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The first volume of
Danacord’s Langgaard Violin Sonatas
series, reviewed
here by me, showed some signs of
the stylistic idiosyncrasies by which
he has come to be known; by the second
volume they are in full flower. That
said we begin with the very early 1907
Aubade, written when he was 14 and dedicated
to his uncle, Axel Gade; it is a charming,
wispy piece. There was a long gap between
the Second Sonata, recorded on the first
volume, and the Third of 1945-49. It
was because of his friendship with violinist
Haakon Raskmark that the last works
for that instrument came into being.
The Third is a five-movement work, which
seems to mimic the externalities of
a suite but evinces the (incomplete)
rhetoric of a late Romantic sonata.
Thus though we have a language that
is essentially Brahmsian in its cast
there are bits missing – lack of development
sections and a rather strange absence
of academic form. The unconventionality
of the structure gives rise to tensions
between the music’s skeleton and its
outward dress. The Espressivo fourth-movement
is clean-limbed and attractive in an
uncomplicated sort of a way but the
very Brahmsian finale – albeit a modified
Romanticism – does give rise to awkward
doubts as to the suitability of the
whole, very personalised schema.
Following the rather
diffuse reinterpretation of a Romantic
sonata Langgaard then gives us his appropriately
named Short Violin Sonata. This lasts
all of three and a half minutes and
falls into four clearly defined movements
conforming to the basic Allegro-Adagio-Scherzo-Finale
type. This eccentric example of stretto
compression (complete with repeats!)
is perhaps the apex of Langgaard’s violinistic
experimentation with conventional arguments
placed in absurdist circumstances.
Sonata No 4 Parce
Nobis, Jesu! is once again in five
movements and opens with Bachian chorale-like
intensity. Here Langgaard throws in
a disruptive piano part, constantly
threatening to subvert the melodic line.
When at last the violin reasserts some
measure of direction the piano grudgingly
offers a modicum of variably tactful
support. Some formidable intensity is
generated via double-stopping over clipped
piano chords and some real romantic
nobility and fervour develops as well.
The prayer and the jagged again co-exist
in the slow movement whilst of the two
successive scherzi the second acts an
accelerated pendant to the first (it
lasts 37 seconds). The finale shows
more of that rather old-fashioned romanticism
that critics take to be malign and corrupted
– though this movement doesn’t sound
like that to me. Écrasez l’infâme
(from Voltaire) is suffused with
those wildly oppositional pulls that
we have seen again ansd again in his
music; a Grieg-Brahms axis is broken
asunder by piano disjunction and insane
violence. Silence looms up and a strange
dislocation pervades everything until
the final hymn-like tune evolves from
the mess and the madness. Which makes
the final work on the disc Andante
Religioso (originally written for
violin and organ) that much more unsettling.
One feels Langgaard of all people would
hardly go gentle into that good night.
Production standards
have been triumphantly met in this second
and final volume; my admiration for
the two performers is unaltered. You
will find much of this music unsettling
for a variety of reasons – puzzlement
as to Langgaard’s stylistic "point,"
flinching at his volatility and juxtaposed
violence, and bewilderment at the elements
of compression and elongation in his
music. That said his is a voice that
exerts a worryingly strong pull on me
– and maybe on you as well.
Jonathan Woolf
see also review
by Rob Barnett
Serguei Azizian (violin) 