Bruckner's Fourth from the Pittsburgh Symphony (Honeck), and Fifth from the LPO (Skrowaczewski)

Anton Bruckner

Symphony No. 4

Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

Conducted by Manfred Honeck

Reference Recordings FR – 713 (Hybrid CD/SACD, 5.1 and stereo)

Symphony No. 5

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Conducted by Stanislaw Skrowaczewski

LPO 0090 (CD)

Here are two very different but very worthwhile approaches to Bruckner, both captured in live performances from the in-house labels of the Pittsburgh Symphony and London Philharmonic respectively. Compared to Skrowaczewski, who was 92 in December 2015 when this recording was made, Manfred Honeck is a mere stripling, and Honeck’s Bruckner discography is a fraction the length of the legendary Skrowaczewski’s (whose complete and highly recommended Bruckner cycle with the Saarbrücken Radio Symphony Orchestra was recently re-released by  Oehms records at a budget price).

Honeck’s liner notes describe the Fourth Symphony as “almost a tone poem in the robe of a symphony”. He takes Bruckner’s gushing about knights on proud horses and rustling forests quite literally and thinks that they provide a guide to interpretation. Personally I find this most implausible. Would our appreciation of this great symphony be any the less if some austere editor had removed all traces of Bruckner’s program? Surely not.

Yet, setting aside his fondness for the program, Honeck is certainly on to something when he observes that this symphony does not always lend itself to what he calls “a rigorous reading of Bruckner as a master of the organ and counterpoint”. Instead Honeck calls for flexibility of tempi and expression to bring out the full range of Bruckner’s emotional palette, which ranges from the earthiness of the scherzo to the deep melancholy of the Andanta (a melancholy that, as Honeck points out, has ironic overtones). The strengths of this recording include a great sensitivity to orchestral balance, keeping the brass on a tight leash so that they do not drown out the strings. He is particularly attentive to the violas and the richness of the orchestra comes out very well in the excellent SACD sound (I listened in 2 channel).

Honeck’s approach to the Fourth seems completely inappropriate, however, for the Fifth, which is Bruckner’s most contrapuntal and organ-inspired symphony. Despite the odd humorous moment, the Fifth has little by way of earthiness and rusticity. So it is not surprising that Skrowaczewski is almost the exact opposite of Honeck, with measured and steady tempi that characterize the “cathedral of sound” model of performance. It is difficult to fault Skrowaczewski’s grasp of the architecture of the symphony. This is not the most dramatic interpretation (listen to the end of the first movement, for example), but in both the slow movement and the Finale Skrowaczewski and the LPO achieve an extraordinary consistency of pacing and flow of the musical line. There is excellent playing from the solo oboe (Adagio) and clarinet (Finale). This is a terrific performance, as well as a fascinating testament to many decades of immersion in Bruckner’s music.  

Both discs are recommended.

Imogen Cooper's Chopin

Imogen Cooper’s Chopin

Polonaise No. 7 in A flat major, Op. 61 'Polonaise-fantaisie'

Two Nocturnes Op. 62

Fantasia in F minor, Op. 49

Ballade No. 4 in F minor, Op. 52

Nocturne No. 8 in D flat major, Op. 27 No. 2

Ballade No. 1 in G minor, Op. 23

Nocturne No. 16 in E flat major, Op. 55 No. 2

Berceuse in D flat major, Op. 57

Imogen Cooper, piano

Chandos CD CHAN 10902

This disc represents Imogen Cooper’s first recorded foray into the music of Chopin. She is, of course, best known for her probing and often intense explorations of Schubert and Schumann. Somewhat disarmingly the liner notes contain a few paragraphs from the performer entitled ‘Why Chopin, why now?’ There she speaks of her “persistent feeling that Chopin is old-fashioned, difficult to program in this age of fabulous, exotic, and novel mixtures.” She goes on to ask (rhetorically): “Does this explain the feeling that a fresh personal discovery entails a considerable effort, an effort to delete the long accumulated data and reach for the suffering (and not always sympathetic, let us be honest) man and poet? To look at his language anew and not take a single note for granted?”

Cooper certainly casts a fresh eye. Her playing is refreshingly free of the clichés of Chopin interpretation, but the mention of suffering is telling. Cooper’s Chopin is unrelentingly melancholy. For many of us Chopin’s genius lies in his extraordinary versatility. He could write for the salon, for the dance floor, or for the confessional – sometimes for all three in the same piece. Cooper’s selection of pieces are all overwhelmingly introspective. There are no mazurkas, waltzes, or polonaises (the Polonaise-fantaise is really more of a fantaisie than a polonaise). The weight of the recital is taken by the first and fourth ballades and a selection of rather dark nocturnes. Each of the pieces played is an undisputed masterpiece, but the cumulative effect is to make Chopin sound rather one-dimensional.

Anybody who cares about Chopin will want to listen to this recording. Cooper is too important a pianist to miss, and her interpretations are certainly powerful. I suspect, though, that many will feel, as I did, that there is something missing here. Even in his darkest moments Chopin had a graceful lightness of touch. Imogen Cooper plumbs the depths, but leaves behind some of the most important things that are on the surface.

Performances of Bruckner 9 by Mariss Jansons and Christian Thielemann

Anton Bruckner, Symphony No. 9

Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

Conducted by Mariss Jansons

RCO 16002 (SACD/Multi-channel DSD 5.0)

Anton Bruckner, Symphony No. 9

Staatskapelle Dresden

Conducted  by Christian Thielemann

Unitel Classica/C major  LC15762 (Blu-Ray)

Here are two very different performances of Bruckner’s Ninth. Both are live, and both are contributions to ongoing cycles, but the resemblance stops there. The stopwatch tells the tale. Thielemann’s performance weighs in at just over 62 minutes of music, while Jansons comes in at 54”44’. I have reviewed Thielemann’s Fifth and Eighth favorably (here and here, respectively). In both of those cases the weightiness of his interpretation worked to good effect. Here I am not so sure. Jansons seems to me to provide a more compelling interpretation, despite his less distingished pedigree as a Bruckner conductor.

Thielemann’s interpretation falls short in the first movement. His approach is too smooth. The problem is a lack of contrast – not dynamic contrast (of which there is plenty), but rather affective contrast. It fails to present enough tension for subsequent resolution. The climax before the coda has all the trappings of drama, but misses the depths that in the best performances make the coda more effective. The legacy of the opening movement weakens the later movements. The Adagio is more compelling taken on its own terms, and the affective contrast works better – not surprisingly, given that this is some of Bruckner’s most dissonant music.  But considered within the symphony as a whole it does not have the force that it should have, because it rests on a weak foundation.

To my ear Thielemann is too reverential. Many listeners, though, will find Jansons going too far in the opposite direction. His tempi are definitely on the brisk side (some might say rushed) and some of his accelerandi and ritardandi are very noticeable indeed. Nonetheless I found his approach to the first movement more satisfying than Thielemann’s. There is a real sense of urgency (in the build-up to the first climax, for example) and as a consequence the tension and drama come across more effectively. There is a real sense of release with the first movement coda. Jansons’s scherzo has a more driving rhythm, which sets up the Adagio nicely. He luxuriates much less than Thielemann in the third movement (and is nearly six minutes quicker!), but the climaxes and overall structure are at least as convincing.

Curiously, the Jansons performance, which feels more authentically live, was actually recorded over three different live performances in Amsterdam in March 2014, while the Thiemann Blu-Ray appears to have been recorded in a single evening (May 24, 2015). The sound quality is good on both, with the Jansons recording from RCO Live coming in SACD format with stereo and surround sound options (I listened in 2-channel, as usual). The videography by Agnes Méth on the Thielemann Blu-Ray is skillful, but occasionally a little too involved.

Of the two my recommendation would be Jansons and the Royal Concertgebouw. But I would not dissuade anyone from buying the Thielemann Blu-Ray.

Sokolov plays late Schubert and late Beethoven

Grigory Sokolov: Schubert, Beethoven, Rameau, Brahms

Franz Schubert, Impromptus D899

Franz Schubert, Three Piano Pieces D946

Ludwig van Beethoven, Sonata No. 29 in B flat major (Hammerklavier)

Jean-Philippe Rameau, Les Tendres Plaintes

Jean-Philippe Rameau, Les Tourbillons

Jean-Philippe Rameau, Les Cyclopes

Jean-Philippe Rameau, La Follette

Jean-Philippe Rameau, Les Tendres Plaintes

Jean-Philippe Rameau, Les Sauvages

Johannes Brahms, Intermezzo in B flat minor op. 117 no. 2

Deutsche Grammophon 479 5426 (2 CDs)

Grigory Sokolov, the legendarily under-recorded genius of the piano, is now slightly less under-recorded. At the time of writing this double CD release of concert recordings from Warsaw and Salzburg brings the recorded repertoire to a grand total of 14 CDs and one DVD – a remarkably small tally for a pianist widely held to be one of the greatest living exponents of the keyboard, who won the Tchaikovsky Competition fifty years ago in 1966 at the age of 16. This set is the second release to emerge from Sokolov’s exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon. I think it’s safe to assume that the future holds a steady trickle of live performance releases. We should all be grateful to DG for bringing an end to the lean years.

The meat of these discs are classic Sokolov repertoire – late Beethoven and late Schubert. The Schubert pieces were recorded at Warsaw’s Philharmonia Naradowa on May 12, 2013 and the Beethoven at the Salzburg Festival on August 23 of the same year. The set is rounded by the six encores played at the Salzburg concert – five of Rameau’s Pièces de Clavecin, and then the second of Brahm’s Op. 117 Intermezzi.

The combination is surprisingly effective, and the encores are certainly not “lollipops”.  The nicely crafted five Rameau pieces provide a delightful counterpoint to the intense performances that precede them, and the beautifully played Brahms Intermezzo, a resigned and autumnal piece, is an excellent capstone to the set, as it must have been to the original concert at Salzburg.

Still, the recording will be justly celebrated for the Schubert and Beethoven performances. One of Sokolov’s most distinctive strengths at the piano (in addition, of course, to his technical mastery) is the depth and intensity that he brings to slow movements. So he is ideally suited to the melancholy lyricism of late Schubert. The D899 Impromptus are all very fine, with No. 1 particularly standing out – at Sokolov’s hands it stretches to over 10 minutes, without any moments of longeur or impressions of self-indulgence. For me, though, Sokolov is even more impressive in the Three Piano Pieces (D946), which he succeeds in making as deeply expressive as the famous last three piano sonatas.

The highlight of Melodiya’s 2014 release of Sokolov performing Beethoven, Scriabin, and Arapov (which I reviewed here) was a wonderful performance of Op. 111, Beethoven’s final piano sonata. That outstanding performance is matched by the Hammerklavier presented here. The slow movement in particular is spellbinding – better performances do not readily spring to mind. And while the Adagio Sostenuto is plainly the performance’s center of gravity, Sokolov maintains expressive balance across the other three movements.

The sound quality is as good as one would expect from Deutsche Grammophon (with a little audience noise for verisimilitude). My only reservation is that the liner notes are breathlessly sycophantic. Hopefully future releases from DG will have some analysis amid the hagiography. This is a relatively minor quibble and these two discs are highly recommended to all music-lovers.

A few days in Paris: Rattle’s Bruckner and a Mitsuko Uchida recital (April 2016)

Spending a few days in Paris in the second week of April allowed me to marvel at the wealth and accessibility of the city’s musical life. On Tuesday April 12 I was able to get a same-day ticket in the afternoon for Simon Rattle conducting Bruckner’s Eighth and Messiaen’s Couleurs de la Cité Celeste at the Philharmonie. On Wednesday I could have attended a piano recital by Yundi. Friday offered a recital by Stephen Kovacevich. Another possibility was an all-Rachmanimoff program with Vladimir Ashkenazy conducting the Philharmonia and Boris Berezovsky at the piano. Sadly I had to miss all of these, despite decent ticket availability (albeit in the higher price brackets) and was only able to rejoin the fray on Saturday night for Mitsuko Uchida’s recital at the Théatre des Champs Elyssées. What an extraordinary range of opportunities for a five-night window! And of course there was much, much else on offer.

Simon Rattle is already developing a strong rapport with the London Symphony Orchestra, although his contract with the Berlin Philharmonic does not expire until 2018. Both the Messiaen and the Bruckner were performed with assurance and precision. The juxtaposition is interesting. The most obvious resemblance between the two composers is, of course, their deep religious faith (much more intellectualized in Messiaen’s case than in Bruckner’s). But from a musical point of view there are more interesting structural parallels and differences. They both compose in blocks of sound. Messiaen’s blocks are static, however, whereas Bruckner’s are much more dynamic. I found that this element of contrast made the start of the Bruckner symphony particularly effective, as did the contrast between Bruckner’s prodigious string sections and Messiaen’s scoring exclusively for wind, piano, and the largest percussion section I’ve seen for a long time.

Messiaen’s Couleurs de la Cité Celeste requires very precise conducting, to allow the piece’s articulation and timbres to emerge against its complex rhythms. Rattle and the LSO were clearly very comfortable with the musical idiom, as of course was pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard (who won the Olivier Messiaen prize in 1973 and is a dedicated exponent of contemporary music). Orchestra and conductor then switched styles effortlessly (after a short interval) and delivered a very memorable performance of Bruckner’s Eighth. Bruckner is not the first composer that comes to mind where Rattle is concerned and I must admit to having been underwhelmed by his Ninth (not least because of his insistence on conducting the reconstructed finale). But here he and the LSO were terrific, combining chamber-like phrasing with full-on sturm und drang. The pacing was well-judged, consistent across the four movements and doing justice both to the depth of the slow movement and the powerful momentum of the outer movements. My only complaint was an occasional loss of articulation as elements of the musical fabric were drowned out in some of the climaxes (most noticeably the principal climax in the slow movement).

At the Théatre des Champs Elyssées a few days later Mitsuko Uchida offered a program that has seen many outings – the Berg piano sonata, Schubert’s D899 Impromptus, Mozart’s Rondo K.511, and Schumann’s Piano Sonata No. 1. Each piece played to a different strength. Her fineness of phrasing and delicacy were on display in the Berg and the Mozart, particularly effectively in the Berg where she brought out the subtlety of the harmonies. Uchida is very closely identified with the Schubert Impromptus and the D899 set were well performed, albeit without the full expressive range on display in her recordings of the set. The lyricism of No. 3 emerged very clearly, but there was room for more drama in No. 1 (although I may be prejudiced from having recently reviewed Sokolov’s monumental live recording from Warsaw).

The Schumann, in contrast, was outstanding, with Uchida bringing out beautifully the piece’s many different aspects and personalities – from the storminess of the first movement through the short but super-lyrical Aria and jagged Scherzo/Intermezzo to the concluding Rondo where  Schumann’s two alter egos (the reflective Florestan and the ebullient Eusebius) chase and wrestle with each other.  A spell-binding performance.

Schubert Piano Trios

Franz Schubert:

Piano Trio No. 1 in B flat major, D898

Fantasie for Violin and Piano in C major, D934

Impromptu for Piano in A flat major, D935/2

Boris Kucharsky, violin

Peter Wöpke, cello

Elizabeth Hopkins, piano

(CD – Paladino Music PMR 0046)

Piano Trio No. 2 in E flat major, D929

Sonata for Arpeggione and Piano in A minor (viola version), D821 (*)

 

Boris Kucharsky, violin and viola (in (*))

Thomas Carroll, cello

Elizabeth Hopkins, piano

(CD – Paladino Music PMR 0047)

These two discs from Paladino Music offer a charming perspective on Schubert’s late chamber music, featuring both string trios and an interesting selection of complementary works clearly designed to play to the strengths of the individual musicians. With the second disc, violinist Boris Kucharsky, a former protégé of Yehudi Menuhin, and pianist Elizabeth Hopkins complete their cycle of Schubert’s music for piano and violin. For the first piano trio they are joined by Peter Wöpke, principal cellist with the Bavarian State Orchestra. The British cellist Thomas Carroll, who is also chief conductor for the Orpheus Sinfonia, does the honors for the second piano trio.

All of the music on these two discs is from the sunnier end of Schubert’s chamber repertoire, even though it overlaps with some of his darkest compositions – the lively Rondo in the first piano trio was written at the same time as Winterreise, for example. Discs of late Schubert chamber music can easily leave the listener rather drained. These two discs have the opposite effect. They remind us of Schubert’s extraordinary ability, even in the advanced stages of syphilis, of writing graceful and exuberant music. 

The second piano trio is a more substantial work than the first, with an intense slow movement and a lengthy and magisterial finale. It was the main item on the program in the only public concert of his music that Schubert attended in his lifetime. It was a great success, unlike the Fantasie in C major for violin and piano, which fell on stony ground when premiered in January 1828. The Arpeggione Sonata has been scored for many instruments, but is best known in versions for viola and piano and cello and piano. Here it is played by Boris Kucharksy on the viola. The rich timbre of the instrument does justice to the expressive andante. Elizabeth Hopkins gives a fine performance of the well-known Impromptu in A flat major.

The playing on these two discs is of high quality and the sound is first rate. But this is a case, I think, where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The two discs are recommended for the light they shed on some of the lesser known corners of Schubert’s late chamber music.

Barenboim's Tannhauser from the Berlin Staatsoper

Richard Wagner, Tannhauser

Peter Seiffert (Tannhäuser)

Marina Prudenskaya (Venus)

Ann Petersen (Elisabeth),

Peter Mattei (Wolfram von Eschenbach)

René Pape (Hermann, Landgraf von Thüringen)

Peter Sonn (Walther von der Vogelweide)

Tobias Schabel (Biterolf)

Jürgen Sacher (Heinrich der Schreiber)

Jan Martiník (Reinmar von Zweter)

Sónia Grané (Ein Hirtenknabe)

Stage direction and choreography by Sasha Waltz

Staatskapelle Berlin & Staatsopenchor

Conducted by Daniel Barenboim

Belair Classics BAC422

Recorded live at the Staatsoper in Berlin in April 2014 this recording of Tannhauser has a lot going for it. Daniel Barenboim is probably the most authoritative living Wagner conductor and he is working with a fine orchestra and a cast with no obvious weak links. The staging is low-key, unobtrusive, and by and large effective. The enthusiastic applause at the end is well-deserved. This is certainly one of the best Tannhauser’s available on DVD/Blu-Ray – certainly significantly more satisfying than Alex Kober’s recording from the 2014 Bayreuth festival, which I reviewed here.

Barenboim basically offers us the Dresden version of 1845 with a ballet in Act 1, as per the 1861 Paris version (coyly described in the program notes as “reference to the Bachanals (Act 1 Scene 1) in the Paris version”). As is well-known, the ballet Wagner added fell somewhat short of the expectations of the Jockey Club, but any Jockey Club members who wandered into this Berlin performance would feel, I think, that they had got their money’s worth. The dancing is extensive with significant amounts of bared flesh on display in the first and third acts. If I have one reservation about the production it is that there are really too many visual distractions. Writhing semi-naked dancers are, I suppose, appropriate for the Venusberg scenes, but I found the dancing pilgrims returning from Rome rather jarring. This is a relatively minor quibble, however, since the choreography is well-judged and the enhanced by the visual impact of the understated designs which, apart from the giant bamboo curtain in the Minstrel’s Hall, primarily exploit shadows and suggestions of empty space.

The singing in this Tannhauser is uniformly strong. Peter Seiffert is a very convincing Tannhauser. He has the power and volume of a heldentenor but, unlike most of the other current heldentenors, he can act and sing with real expressiveness. He is also capable of sharing the stage, which is one reason why the principal duets and ensembles work as well as they do. The other reason is the quality of the other principals. Probably the most impressive is Peter Mattei’s Wolfram von Eschenbach. Mattei’s Wolfram is far from the pedantic and whiny troubadour that we often find. Despite his odd costume (he looks like Sherlock Holmes in cavalry boots) Wolfram comes across as a character with real depth, providing dramatic and musical continuity throughout Act III, in counterpoint first with Elisabeth and then with Tannhauser. Rene Pape (as Hermann, Landgraf von Thüringen) is probably the most celebrated member of the cast. His singing is immaculate, although the role is much less demanding than König Mark, which he has sung with great distinction.

I do think that Venus is more effective when sung (as it is here) by a mezzo soprano. Marina Prudenskaya sings with venom in Act I and she is convincing at both ends of the tessitura. Although a little more body would have been ideal, Prudenskaya is a compelling Venus. Ann Petersen’s Elisabeth is a worthy rival to Venus’s charms – and clearly not immune to the pleasures of the flesh. This role, like Wolfram’s, is often interpreted in an excessively prissy way. Not so here. Petersen borders on the heroic at various points in Act III.

The Staatskapelle and Staatsopenchor do fine work for Daniel Barenboim, who has a characteristically strong sense of drama and architecture. All in all this is a very fine recording. I only have two complaints. First, the liner notes  are extremely thin with no information on the singers or production. Second, and particularly galling, the credits are projected on the screen during the overture. Still, the audiovisual quality is excellent and this recording is highly recommended.