After their peerless ‘Winterreise’
last month, Goerne and Brendel here gave us sublime interpretations
of the first ever true ‘song cycle’ and Schubert’s swansong to the genre:
sublime, that is, mainly on the Friday, since although Wednesday’s performance
offered some of the finest Schubert singing I have ever heard, especially
in the Heine songs, it was marred by some wayward playing by Brendel
in the Beethoven and by some pesky fireworks which kept going off at
the quietest moments. A severe throat infection and a cold have meant
that my review is late, but did not keep me from attending both performances,
although I experienced Friday’s mainly from the back of the hall where
I stood ‘just in case.’ Granted, I would crawl on my hands and knees
to hear Goerne in this music, but I was surprised by the dearth of other
critics present: given the historic nature of the occasion I would have
expected at least one night to have been graced with ranks of experts,
but it was not to be. No matter: a packed house of Lieder lovers enjoyed
what one of them later described as a ‘completely shattering’ musical
experience.
As always with this singer, the
programme gives us plenty to think about rather than simply wallow in:
these two ‘cycles’ are perfectly matched in terms of their parallel
experiences of longing, unattainable love and distance, but it takes
someone like Goerne to remove from both the superficial varnish of Biedermayer
charm which often deludes listeners into imagining that both works are
‘cosy’ when in fact they are anything but, being as dark and weighted
with sorrow as much of ‘Winterreise.’ Goerne and Brendel present Beethoven’s
cycle as an anguished plea rather than a lovelorn appeal, and it is
the special feature of Goerne’s singing that his interpretation is radiantly
poetic whilst never taking individual words out of context. This was
especially true of ‘Auf dem Hügel sitz ich spähend’ where
the rhythmic pulse of the music was exactly echoed in the words, ‘Unserm
Glück und unsrer Qual’ needing no undue emphasis to make their
points.
These musicians are now so steeped
in these songs that their singing and playing somehow seem to take the
bar lines away: this is not to suggest excess freedom, since they are
scrupulously attentive to the composer’s markings, but an expansiveness
of phrasing which sounds entirely natural. Goerne made the intensity
of the poet’s longing in ‘Wo die Berge so blau’ almost painfully vivid,
with ‘Möchte ich sein!’ troubled rather than wistful, and Brendel’s
sharply etched, almost stabbing accompaniment was entirely in accord
with this. It’s possible to regard Goerne as somewhat ‘breathy’ at times,
but one can hardly complain when that same breath is used with such
awesome control as it was in the transition from the final line of the
third song to the first of the fourth – I wonder how many other singers
can actually do this and still deliver the lines with the requisite
lyrical finesse?
The final song provided some of
the most wondrous singing I’ve heard in a long time: this quasi-recitative,
almost canon-like music was delivered with the most profound devotion,
the lines ‘Und du singst, was ich gesungen, Was mir aus der vollen Brust’
phrased with warm expansiveness, and the poignant echo of the music’s
opening lines in the piano played with haunting delicacy. It’s very
difficult to imagine a finer performance of this piece: one doesn’t
often feel that anyone has said it all with a masterwork, but it seems
to me that they have.
The Rellstab settings which form
the first part of ‘Schwanengesang’ followed (with the addition of ‘Herbst’)
leaving the very different Heine ones for after the interval: an entirely
appropriate grouping since the Rellstab are so close to the Jeitteles,
and it was gratifying to hear that Goerne has taken absolutely no notice
whatsoever of those critics who have complained about his perceived
lack of ‘charm’ and ‘lightness’ and his alleged tendency to the ‘lugubrious,’
since he still presents these songs as dark rather than light, as melancholy
rather than pretty – this is Lieder, for goodness’ sake – ‘just one
letter away from Leider’ (!) it’s meant to be sad, not to encourage
toe-tapping. This ‘Liebesbotschaft’ is not Johnson and Ainsley’s delicately
rippling brook and highlighting of phrases such as ‘Wiege das Liebchen
in Schlummer ein’ to be sung with especial tenderness: rather, it is
a powerful statement of suppressed passion, delivered in an urgent mezza-voce
and played with understated fervour.
Goerne’s voice is ideal for songs
such as ‘Kriegers Ahnung’ and ‘In der Ferne’ where he uses all his formidable
strength as well as unequalled tenderness, but his is a tenderness underpinned
by the poignancy of memory and thus bittersweet in tone: I have seldom
heard ‘Herzliebste – gute Nacht’ delivered with such anguish. ‘In der
Ferne’ entirely avoided self-pity whilst still building up a profound
sense of unutterable sorrow and isolation, with singing and playing
of stunning force in the final lines.
The Heine songs were unforgettable:
I have no hesitation in saying that this will be the recording
of them for our time, and especially so given that the Hyperion edition
is not suitably ‘cast’ in terms of their singer even though the playing
is often at an equal level. ‘Ihr Bild’ and ‘Am Meer’ were absolute marvels
of sustained legato singing, even emission of meltingly beautiful tone
and playing which paralleled the drive and passion of the singing. The
way in which Goerne’s voice opened out during ‘Und das geliebte Antlitz
/ Heimlich zu leben begann’ was quite magical, the tone filling the
words without over-stressing any of them, and in ‘Am Meer’ the opening
phrases were given with a solemn grandeur which was later superbly contrasted
with the gripping final lines, ‘Vergiftet’ conveying a world of bitterness
and anguish.
‘Der Doppelgänger’ was tremendous:
never before have I heard it sung with such elemental force, such magisterial
authority. In the first stanza, Goerne and Brendel united to evoke a
feeling of barely suppressed disquiet, the piano’s tremulous, hesitant
footfalls and the mesmerizing tone of the voice blending to create a
sinister atmosphere around the protagonist, ‘as if the singer were breaking
out into a cold sweat’ as Graham Johnson puts it – the audience certainly
was. ‘Mir graust es’ was wonderfully onomatopoeic – I swear I actually
saw people shuddering – and the crucial ‘meine eigne Gestalt’ was utterly
spine-chilling, the exposed high G wonderfully controlled, the massively
commanding voice rising to a perfectly pitched howl of despair, the
ensuing ‘Du Doppelgänger’ uttered with ringing authority. In almost
twenty five years of recital-going I have never seen an audience so
stunned.
‘Die Taubenpost’ was, appropriately,
given as an encore. This was the time for charm, if it has to be there,
and we got it aplenty, but not overstated: singer and pianist gave it
the perfect combination of hesitation and fervour, the incomparable
final lines not singled out but sung with the same heartfelt tenderness,
natural grace, unforced candour and sense of romantic idealism that
had characterized the rest of the song, and indeed the rest of the performance.
Goerne towers above every other Lieder singer around today, and this
partnership with Brendel should result in recordings which will form
the standard by which all others may be judged.
Melanie Eskenazi
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