SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Mendelssohn, Schumann and Dvořák: Jonathan Biss (piano), Philharmonia Orchestra, Christoph Von Dohnanyi, Royal Festival Hall, London, 10.5.2009 (GD)

Mendelssohn: Overture, 'Calm Sea and a Prosperous Voyage, Op 27

Schumann: Piano Concerto in A minor, Op 54

Dvořák: Symphony No 9 in E minor, Op, 95, 'From the New World'

This concert was given in memory of Mansell Bebb, the Philharmonia Orchestra's Personnel Manager, who sadly died in March. The concert took the standard conventional form of overture, concerto, and grand symphony and it was good to hear this little played Mendelssohn overture inspired by the Goethe poem of the same name. Although it takes on quite a conventional form; slow modulated introduction, allegro, and jubilant finale, it also has the feeling of a tone poem with evocations of the calm sea in the 'Adagio' opening. Dohnanyi managed this opening well taking the trouble not to underline the shift to the wonderful D minor melody. But as we reached the jubilant 'Allegro' I felt a lack of tonal weight in the thrust of the initial D major theme. I listened in vein for a really distinct and stalking double-bass line. Also, Mendelsohnn's innovative writing for bass clarinet and bassoons was difficult to detect. Throughout the concert Dohnanyi favoured a rather pleasing but homogenous orchestral balance. The triumphant concluding fanfares, marked in the more measured tempo of allegro maestoso, and depicting the safe 'prosperous' landing, were well paced, although I did hear a certain shrillness in the brass.

The young American pianist Jonathan Biss has received a degree of critical acclaim recently. But tonight I heard nothing more than adequately professional pianism. Of course this is said in the context of quite extraordinary performances of this concerto from the likes of Grimaud and Joao Pires heard quite recently. Although Mr Biss played well, balancing the lyrical and dynamic with considerable taste, his playing lacked, for me, the incredible range, finesse and pianistic diversity heard in the above mentioned pianists. Also, although Biss and Dohnanyi were always together, I missed that sense of engaged dialogue, which this, of all concertos, calls for. The entry of the 2/4, double time march on full orchestra at the start of the first movement recapitulation was rhythmically inaccurate, and Biss's cadenza was marred by some scrambled notes. Biss and the orchestra delivered the 'Intermezzo' intimacies of the second movement much better, with a touching cello line in the A major song-like second subject. Both Biss and Dohnanyi lacked the necessary thrust in the jubilant 'Allegro vivace' finale and the famous 'deux-temps' rhythm for oscillating piano and string semiquavers was without the essential bounce and lilt. Tovey's comment that 'every note inspires affection' in the exultant coda did not quite register tonight although it was all quite accurately executed.

Dohnanyi played the famous 'New World' symphony in a quite straightforward manner, thankfully devoid of rhetorical, willful, excess. No slowing down for the second subject of the first movement, and a similar restraint in such matters throughout. The first fortissimo, in G major in the basses, again lacked the appropriate tonal weight and this textural problem was exacerbated by the triplet timpani figure being played in a ludicrously loud manner. It is marked ff but tonight the timpanist played what sounded more like ffff!. In classic recorded versions from the likes of Ančerl and Kubelik it sounds arresting and dramatically convincing played as marked! The first movement’s tersely dramatic E minor development section and the arresting coda in modulated minor keys again lacked the required heft, especially in the string section; double-basses again being virtually inaudible; Tovey's 'tragic fury' was wholly lost tonight! The slow movement 'Largo' did not drag, but was a touch bland and while I know that comparisons are 'odious' I did miss the sound of those grainy sharp Czech woodwinds when initiating the movement's concluding climax,  which here although well contoured, sounded a tad harsh, especially in the brass.

The 'Scherzo' was suitably rhythmically adroit but lacked all the sense of buoyant inflection which is in the very idiom of the many allusions to Czech folk/dance rhythms. Similarly in the finale everything was quite well proportioned and structurally sound but I failed to hear the 'con fuoco' (fire) Dvořák asks for. How well Toscanini caught this dramatic fire, and how lacking it was in tonights performance! Throughout the last two movements the timpani were again too loud, often to the point of obliterating important string and woodwind detail! In the coda Dohnanyi correctly played the fragmented themes from all four movements leading to the final blazing statement in tempo but by then all I could summon up was a kind of dutiful respect for a conductor who certainly knows Dvořák's score in a formal sense, but who was tonight unable to register any kind of engagement with that Czech spirit of folk inflections and dance rhythms which, even in fusion with some American Black folk themes, is the essence of the work.

Geoff Diggines

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