This performance was ‘One of Trevor Pinnock’s final
collaborations as director of the English Concert,’ since he is shortly
to hand over responsibility for the artistic direction of the orchestra
which he founded in 1973 to the violinist Andrew Manze, although he
will return as a guest conductor. One takes this ensemble so much for
granted that it is difficult to imagine musical life without it, and
this evening gave an apt demonstration of all that this, surely the
finest baroque orchestra in Europe, stands for. Pinnock directed a performance
of exciting drama, exquisite subtlety and frank devotion, where the
playing frequently touched heights which one is only rarely privileged
enough to encounter. Moments such as the halo of strings which surround
Christ’s arioso passages, the continuo of the Bass arias and the highly
charged sweep of strings which ushers in the final chorale, were as
vividly characterized as I have ever heard, and the oboe, flute and
‘cello passages were superbly taken by Katharina Spreckelsen, Lisa Beznosiuk
and Jane Coe.
The opening chorus was a little tentative, but by ‘Herzliebster
Jesu’ the ECC were singing with superb attack, wonderful shading and
the sharpest diction I’ve heard from an English group. ‘Erkenne mich,
mein Hüter’ and ‘Ich will hier bei dir stehen’ were taken very
slowly and reverently, and ‘Befiehl du deine Wege’ was simply stunning
in its calm, measured unity and directness. The singing of the choristers
of Southwark cathedral, and more significantly, that of some of the
soloists, however, was not consistently on this level.
I have yet to hear a tenor who sings the Evangelist
with greater emotional commitment, fluency of phrasing, precision of
diction and authority of declamation than John Mark Ainsley. He is the
pick of today’s Evangelists not only for these qualities but for his
unique understanding of that blend of slight theatricality and Lutheran
sermonizing which is essential if the narrative is to have its full
force. If your taste in Evangelists is mainly for the beautifully toned
timbre or the ragged, ‘I’ve-just-read-this’ reportage, then Ainsley
may not please you throughout, since he is not a man to balk at sacrificing
a little tonal beauty in order to convey the full import of a line,
and he never gives you anything as shabby as overt theatrics; it is
honesty above all which characterizes this Evangelist, coupled with
a feeling for the nuance of individual words and phrases which bring
tears to the eyes. Two examples must suffice: in the Arrest of Jesus,
the narrator repeats Judas’ words to the multitude; ‘Welchen ich küssen
werde, der ist’s, den greifet’ and he then notes ‘Und küssete ihn.’
- Ainsley conveyed the cruelty of the action with just the one word,
‘greifet,’ and he made you feel the import of the kiss with an ironic
tenderness and sweetness in his tone: in the narrative of Peter’s betrayal,
the Evangelist’s ‘krähete’ was superbly onomatopoeic, and at the
challenging melismata of ‘weinete bitterlich’ he coloured the words
with his characteristic blend of warm intimacy and thrilling drama.
A commanding performance.
Having Heard Michael Volle’s singing of the Bass arias
on the Ozawa recording (in which Ainsley is the matchless Evangelist
and Thomas Quasthoff the very moving Christus) I was not prepared for
the nobility and grandeur of his singing; here is a bass infinitely
more suited to Christus than the arias. The word ‘leonine’ might almost
have been invented for Mr. Volle, since he is an exceptionally striking
figure, making his portrayal of Christ as a vulnerable, intensely human
figure all the more compelling. He sang the wonderful arioso passage
beginning ‘Trinket alle daraus’ with skilful management of legato and
noble, eloquent phrasing, and his characterization was vivid and sensitive
throughout, nowhere more so than in ‘Stecke dein Schwert’ where he conveyed
all of Christ’s dignity and certitude.
Carolyn Samson is a soprano of exceptional gifts; not
only is her voice warmly distinctive but her performance conveys none
of the anxiety which a young singer might experience in this difficult
music, giving us instead a sense of sheer enjoyment in every line; ‘Wiewohl
mein Herz in Tränen schwimmt’ revealed a genuine sense of the import
of the words, superb phrasing and excellent projection, and ‘Aus Liebe
will mein Heiland sterben’ was the focal point which it should be but
so often is not.
Very little of the rest of the solo singing reached
the levels of these three, although Catherine Wyn Rogers, replacing
Robin Blaze at short notice, acquitted herself well in ‘Können
Tranen meiner Wangen.’ The young German baritone Stephan Loges has had
a full calendar since winning the Wigmore Hall’s Song Competition in
1999, and he remains promising although possessing a voice of no very
special distinction; he sings accurately and musically but with a rather
dry tone – ‘Komm, süsses Kreuz’ was probably his best moment, with
its well projected words and confident phrasing. Susan Gritton had very
little to do, and did it competently, and the same word might be applied
to the bass Brindley Sherratt, who made little of ‘Mache dich, mein
Herze, rein.’ The tenor Werner Güra simply should not have been
standing on the same platform as John Mark Ainsley, since his anxious,
dry, undistinguished singing was not at even an acceptable level, and
it is mystifying to discover that he has an emergent version of ‘Dichterliebe’
when the latter tenor has yet to be invited to record it.
The closing moments of ‘Wir setzen uns mit Tränen
nieder,’ performed with moving grace, were a fitting conclusion to this
culmination of the English Concert’s six-year project focusing of the
major religious works of the 18th century.
I cannot conclude without referring to an unfortunate
piece of mismanagement by the RAH: ‘Latecomers will not be admitted
until a suitable break in the performance,’ the tickets proclaim; precisely
at which briefing, one cannot help wondering, was it decided by the
Hall’s management that the beginning of the central moment in Part One
of the ‘St. Matthew Passion,’ the moving narrative of the arrangements
for the Last Supper, constituted a ‘suitable break?’ Here we had the
Evangelist telling the story as though he really were Matthew, and Christus
intoning his instructions to the Disciples – and with what were they
favoured – the rapt silence which should accompany such words in such
performances? Why, no – at a concerted entry, every door in the hall
opened to admit a gaggle of latecomers at each, who then proceeded to
arrange themselves noisily, and in the case of the eight idiots near
to us, to argue as to who was sitting where, so we heard ‘Let me get
past you! and ‘Actually, I think I’m in Row 8’ as accompaniment to the
Evangelist’s narrative. For once, I was rendered speechless with dismay
and could only shake my head, an action duplicated with equal disbelief
on the platform.
Melanie Eskenazi
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