SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Beethoven: Sonata No. 9 in E Major, Op. 14, No. 1; Sonata No. 10 in G Major, Op. 14, No. 2; Sonata No.8 in C Minor, Op. 13, “Pathétique;” Sonata No. 11 in B flat Major, Op. 22, Sonata No. 26 in E flat Major, Op. 81a, “Les Adieux”

 

“Difficult” is a common shorthand description of music by composers, like Schoenberg and Carter, that is structured in ways different than the vast majority of music that makes its way to the public’s ears. That common music has familiar, recognizable features, like a clear integration of melody, harmony and rhythm, a structure that repeats elements deliberately so that they remind us we’ve heard them already, a sense that the music is going in a specific direction, even if it’s a surprising one. Difficult music seems to go against all this; it’s dissonant or atonal, has no clearly identifiable melody or structure, repeats elements either rarely or in such a complex way that it’s unclear. Difficult music is hard to hear.

 

Beethoven, commonly known, accepted and loved, is fundamentally a difficult composer. He is constantly breaking the familiar rules of music. He writes few melodies, his harmonies modulate in what often seems an arbitrary manner, and he pushes his rhythms onto the wrong foot. Much of his music is intentionally unsettling, but his expressive power is that he offers us just enough beauty, wonder and exaltation that we gladly listen to each baffling, impenetrable moment. His materials and demeanor are commonplace even as his goals are a rarified. Great Beethoven playing expresses an attractive, accessible humanity and emotional content while also clearly conveying complexity and difficulty. Till Fellner’s most recent recital of Beethoven piano sonatas was great Beethoven playing.

 

It was also slightly inconsistent, but that’s not a fault, rather it’s a true expression of the composer. Consistency of expression in this music is a chimera, and as a goal it leads to anodyne, miscalculated playing. Beethoven himself was inconsistent, across his career and even within pieces, but that is a result of the constant probing and daring in his pieces. He constantly tries and doesn’t always succeed, and there’s no constructive way to gloss over it. Also, his overall intensity is so much that it seems both understandable and even appropriate for it to wax and wane within an extended performance.

 

In the Opus 14 sonatas, Fellner’s considerable strengths were on display; clarity, a lively touch, well-formed conceptions that seem both fresh and fully appropriate. His Allegro opening Sonata 9 was more a moderato, but it felt like the right choice. His playing manages to balance both self-effacement and willfulness, and his tempo was a means to reveal the eccentricities of the music with complete transparency. Phrases start and take odd turns, then end abruptly. Sections seemed tacked together arbitrarily, the keys modulate with little preparation, and it seems simultaneously odd and logical. Beethoven’s profound understanding of large scale harmonic structure and the emotional effects of moving through different keys binds everything together with great strength, and Fellner hears this and has complete sympathy and confidence with the oddness in the music, and his absolutely steady rhythmic feel give the audience that confidence as well. I have never heard these pieces played with such an unself-conscious acceptance of the quirks and strangeness, or with such a sense that the music can be allowed to wander as far off track as Beethoven directed, confident that the musician will be able to return safely. Fellner played the opening theme of Sonata 10 with more tenderness than I had imagined existed in the music. Again, his moderate tempo choice was a key in allowing his ideas to speak. He completely understands this music, the jokes, the surprises, the extroverted gestures and the introspective meaning. These performances were revelatory.

 

The ‘Pathétique’ was excellent. His opening chords were forceful, then he pulled back the feeling slightly in the introductory phrases that immediately follow. The meat of this movement was fast, technically controlled, terrifically intense. The Adagio cantabile was like a slow, deep, satisfying exhalation and was played with a moving dignity. The finale alternated between a nervous edginess and a playful confidence. This sonata ended the first half, and perhaps took a little something out of the pianist. The first two movements of the Sonata 11 opening the second half were solidly played but emotionally subdued, as if he wasn’t quite connecting with the center. This is little criticism, though. A musician searching for meaning in some of the most profound music written, and struggling at times with that search, is far more important in failure than a thousand impeccable and forgettable performances that have nothing to say about the notes. He began to find grace and plangency in the Adagio movement, the Menuetto was wonderful, although he again seemed to run out of some energy in the closing Rondo.

 

Or perhaps he was saving himself for the Sonata 26, “Les Adiuex.” The dignified opening was very powerful, and again the open-eyed view of Beethoven’s difficulties, the unfathomable harmonic structure and harsh dissonances of this incredible opening, were revealed in a full, but not harsh, light. His Allegro was surprisingly quick, but fluid and not showy at all, and he played the scale at the close of the opening movement with spine-tingling clarity, control and focused emotion. Fellner’s view of the Abwesenheit movement is of emotional desolation slowly transforming into determination, which made his transition to the final Das Wiedersehen deeply satisfying both musically and emotionally. His rocking left hand was so well articulated that it seemed to speak, and the words were “joy, joy, joy! The finale expresses many types of happiness, and Fellner agreed with them all.

 

As an encore, he played the entirety of the two movement Sonata No. 20 in G Major, Op. 49, No. 2. This was obviously a generous quantity, but even more a rarely generous quality, as it seemed Fellner was allowing the audience to eavesdrop as he practiced at a very high level, searching for personal meaning and comprehension in the music. We heard his process, and we heard Beethoven. It was a moving experience. After this concert, I very much want to hear Fellner’s Beethoven again and again and again.

 

George Grella