A set of Bach cantatas is not perhaps the expected
material for the Wigmore Hall, such music being more usually heard in
a church or more ‘conventional’ larger concert venue, but Matthias Goerne,
who chose the programme, believes it to be the perfect place to sing
and hear this intimate music, and so, for the most part, it proved to
be. Goerne is so often said to be the successor to Fischer-Dieskau,
and although I consider him to be as significant a musical figure for
our time as the latter was for his own, it seems to me that the younger
baritone is so individual an artist that there is only one definite
feature which links them in my mind, and it is that to hear either at
his most sublime, you must hear him sing Bach. Goerne’s singing on this
occasion, despite one or two uncharacteristically vague – sounding lines
and a distressing mistake in the final work, was the model of what Bach
singing should be, in its combination of reverent spirituality and vivid,
masculine life.
‘Ich habe genug’ must be one of the most moving works
in the whole canon, and Goerne and Albrecht Mayer gave it a performance
of sublime authority and unbounded tenderness. Mayer’s playing of the
florid, haunting solo was so fluent as to make the instrument seem a
part of himself; this Principal Oboe of the Berlin Philharmonic is establishing
himself as a leading soloist of that instrument, and his style was the
ideal match for Goerne’s ‘cello-like tone and remarkable facility with
florid passagework.
It is the recitatives, even more than the arias, which
mark Goerne as a Bach singer of the highest order, and in the first
one here he achieved a superb blending of exquisite tenderness at ‘Dass
Jesus mein und ich sein eigen möchte sein’ and consoling strength
at ‘Mit Freuden sagt ich, Welt, zu dir: Ich habe genug.’ The central
aria, ‘Schlummert ein’ was phrased with warmth and serenity, especially
at ‘Fallet sanft und selig zu,’ and the energetically forceful ‘Ich
freue mich’ was sung with great skill, the long phrases taken in single
breaths with power in reserve.
The less frequently heard ‘Ich geh’ und suche mit Verlangen’
gave the members of the Academy of St.Martin in the Fields a chance
to shine in the opening ‘Sinfonia,’ as well as introducing the soprano
Ofelia Sala, and what a joyful discovery she is; her singing is naturally
warm in character, sensitive in phrasing and eloquent in articulation,
and she blended beautifully with Goerne in the sensual duets; I would
love to hear her Sophie or her Pamina. The wonderful Arioso passage
here called forth from Goerne some of his most radiantly poetic singing:
‘Komm, Liebe Braut’ was irresistible, and the final Aria ‘Dich hab ich
je und je geliebet’ was the high point of the evening, with the bass
repetitions of ‘Ich komme bald’ weaving mesmerizingly around the soprano
and continuo lines.
The second half of the concert was devoted to ‘Ich
will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen,’ a les than happy experience for all
concerned at the outset. In his recording with Norrington, Goerne sings
this Cantata with matchless refinement, caressing beauty of tone and
depth of feeling, and it is clearly intimately familiar to him; on this
occasion, however, he suffered one of those mishaps which all performers
endure at least once or twice in a career, in that he turned over too
many pages, got lost, the players in turn found themselves at sea and
could not be re-united with him; Goerne had the grace to do the right
thing, in that he brought it to a halt, apologized and they all began
again. It did take a while before things settled down; Goerne was naturally
distressed, and it probably didn’t help that he must have been aware
of just how much the audience felt for him.
Matters finally restored themselves by the middle of
the first recitative, and he went on to give performances of this and
the following Aria and Arioso which can only be described as masterly.
Here is a bass who really can sound like one’s idea of the voice of
God in such lines as ‘Die ist das Himmelreich,’ where the consoling
warmth of the timbre is used to such dramatic effect that the ensuing
seconds of silence seem to last for minutes. ‘Endlich, endlich wird
mein Joch’ was simply breathtaking, and the final recitative’s blending
of serenity and world – weariness at ‘Wiewohl wird mir geschehn’ was
perfection.
A packed house was warmly appreciative, although I
could not help noticing that there were very few critics present. I
cannot imagine not wanting to hear Matthias Goerne sing Bach, or Albrecht
Mayer play, and would cheerfully cross a desert to hear either of them,
but those who would have liked to attend and were prevented from doing
so by distance or other disadvantages, may be consoled by the fact that
the concert is soon to be broadcast on the Internet by iclassics.
Melanie Eskenazi
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