Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Beethoven: Marc-Andre Hamelin (piano),  London Philharmonic Orchestra,  Ingo Metzmacher (conductor) Queen Elizabeth Hall London. 20.04. 2007 (GD)

 

The concert opened with the revised (1943) arrangement of Schoenberg’s ‘Verklärte Nacht’ opus 4, for string orchestra. Metzmacher gave quite an intense performance of this early work. In allegorical and musical terms the work, based on an expressionist poem by Richard Dehmel, is by its very nature intense, but throughout Metzmacher imposed a kind of superficial intensity achieved by excessive deployment of rubato, emphatic stringendos and dynamic distortions. For example, the second section marked ‘rallentando measure 100’ was far too lethargic here, sagging and incoherent in relation to the structural whole. Schoenberg, in his ‘Treatise on Harmony’, and other works, emphasizes that the expressive intensity of his music should register not as ‘expressive decoration’ but as revealing a ‘new knowledge’ (that obtained through the necessity of a new musical language) implicit in the musical structure. Tonight Metzmacher was attuned more to ‘expressive decoration’ and rhetorical effects, alien to Schoenberg’s whole ethos. Even though ‘Verklarte Nacht’ is a very early ‘romantic’ piece it is far more nuanced, tonally and harmonically  than anything in Mahler or Richard Strauss, as the famous inverted ninth chord at measure 42 demonstrates. Also Metzmacher did not play the five sections as structurally interrelated, but tended to sectionalize each piece, dragging the final adagio which is really a more forward moving adagio coda. For the most part the strings of the LPO played very well, although the pp cascades (hovering between D major and D minor) in the penultimate adagio needed to be more hushed, mercurial and translucent. Here the rather boxy acoustic of the QEH did not help matters.

Stravinsky’s (1924) Concerto for Piano and Wind instruments is a precursor to the mature works of his ‘Neo-Classical’ period, with its Bachian toccata-like piano writing, and some   almost jazzy figurations in the wind parts, especially in the first and concluding allegros. From the slow in A minor introduction  for horns and timpani, one knew this was going to be a rather stately performance, which, in as sense, Stravinsky’s ‘maestoso’ marking before the ‘largo’ second movement partly justifies; but here I had no sense of contrast between the opening largo, the allegro, and concluding first movement maestoso. This was mostly due to Metzmacher’s rather four-square and tonally heavy delivery of the allegro, which should be swift, playful, with a real feeling of improvisatory dialogue between piano an orchestra; totally lacking here.

The largo itself tended to drag, with no anticipatory feeling of its lead-in to the concluding allegro. The swaggering A flat march in the final initiated by a trombone lacked that sardonic bite, so essential in Stravinsky. Also there was occasional muddled ensemble, especially in the final. Overall the winds and brass of the LPO played quite well and the balance between them and the six double-basses situated at the rear of the orchestra came-off effectively. The timpani parts needed to be played with more rhythmic imagination (they were frequently smudged over by the wind orchestra). Marc-Andre Hamelin for the most part played accurately, but frequently I had the sense that he was  doing just that ( a kind of run-through)  with no real projection of  dialogue with the orchestra; this was light-years away from the pianistic/improvisatory insights of Alexander Toradze, who played the concerto with Gergiev in London recently.

Metzmacher used a very large string complement indeed for Beethoven’s Fourth symphony, with six double-basses! Overall this was a most enjoyable performance, with plenty of ‘vivace’ in the first movement’s allegro, a forward moving adagio (Beethoven’s ‘adagio’s’ in this period, 1806, are never adagio’s in the manner of the works of his later period, or of the later ‘romantic’ nineteenth century adagios), a thrusting, swift ‘menuetto’ (actually more a scherzo), and a rousing finale allegro, although here the ‘ma non troppo’ marking needed to be observed more.Metzmacher wisely did not allow the opening ‘adagio’ to drag. However I was particularly disappointed that he saw fit to place all his violins on his left. Beethoven here is specifically experimenting with the antiphonal effects of divisi violins, especially in the first movement’s development section where the long sustained B natural major pedal crescendo, leading to the tonic B flat is punctuated by antiphonal figures for first and second violins. Here the pedal timpani crescendo needed far more power. Throughout, the works numerous dynamic sections (e.g. the first movement recapitulation), a far more trenchant accenting on timpani and trumpets, which should cut through the string texture, was required. I would have expected Metzmacher to have deployed hard timpani sticks, but the soft felt heads used simply failed to register Beethoven’s innovative orchestral dynamic effects.

The same could be said of the second movement’s coda where the timpani, recalling the opening rhythmic figure on strings, develops a crescendo roll which concludes the movement; all this had little effect. The third movement menuetto (scherzo) was nicely accented. But again the frequent abrubt cross-rhythms, and off-beat sforzandi accents of the finale failed to register in the intended sense of dramatic contrast. The ‘great bassoon joke’, a brief figuration of the initial opening theme on bassoon just before the symphony’s coda (which Beethoven undoubtedly learnt from Haydn), was a little muffled…one of the reasons Beethoven added ‘ma non troppo’ to the allegro marking no doubt. Throughout the LPO played well, especially the strings, which just managed the finale’s whirling spin of figurations at Metzmacher’s fast tempo.

 

Geoff Diggines