Messiaen - Turangalîla-Symphonie: Cédric Tiberghin (piano), Cynthia Millar (ondes martenot), Sydney Symphony, Simone Young (conductor), Sydney Opera House Concert Hall, Sydney, 11.8.2007 (TP)

 

Messiaen's sprawling Turangalîla-Symphonie must be his most popular orchestral work and it certainly seems to be the most frequently performed.  Sydney, having not heard the piece since 1999, was due to hear it again and it fell to Simone Young to light the fuse to Messiaen's decadent score.  Young, the head of Hamburg's state orchestra and opera company, is herself a Sydney-sider and is always a popular guest with the Sydney Symphony.  Her fluent performance of the Turangalîla-Symphonie emphasised its more lyrical qualities. 

The opening of the first movement was more portentous than frenetic, with the brass boldly intoning its love motif for the first time against the contrasting figure from strings and piano, which in this performance had an unusual underwater quality.  Despite the driving force and insistent Eastern rhythms of Messiaen's “gamelan”, his huge phalanx of percussion instruments, Young's lyrical emphasis reasserted itself again and again throughout this performance, as she caressed each theme sensuously.  In the second movement, she shaped and guided the ondes martenot's vocalise with care.  She conducted the opening of the third movement without baton, allowing clarinet and other-worldly ondes freedom in their dialogue.  Lyricism was paramount even in the brightly coloured cacophony of the famous fifth movement, The Joy of the Blood of the Stars.

The Sydney Symphony was certainly energised.  Perhaps it was the thrill of having all of that lovely percussion together in the same space and being given licence to play across and against everyone else with abandon.  The gamelan was certainly right on top of the beat at every stage.

Cynthia Millar, who played the ondes martenot in the last Sydney performance of this piece, was clearly in her element, although her instrument was often just a touch too loud, and for most of the first movement her speakers emitted a constant buzzing which returned from time to time during the rest of the performance.  Cédric Tiberghin was a real standout.  Even if he was from time to time overwhelmed by the orchestra, he was always present within the soundscape, and his war-machine staccato and flurries of snowflake notes from the top of the piano's range were ear-catching.  I should very much like to hear more of him and hope that he will return to Sydney soon.

But even though this is a concertante work, it is the conductor who has the most influence on any performance of this score, and Young's was a success.  Her operatic instincts inspired a performance that emphasised long melodic lines, no mean feat against the gamelan's chatter.  Her beat was consistently clear, her cues precise, and her handling of the score's complex time signature changes assured.  Only one thing was lacking: sufficient dynamic contrast.  Messiaen's score is, it is true, anything but subdued, but for the most part this account oscillated between loud and extremely loud, without really exploring shades of the spectrum in between or on either side.  Even so, this was an impressive, celebratory performance.

 

Tim Perry

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