the word to describe it, I imagine - take her dare-devil performance of the Kreisler cadenza, a showcase of 19th century virtuosity in her separated bowing.
A lot of the time, her approach seemed more Brahmsian than Beethovenian. Which is to say that I don't think that her style is totally suitable for Beethoven. Overall I found she downplayed the pathos in the first movement. However, there were passages which she played in a certain manner which made me see new light in it, which were of undeniable beauty.
Particularly amazing was her thoughts on some single notes, where her variation of intensity and colouring was simply virtuostic - a mark of a true artist, and really thought-provoking. In her playing, the solo part is kept firmly in the focus, even where it seems to be "accompanying" the orchestra with the finely spun variations.
Shui Lan started the Larghetto at an appropriately slow tempo. I have always felt that Beethoven makes it very difficult for the soloist here. After the hushed entry with muted strings, how is the poor soloist to enter without disturbing something? Mutter's entry was not as sublime as she probably could achieve; here her shading seemed more in the singing aspect of the solo lines. Here some of her high note vibratos I found just a little disturbing.
Overall she paced this in a more or less straightforward manner, more in the style of an intermezzo rather than the emotional centre of the piece. The passage where soloist plays over pizzicato strings somehow lacked the rapt emotion one might have heard in Menuhin's account, for example.
A shortened Kreisler cadenza played to maximum virtuostic effect led her breathless entry into the third movement, where she at first sped ahead of the orchestra, which quickly caught up. It was most at home in this movement, and the exuberance of the music and performance from both soloist and orchestra was undeniable. On the first night she punctuated the flow of the music every now and then with a little "Luftpaus" which I found most refreshing.
This movement was taken in a rather straightforward manner on both nights, but on the first night there was a dangerous excitement in the air, caused perhaps by Shui Lan's (as I perceived it) late cue in one of the orchestral entries in the Larghetto (why did this have to happen?).
To my friends reading this: that passage alone was worth the price of admission. I am quite sure not half-a-dozen violinists dead or alive could have thought of playing that passage that way. On the second night she played it at rather a faster tempo, which took away a little of that expressiveness. They say that if you haven't heard something, you can't miss it; I definitely missed that moment. For those who went on Friday, you missed something truly great.
The audience received Mutter's performance with a standing ovation on the first night; on the second there only one person stood and applauded (and we applaud you - Ed.). With her incredible radiance she acknowledged the orchestra and conductor, made two exits before playing the Sarabande from Bach's second Partita, which we heard just a week ago from Amoyal. Very different from his of course; her playing ranged from vibrato-less to vibrato-laden, from sans portamento to Menuhin-esque portamento - a true delight. On the first night she played better, with more control. On the second night, the audience launched into spontaneous synchronized applause, the likes of which is chiefly heard in Vienna, which we have never heard before at the Victoria Concert Hall, urging her to the Sarabande. Truly a night to remember.
Impromptu German Glossary
Derek Lim went to get Ms Mutter's autograph after the concert on both nights, and wishes the Singapore Symphony Orchestra and Shui Lan more nights of madness!
497: 5.6.1999. up.7.5.1999 ©Derek Lim
Wahn! Wahn! So said Hans Sachs (famously in Meistersinger), albeit in a different context, and that was what I thought when I saw this concert's programme for the first time. Webern, Mahler, then Beethoven. What kind of madness had taken over the Shui Lan when he programmed this? Apparently the most blessed, beautiful kind. I attended the concert on both nights, and on both nights I found myself touched by some of the most touching playing the SSO has proffered for a long time.
Again I wonder how can anyone resist the portions of breathtaking, chills-run-up-your-spine beauty? This is not difficult music. As the great pro-modern conductor Hermann Scherchen said, "Music does not have to be understood; it has to be listened to." Unfortunately for the vast majority of the audience, the word Webern must have conjured up horrific images.
The performance itself was one of utmost sensitivity, though painted in broad strokes, as it would have been necessary to, given that a lot of the orchestra, especially the strings, were still counting sharps and flats - there must have been half a second between the first and last desks of the first violins at times. I would like to give special mention to Mr Souptel's solo parts, which were very well-played, if sometimes seemingly ahead of Shui Lan's conducting, as were Heger's fleeting viola solo parts.
The orchestra did not respond fully to her, I feel, and ensemble was positively ragged in places, with a terrible horn flub in one particular entry on Friday. As a whole I found Shui Lan's accompaniment attentive, but lacking a certain flexibility and imagination in tempi which Mutter certainly had. Mutter was simply, herself, which is to say I don't agree with everything she does, but it was certainly imaginative in every respect.
If the second night seemed more comfortable, the first night was definitely the more expressive, Mutter doing a coup de theatre. I have always found the movement to be laden with a mixed sadness, after the (preferably Kreisler) cadenza. In Mutter's performance of the cadenza on the first night, one sensed this nearly unbearable lonely sadness amid the breathtaking virtuosity. But it was with what she played after the cadenza that made me break into tears. She slowed the tempo down by at least half it seemed, and then whistled the Rondo theme in a most pleading way.
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Photos of Anne-Sophie Mutter from DG/Gramophone 11/98.
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Readers' Comments
From: Edwin Phua (fantast@pacific.net.sg / Friday, June 11, 1999 at 00:51:42)
What kind of audience went on the second night? Didn't they hear the great music and the beautiful playing as did the audience of the first night? Anyway, thanks for a great review, comforting to many who were unable to obtain tickets to hear a great musician like Anne-Sophie Mutter!! And would, of course, have given her another standing ovation!!
From: Denise Mutter (mutterdenise@hotmail.com / Saturday, June 26, 2004 at 05:44:04)
Could we have a correction, please? My son, Charles Mutter, is no 'Ms'!
From: abbass (a_e_mutter@yahoo.com / Tuesday, February 22, 2005 at 15:31:11)
In the name of the creator of the violinists i am one of the lovers of anne sophie mutter due to her power and emotion in playing that music. I have the best wishes for you dear anne. I wanted to see all of your performance on violin but here in iran i was not successfull, i hope and wish to see you and your performances. good bye.
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