SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Beethoven: Till Fellner, piano, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, 12.2.2010 (GG)

Beethoven: Sonata No. 12 in A flat Major, Op. 26; Sonata No. 13 in E flat Major, Op. 27, No. 1 ‘Quasi una fantasia;’ Sonata No. 14 in C sharp Minor, Op. 27, No. 2 ‘Moonlight;’ Sonata No. 22 in F Major, Op. 54; Sonata No. 21 in C Major, Op. 53, ‘Waldstein’


Till Fellner brought the latest installment of his ongoing Beethoven sonata concert cycle to New York City this past weekend, and left behind memories of a stunning, exceptional conception and performance of the ‘Waldstein’ sonata, along with the deep pleasure of hearing a substantial chunk of the great body of work that is the Beethoven piano sonatas, played at a very high level of musical thinking and technique. Fellner’s approach to Beethoven, at least in these pieces, is refreshingly transparent and understated. His touch is on the percussive side, and he places a slightly stronger emphasis on the structural elements of the sonatas than I am used to hearing. It’s a smart decision intellectually, musically and emotionally as Beethoven wields structure in the pursuit of expression as no other composer has done.

Along with the general decision about Beethoven, Fellner made certain features of each sonata the emphasis of his playing and conception. From the opening of the first piece on the bill he made it clear that he had lots to say; he emphasized the dissonances and inner voices in the opening theme of the Sonata No. 12, and accepted the tongue-in-cheek quality of some of the variations as just that and played them with good-humored skepticism. His measured, clear style really shines in slow movements; the Marcia funebre was enthralling, and he treated the casual ending of the Sonata with an insouciant offhandedness. He played the wonderful Sonata No. 13 with a pointed emphasis on the brilliant structural feature that connects the finale to the lovely Adagio movement, and the piece itself is at its most fantastic in that slow movement. Fellner’s tempo was well-judged and perfectly argued throughout, and he performed the deeply impressive feat of taking what appeared to be a mistake a few phrases from the coda, an incorrect interval, and turning it into something that made musical sense. The ‘Moonlight’ Sonata was unsentimental and perhaps underdone in the first two movements, but in retrospect the pianist was holding back his resources for the final movement, which was intense and on-edge.

The brisk, slightly obsessive Sonata No. 22 was well-dispatched after intermission, and then came the ‘Waldstein.’ What Fellner did was the highest art of interpretation, coming to incisive, comprehensive terms with the score and playing the music in a way that connected the very first moments seamlessly to the very last and to all those in between. His method of expressing this structural sense in music was also deeply expressive and exciting; his playing gave the sensation that something special was happening, and that the phrases and sections to come would be presented with a sense of logic both surprising and incontrovertible. His first key decision all this was to play, almost throughout, at a tempo that was almost unusually slow. He convinced throughout that this was the right tempo. The agitated opening chatter of left hand chords was still agitated, but the speed allowed all the notes of the right hand melody to speak with weight; and what often are played as grace notes became graceful lines. It was expressive of feeling and intellect, and was the first element in building a large-scale sense of tension. Fellner also emphasized an understated manner, hinting at the power underneath the music but never indulging it.

His slow movement was understated still, almost brittle, with a real sense of improvisation, of the music searching its way to a resolution. The key moment in the piece is the elision between the second and final, Rondo movement, where the pianist has one simple exposed note with which to pivot from desolation to the most beautiful, sublime sort of comfort. Fellner did this with as little fuss as I imagine possible, letting the note speak just long enough for us to clearly know what it is and what it signifies, and beginning the Rondo while it still decayed with the gentlest poetry. He still maintained the discipline of tempo and expression, the right-hand chords floating in air. The music wanders through times of stress and doubt, and again Fellner kept his cool, describing what was happening without indulging it, so when the theme returned and the chords came ringing out of the piano, there was great power. Finally, at the coda, he both opened up the width and depth of expression and pushed the tempo, and the contrast with the intellectual and emotional cool that had come before was extraordinarily powerful. It was a performance that will endure.

George Grella