For the Brussels Le Monnaie opera orchestra,
their visit to Antwerp was a great night out, and one to give hope that
Antonio Pappano may encourage similar diversification when he
takes over the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden later this year. His
eclectic tastes have already been displayed in London, and his supersensitive
control of orchestral timbres was to be relished again in the fine Blue
Hall (one of four) at the modern Antwerp arts complex outside the centre
of the city. It is a pleasant concert venue, with perfect sight lines,
ample legroom for everyone and excellent acoustics to show off a large
orchestra.
The programme seemed to be trying too hard to please
everyone; for me the Gershwin piano concerto was a misfit - undistinguished
music, which has never convinced me that it deserves its place in the
repertoire, nor did Thibaudet's efficient account persuade me otherwise,
delight the audience though it did. Best was first, Carl Ruggles' concentrated,
uncompromising masterpiece, introduced to Paris by Nicolas Slonimsky
in 1932, but USA only in 1966! A strong solid creation by one of the
finest of the American experimentalists, treading its own path, not
derivative even if arousing fleeting thoughts of Sibelius (En Saga)
& Varese; not so quirky and inconsequential as Ives can be - Ruggles
was very much a man unto himself.
The spell was broken with the brash Gershwin concerto;
there appeared to be little that Pappano could do with it, though the
audience responded to its energy. After the interval magic of another
kind was established with the Ives, which needed two conductors to control
the simultaneous, rhythmically unrelated strands. This was a 1954 version
of the much earlier The Unanswered Question for smaller forces;
recomposed as the last of his Three Outdoor Scenes (a great pity we
did not hear them all together) it requires an extravagant line-up including
six hands at two pianos (we had the two pianos but only two pianists!).
For me the Bernstein was a surprise and made a worthy finish to an interesting
concert. I had not heard in concert this1961 recomposition of music
from the mould-breaking musical of 1956, and it is noteworthy for the
ordering of selected items (with a quiet finish) and especially for
the expertise of Bernstein's orchestration which gave every opportunity
for each section to shine - notably the percussion who had a field day
- and for Pappano who draw expressive subtlety from the orchestra. He
is a master of strings pianissimo, as remembered from the Verdi
Requiem at The Barbican.
Back in London, Pappano began his LSO concert with
another American favourite, Copland's evocative Quiet City, which
commenced with Pappano’s trademark – a practically inaudible pianissimo.
Prokofiev's Symphony Concerto (1938/52) has never established
itself in the repertoire and can be an uncomfortable work to hear. Very
long, with a huge central movement, Han-Na Chang was a forceful, commanding
cellist with a big tone, but did not seem to have got inside this elusive
score. However, it was worth hearing live to demonstrate that Prokofiev
solved all the balance problems completely - no need for the artificial
spotlighting of the soloist which is ubiquitous nowadays on recordings
and, to a lesser degree, in broadcasts. Next day, Rostropovich's ardour
and creative phrasing in the live 1964/72 recordings Rostropovich
The Russian Years box (EMI Classics 7243
5 72016 2 9) convinced me that the work is not just an ugly
duckling, but is one which demands consummate musicianship as well as
transcendent technique. This rather peculiar (and very long) programme
finished with a fine account of Ravel's complete ballet score of Daphnis
et Chloé, in which the LSO chorus was more effectively integrated
with the orchestra than at San
Sebastian ( - - Ravel's ballet score Daphnis &
Chloe, in its complete version with a large, wordless choir (the Sociedad
Coral de Bilbao had far too little to do but did it well) fared less
well - - ); one always feels sorry for the choristers when
those wordless passages are their only contributions in a programme.
The following day there was another substantial American
work in a BBC Symphony Orchestra concert conducted by Kazuchi Ono, who
will succeed Pappano as Music Director of Le Monnaie in Brussels
this summer. George Crumb's 1979 Star-Child,
(Bridge 9095, also including Mundus
Canis) is an elaborate construction, with a graphically intriguing
score but, to my ears, is thinner
in musical content than its apparatus (large orchestra, two choirs and
bell ringers) justifies. Crumb frankly acknowledges that his contrasted
musics superimposed on slow moving continuous strains for strings are
'in the manner of Charles Ives', and this needed the luxury of three
assistant conductors to coordinate it all. Best was the singing of Valdine
Anderson in duet with the singing-trombonist Roger Harvey (echoes of
Berio's Sequenza).
Afterwards The Planets (which I had been avoiding
for some years, even though Calum MacDonald claims that it remains 'immediately
impressive after a hundred hearings') was unexpectedly invigorating
and was done proud by Kazuchi Ono, conducting without a score, including
Colin Matthews' Pluto the Renewer, which emerged from
the dying strains of the wordless chorus finishing Neptune. Time
will tell whether that addition, which has achieved success on CD, give
The
Planets another 80 years lease of life and popularity?
Peter Grahame Woolf
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