Vladimir Jurowski : John Foulds Dynamic Triptych, Shostakovich 11

“Revolution in the Head" strange title for the concert by Vladmir Jurowski and the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, London, featuring John Foulds’s Dynamic Triptych and Shostakovich Symphony no 11 "The Year 1905".  Jurowski's Shostakovich is always good, and he's done this particular symphony many times, but this performance was extraordinary - valedictory, tender, and intense committed. Frankly, we can never get enough of performances like this, and of Jurowski's characteristic intelligence and world-vision. I'll miss his short discussions which go way beyond the score, to the very essence of human creativity.

But why "Revolution in the head" ? Not the obvious connection with the insurrections of 1905, but  what they may or may not have foretold. A few years back there was a quiz through which you could figure out what type of revolutionary you'd have been at the time. It was so erudite and so detailed that the only people who got it would have been historians, but my goodness it was accurate !
What of John Foulds’s Dynamic Triptych op. 88 (1929)? Foulds has cult status and attracts exaggerated claims. Dynamic Triptych is readily accessible, as it deals with three basic elements of composition : mode, timbre and rhythm, each developed with playful inventiveness.  Even humour - listen out for the off the wall sound in the second section when the whole idea of timbre melts away, almost as ethereal as a theremin. The soloist here was Peter Donohue, with whom Sakari Oramo recorded the Dynamic Triptych with the CBSO fourteen years ago.

On the radio, Donohue says that Foulds's' reputation as a composer of light music affected his reception, but Foulds's' World Requiem (1919-21) is hardly light music. More worrying is the idea that Foulds was eclipsed by Schoenberg and American composers, though Ives and Varèse then were marginal figures.  The fact is that composers had been experimenting with new approaches to modality, timbre and rhythm for quite some time.  As for the Orientalism that so inspired Foulds, that too was nothing new.  Orientalism isn't just about the orient but the promise of intriguing new ways of expression. In Germany, the Idea of the East inspired Goethe, Beethoven, Mozart and of course Mahler, Zemlinsky and others.  In France, contact with other civilizations influenced art, poetry, music to an even greater extent. In Italy, think Puccini, and in Russia, think Stravinsky. Even if one were to restrict comparisons only to British music, we have the examples of Gustav Holst, Samuel Colderidge-Taylor, Delius, Sorabji and Benjamin Britten.  And of course Ralph Vaughan Williams and others studying the modes of earlier western tradition.  British music isn't "pastoral" or insular, however much some might prefer it to be. Why blame Schoenberg (and Americans) when so much else was going on ? Foulds’s' Dynamic Triptych isn't that "strange" either when you consider what else was being written in the explosion of creative freedom of the 1920's and 30's. Perhaps Foulds’s' time will really come when he's appreciated not as an oddity but in the context of his time.

Elgar The Apostles - Martyn Brabbins, Royal Festival Hall.

At the Royal Festival Hall, Sir Edward Elgar's The Apostles, Martyn Brabbins conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Chorus, the BBC Symphony Chorus and a good array of soloists. The Apostles is hardly unknown : it's been done numerous times, so its place in the canon is beyond dispute.  So why doesn't it get the respect it's due ?  It occupies a very special place in our understanding of Elgar and his music, and of the times he lived in. The Apostles is part of a trilogy of oratorios examining the nature of Christianity as Jesus taught his followers. This context should be well known, too, since both The Apostles and The Kingdom have been done in recent years, establishing the context. Though Elgar used the grand gestures popular in Edwardian times, it is significant that his approach to Christian belief was much more a personal statement of faith, humble and humane rather than triumphalist.  This might be the "real" Elgar, the "man behind the mask", Elgar the eternal outsider, despite his public acclaim. This makes a difference in reception and interpretation, which is why The Apostles deserves greater appreciation. 

In The Apostles, Elgar shows how Jesus sets out his beliefs in simple, human terms. Judas has doubts about him but is confounded. In The Kingdom, the focus is more open ended.  As the apostles go out on their mission, their story unfolds through a series of tableaux, impressive set pieces, but with less obvious human drama. The final, part would hase been titled The Last Judgement, when World and Time are destroyed and the faithful of all ages are raised from the dead, joining Jesus in Eternity. The sheer audacity of that vision may have stymied Elgar, much in the way that Sibelius's dreams for his eighth symphony inhibited realization. Fragments of The Last Judgement made their way into drafts for what was to be Elgar's final symphony, which we now know in Anthony Payne's performing version of what was to have been Elgar’s Third Symphony. Just as The Dream of Gerontius tells of one man's journey from physical life to the life everlasting. (read more here). The Apostles deals with the relation between  God made man and mortal men. Hence the inherent contradiction that sometimes confuses The Apostles with overblown Edwardian public declarations of Christianity.

The Apostles unfolds in a series of seven tableaux, held together by male and female narrators. This structure allows a surprising degree of intimacy, concentrating on the interaction between  Jesus and the people around him. Judas, Peter and John are gearing up for their mission to spread the gospels to the world. The chorus exults and the brass plays the glorious fanfare, which seems to stretch over vast distances. The huge kettledrums beat out a ceremonial march. Splendid! Yet it is the quiet voice of Jesus which rises above the tumult. "He who receiveth you, receiveth Me, and he that receiveth Me, receiveth Him who sent Me".When Jesus  reveals the Beatitudes in By the Wayside, the baritone should sing with sincerity and conviction.  "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth". Meekness isn't weakness, though, for Jesus hints at persecutions to come.

The tension between grand forces and simplicity gives The Apostles much of its  appeal. Elgar describes the storm on the Sea of Galilee, and Davis whips the orchestra into a turmoil. "It is I, Be not afraid!" : the very words  seems to shine like a lighthouse. Elgar's Jesus favours sinners, like Mary Magdalene. Peter the Doubter, and Judas Iscariot. Indeed, Elgar gives Judas more space than the others, suggesting his sympathy with those who question.This dialogue between Judas and Jesus is importnat because together they bring out a more unconventional element in the drama.  Judas isn't a monster. He expresses genuine concern where the other Apostles obey blindly. When Judas recognizes his mistake, his anguish is so intense that the part can take on a strange, noble dignity. The long passage that starts "Our life is short and tedious" evokes compassion. This is a Judas with whom modern people can identify. We cannot judge, but remember the Beatitude "Blessed are the merciful!".

Elgar goes swiftly from Golgotha to the Ascencion, as if drawn forwards by the musical vision of Angels singing "Alleluia!". The string writing is pastoral, yet luminous,  another insight, connecting Jesus's "rebirth" with his Nativity. The Mystic Chorus can ring with beautiful clarity. In The Apostles, Elgar writes for voice as if he were writing for different elements in an orchestra. He weaves together lines for the orchestra, choir and soloists to form an immaculate, shining wall of sound. "And lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world".

The Royal Festival Hall is not the most ideal setting for a piece like The Apostles, which, when heard in a cathedral or the Royal Albert Hall, breathes its full majesty. Cathedrals and the RAH have better organs, too, which make a difference.  Still, if the message of The Apostles is human scale, concert hall acoustic isn't necessarily a factor.  Mark Elder was originally scheduled to conduct. Since Elder's done the piece many times (and recorded it) his Apostles is a known quantity.  Though Elder did it with the Hallé at the Proms and on the recording, and the lineup of soloists is slightly different, (Alice Coote and Brindley Sherratt reprising their roles), the difference would not have been extreme. Jacques Imbrailo was divine, but Roderick Williams is a great communicator, too. I did want to hear Elizabeth Watts, Allan Clayton and David Stout but they're good enough that they can be heard everywhere. Brabbins, on ther other hand, is one of the most original and distinctive conductors around, specializing in British and modern repertoire. His The Apostles should have been worth hearing ! Pity that I couldn't make it to the RFH, since I would have appreciated the experience.  Still, conductors rarely do something only once, so here's hoping !

Vladimir Jurowski : Britten (Julia Fischer), Tchaikovsky, Knussen LPO

Vladimir Jurowki and Julia Fischer with the London Philharmonic Orchestra in Beijing, March 2019

We'll miss Vladimir Jurowski when he moves on from the London Philharmonic Orchestra, after 18 years, 11 of these as Principal Conductor. Jurowski is a man who thinks deeply, creating programmes that are more than the sum of their parts, often venturing into repertoire off the beaten track.  This concert at the Royal Festival Hall brought together Oliver Knussen (Scriabin Settings), Benjamin Britten (Violin Concerto) and Tchaikovsky (Symphony no 6, the "Pathétique") 

Knussen's Scriabin Settings (from 1978) have recieved many performances over the years, most recently at the Knussen Memorial at Aldeburgh in June. Based on Scriabin's late miniatures for piano for small ensemble, Knussen's arrangement extends the colours without sacrificing transparency. Despite the chamber-like forces, "Désir" hints at what massed strings might sound like : an intriguing whisper, stirring the imagination.  High, bright winds weave filigree patterns in "Nuances", leading seamlessly into "Caresse dansée" where the tones are darker and more sensual, leading to the livelier  "Feuillet d'Album".  In "Enigne" the flute danced brightly before the elusive conclusion. Though Scriabin is the muse, Knussen's Scriabin Settings are true Knussen territory : whimsical, open-hearted and aphoristic.

Julia Fischer was the soloist in Britten's Violin Concerto op 15, 1938-9.  The introductory lines here were elegant, a brief moment of serenity before the agitato, where angular figures were underlined by percusion, suggesting gunfire.  Spain had fallen to Franco, supported by the Nazis. To an anti-fascist like Britten, and many others,  exile must have seemed the only hope for civilization.  The Violin Concerto is a scream of anguish, so intense that  it has affected reception.. It takes courage to write a deeply uncomforting statement like this.  Perhaps only now can we appreciate its place in the canon of major works by a composer for whom cruelty and the loss of innocence were moral crimes. While the second movement begins vivace, the mood is bittersweet, Fischer recognizing the importance of the tight, tense pizzicato contradicting the sweep of the strings. Fischer platyed the long, meandering lines with melancholy, intensifying the contrast with the turbulent animando, where brass and timpani dominate.  Nonetheless, the violin breaks free, true to itself,  fast paced passages flying at high tessitura, above the darkness around it :  hollow wood, the violin beaten like percussion, as if it were a folk instrument in a far away homeland, before a cadenza that soared above murmuring brass, the orchestra muted so it felt deliberately distant.  Jurowski delineated the passacaglia so it felt like an anthem, undaunted and austere, rising (like the violin) ever upward.  Thus fortified, the violin could reprise something of the confidence with which the piece began, Fischer playing with steady assurance, the orchestral strings like a chorale behind her.  From the orchestral strings, a suggestion of guitars : the ghosts of the dead in Spain, rising again, led by the violin, marching quietly onward. Listening to the Violin Concerto, perhaps we can already hear Britten confronting the fundamental bleakness of the human condition, from which there is little escape.

By pairing Britten's Violin Concerto with Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Op. 74, Jurowski highlighted the more disturbing aspects of the symphony.  Because it's heard so often and sometimes receives performances that don't do it justice, the depth of its pathos aren't always done with the commitment that Jurowski brings to its interpretation.  Wonderful colours, too, in the orchestral playing, enhancing the complex, shifting moods.  The pulse in the third movement flowed with purpose, the march aspects defiant, like a march to the scaffold, undertaken without fear or regret.  In the final movement a surging undertow grew in power, long string lines stretching as though the composer wanted to savour them for as long as possible before silence descended. 

Jurowski : Stravinsky Firebird, Rimsky-Korsakov

Young Stravinsky, around the time he met Rimsky-Korsakov in 1902

Vladimir Jurowski's Stravinsky Journey with the London Philharmonic Orchestras took flight with The Firebird at the Royal Festival Hall. A spectacular performance, soaring to heights of glory. The Firebird is an immortal with magical powers, who defies the bounds of nature.  Jurowski inspires an explosion so dazzling that it was almost blinding.  Colours shone in myriad shades, sparkling like jewels lit with fire from within.  But beneath the splendour lies an undercurrent of sadness. The Prince, like Kashkey, cannot remain unchanged.  That blaze of resplendent gorgeousness comes at a price. Jurowski's Firebird is much more than a flying jewel box. Bold, bright and savage, it is informed by an awareness that happiness must be savoured to the full while it lasts   Inevitably, life ends. Flames turn to embers and ash.  Folk legends often have a core of moral truth: they are much more than pretty fairy tales.  One of Jurowski's great strengths is that he is a man who thinks. All good conductors think musically, but Jurowski is a philosopher of sorts, too, and spiritual.  He doesn't often conduct dancers, so his Stravinsky isn't as dynamically earthy and physical as, say, Gergiev's, but it has a  psychological integrity, which is just as valid, and just as rewarding.
There's also much more to conducting than waving a baton (or waving your arms). Gpood conductors make connections, enriching their programmes  to enhance the music they choose.  The Firebird is an outstanding piece but it didn't spring out of nowhere.  Jurowski conducted Stravinsky's "lost" Funeral Song (Chante funèbre) op 5  at the 2017 Proms when he had to programme it with  Shostakovich Symphony no 11, Britten's Russian Funeral and  Prokofiev's Violin Concerto no 1 in D to fit in with the BBC's theme-based strategy (read more here), so Stravinsky got short shrift. This time,  at the Royal Festival Hall, Jurowski was able to present the piece in proper context.  Musically, much more intelligent, and played with more committment, too.   When Gergiev conducted the modern world premiere at St Petersburg, he programmed it with Rimsky-Korsakov The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and the Maiden Fevroniya (1907) and Stravinsky's The Firebird, enshrining bthe connections.  Please read my piece about that premiere : Lost no more : Stravinsky' s Funeral Song.  This time round, Jurowski made the same - inescapable - connection, while adding more early Stravinsky Scherzo fantastique and Rimsky-Korsakov's Piano Concerto in C sharp minor, with Alexander Ghindin.

Stravinsky's  Scherzo fantastique op 3 is a very early work, written in 1908 before the death of Rimsky-Korsakov in June that year, for whose funeral Stravinsky was to write the Funeral Song.  A neat and erudite connection, but also musically astute, since in the Scherzo fantastique, we can hear ideas in germination which will come to fruit in The Firebird. Stravinsky was already Stravinsky, though he owed his mentor so much.  Rimsky-Korsakov's early Piano Concerto in C sharp minor op 30 (1882) was inspired by and dedicated to Franz Liszt, and first performed with the support of Mily Balakirev. The piece honours both masters, incorporating a folk song theme from Balakirev and adapting it in a Lisztian manner, with "Polish" flourishes.  Ghindin seemed to relish the showcase passages, notes flying freely and vividly. Like a Firebird !. 
 

Stravinsky's Journey : Jurowski, LPO

Vladimir Jurowski photo: Simon Jay Price, courtesy Albion Media

REVIEWS embedded below. After last year's wonderful journey through Stravinsky, with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Philharmonia Orchestra, Vladimir Jurowski and the London Philharmonic Orchestra embark on another Stravinsky saga at the Royal Festival Hall.  Salonen and the Philhrmonia focused on Stravinsky in different phases of his career.  Some brilliantly perceptive programmes - please read more HERE,  HERE, and HERE.  In this new series with Jurowski and the LPO, well-known Stravinsky pieces are heard with the music of other composers, some Russian, some with relatively little obvious conections, and not all concerts feature Jurowski. Not quite as musically challenging, but lots of fun, nevertheless.
 
Saturday 3rd February - The Fairytale begins - Rimsky-Korsakov Fairy Tale, Glazunov Violin Concerto, Tchaikovsky (arr. Glazunov) Meditation from Souvenir d’un lieu cher, Stravinsky Faun and Shepherdess, Stravinsky Symphony No. 1

Wednesday 7th February - Flight of the Firebird  - Stravinsky Scherzo fantastique, Stravinsky Funeral Song, Rimsky-Korsakov Piano Concerto, Stravinsky The Firebird (original version)  PLEASE READ MY REVIEW HERE


Saturday 10th February - Petrushka and friends -  Liadov Baba Yaga, Liadov The Enchanted Lake, Liadov Kikimora, Prokofiev Violin Concerto No. 2, Stravinsky Petrushka (original version)


Wednesday 21st February - The Rite of Spring - Debussy Printemps, Ravel Piano Concerto for the Left Hand, Delius Idylle de Printemps, Stravinsky The Rite of Spring (conductor : Juanjo Mena)
Friday 23rd February - Once Upon a Time - Stravinsky The Song of the Nightingale, Elgar Cello Concerto, Rimsky-Korsakov Scheherazade.

Saturday 17th March - Daniil Trifonov plays Stravinsky  - Tchaikovsky (arr. Stravinsky) Sleeping Beauty (excerpts), Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1, Stravinsky The Fairy's Kiss   PLEASE READ MY REVIEW HERE

Wednesday 21st March - Stravinsky meets the classics -  Stravinsky Apollon musagète, Weber Konzertstück for piano and orchestra, Stravinsky Capriccio for piano and orchestra
Schubert Symphony No. 3, (Conductor : Andrés Orozco-Estrada)
Saturday 24th March - Symphony of Psalms -  Stravinsky Symphony of Psalms, Stravinsky Violin Concerto, Stravinsky Credo, Stravinsky Ave Maria, Stravinsky Pater Noster, Bernstein Chichester Psalms (Conductor : Andrés Orozco-Estrada,  Patricia Kopatchinskaja violin)
Wednesday 11th April - Perséphone - Thomas Adès Suite from Powder Her Face
Gerald Barry Organ Concerto (Thomas Trotter), Stravinsky Perséphone (Thomas Adès conductor)
Friday 13th  April -  Stravinsky Jeu de cartes, Bryce Dessner Concerto for Two Pianos (world premiere),Rachmaninoff Symphony No. 3, (John Storgårds conductor)
Wednesday 18th April - Bold and New - Stravinsky Symphony in C, Stravinsky Tango, Debussy Fantaisie, Shostakovich Symphony No. 6 (Leif Ove Andsnes, piano)
Saturday 21st April - Ode to Beethoven - Anders Hillborg Homage to Stravinsky (world premiere)
Falik Requiem for Igor Stravinsky, Stravinsky Ode, Beethoven Violin Concerto (Vladimir Jurowski conductor, Gil Shaham violin)

Jurowski's Pillars : Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Britten Prom

Stravinsky and Shostakovich with Vladimir Jurowski and the London Philharmonic Orchestra. This Prom was typical of Jurowski's genius for intelligent, musically astute programming : Stravinsky's Funeral Song at one end, and Shostakovich Symphony no 11, two pillars,  with Britten's Russian Funeral as supporting buttress, with Prokofiev's Violin Concerto no 1 in D between them. When even Vladimir Putin worries about planetary catastrophe we should need to think how and why we got into a world where some people admire nutcases with nukes.

Stravinsky's Funeral Song was revealed in December last year in St Petersburg, where it had lain undiscovered for over 100 years.  For more background and its significance, please read my article Lost No More : Stravinsky Funeral Song.  Gergiev conducted that performance in a superlative programme connecting Stravinsky with Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, whose funeral it marked. These connections are important, because the piece on its own is so short that its impact won't be appreciated out of context.  Gergiev linked it to Rimsky-Korsakov The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh and to Stravinsky's The Firebird, a wonderfully unified concept, which Jurowski is doing too at the Royal Festival Hall in February 2018, in a slightly different programme. Mark your calendars.   Combining Stravinsky and Rimsky-Korsakov is musically litterate and satisfying, but for this performance, Jurowski had to fulfil the rigid Proms diktats about dates and nationalism.

Before the Shostakovich symphony, though, Jurowski programmed Benjamin Britten's Russian Funeral (1936), which sets the hymn "You fell as Heroes" commemorating the massacres of the protesters of 1905, which Shostakovich was to incorporate into his Eleventh Symphony in 1957. Earlier this Proms season, we heard Britten's Ballad of Heroes, which has long been misunderstood because listeners can't get past the idea that being anti-war doesn't preclude protest in other forms. The ballad was written after the Spanish Civil War - it's not a call to battle, but a mark of respect for those killed and a protest against oppression. Please read my piece on it HERE.   Hearing Britten before Shostakovich in this context emphasizes the idea of universal struggle against oppression, wherever it might happen, or when. 

 Stravinsky's Funeral Song is about one man and highly personal, while Shostakovich's Symphony no 11 marks the death of multitudes. In 1905, people were massacred on the streets of St Petersburg. Twelve years later, the Tsar was overthrown for good.  Thus the scale of the piece, which not only marks the deaths of 1905, but also the end of Old Russia and the beginning of the New.  Thus the mute stillness of the First Movement "In the Square of the Winter Palace" with its ominous rumblings, and trumpet calls, which gave way to the the more abstract "soaring" theme, rising above the frozen ground, so to speak, as tension gradually rose with percussion defining a  staccato growl.  . Perhaps we can imagine the walls of the palace looming in the solid rising figures but these could also symbolize impenetrable forces of repression.Against these, the winds of change  blow when the strings fly into action, screaming in swirling, wayward lines.   Jurowski's sense of form keeps the scene in sharp definition.

Jurowski conducted with military precision,  contrasting the violence of the attack and the chaos it sliced through.  Thus the eerie silence from which the Funeral Elegy emerged : people are lying dead, but their voices will be heard above.  If anything, Jurowski's control was even more impressive here, allowing the strings and winds to wail, without compromising into insincere sentiment.  Utterly justifying  the connection between this symphony and Stravinsky's Funeral Song.  A magnificent finale, where the angular repetitions march forwards with ferocity.  Though Jurowski, by  nature, is a gentle person, he can be intensely passionate when he needs to be, as truly spiritual people often are.  Where once the soldiers marched on the people, the people now march forth in triumph.  Fanfares can be banal, but Jurowski's clear minded intelligence doesn't degenerate.  The heart of this finale isn't the noise, but the quiet cor anglais and bass clarinet themes. Eventually the Elegy returned, the tocsin bells tolling  clearly above the tumult.  the music breaks off suddenly - the struggle isn't over.  La lutte continua ! everywhere and at all times. Including the present.  

Between the two pillars and supporting buttress of Jurowski's programme, Stravinsky's arrangement of Song of the Volga Boatmen and Prokofiev: Violin Concerto No 1 in D with  Alina Ibragimova, ratherb diluting the overall impact, but that's the Proms for you.

Jurowski : Kancheli and blazing Ralph Vaughan Williams

Vladimir Jurowski (photo : Thomas Kurek)

Vladimir Jurowski at his finest in last week's concert at the Royal Festival Hall with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, part of their ongoing series Belief and Beyond Belief.  Jurowski is special to me because he's an extremely spiritual personality,  who thinks deeply about music as part of human experience. When Jurowski speaks, he's worth listening to;  he doesn't do small talk. A while back, he did a series in Russia about war and peace for audiences that didn't look like they spent much time in black tie. His choices were eclectic, even avant garde, but he described them in such a way that the audience held onto his every word. He communicated such sincerity that he drew respect even when the language barrier intervened. The South Bank is so full of hype these days that's it's annoying even to navigate the website. But there's nothing fake about Vladimir Jurowski.

In this concert, Jurowski and the LPO did an unconventional but thoughtful programme  Giya Kancheli Mourned by the Wind and  Bohuslav Martinů: Memorial to Lidice together with Ralph Vaughan Williams Symphony no 9.  Fortunately it's now broadcast on BBC Radio 3 , since going to the South Bank is more pain than pleasure these days.  The other big plus is that we get to hear Jurowski talk about the music, more fluently than most presenters. Third bonus, as interval feature Herbert Howell's a capella chorale Take him, Earth, for cherishing.

Kancheli called Mourned by the Wind (1988) a "Liturgy" but it's not religious so much as an intense, personal outpouring of grief for a dead friend.  It begins with a single chord which resonates into silence. The viola enters, quietly at first, playing a figure that hovers back and forth between two poles. Isabelle van Keuelen held the line firmly, unswayed by the sudden cataclysmic outburst in the orchestra behind her.  Fierce staccato blasts, another cataclysm, wilder than the first, with thundering timpani, and another "death stroke" single chord.  But the viola isn't defeated.  Emerging from a rumbling, shimmering background it defines a melody that evolves into delicately plucked patterns: resplendent like starlight.  The "death strokes" return, wave after wave, but the viola holds its plaintive line, until it evaporates into silence.  

Martinů Memorial to Lidice (1943) commemorates Lidice in Bohemia, obliterated by the Nazis. Again the subject matter is death but on a more abstract musical level; the connections include contrasting poles. In Kancheli the tension swings between staccato orchestra and solo viola, In Martinů, the contrast is between brute force and the innocence of folk music. 

Thus a dramatic context was set for Vaughan Williams's Ninth Symphony from 1956-7.  Whatever the symphony may or  may not be about,  Jurowski gave it a savage power and majesty one doesn't often associate with British music. All to the good, for here, at the very end of his life, RVW is breaking new ground. He will not "go gentle into that good night".  He uses saxophones in sassy chorus, and a flugelhorn, extending the low resonance of the brasses, which include tuba, and contrabassoon. Dark colours of foreboding and passages which march with demonic violence. 

It's also a strikingly modern work, vividly experimental and unabashed, as Jurowski's approach made clear.  No wonder critics 60 years ago didn't know what to make of it.  As Edward Said said, "late style" can be liberating since a composer no longer needs to conform. Elliott Carter joked that in his own "late, late style", he didn't have to seek approval from anyone but himself.  Yet RVW is totally in control of his powers, highly disciplined, attention focused on essentials, nothing superficial. He uses the flugelhorn for a purpose, as if blasting away at the veneer of conventional "good taste". Life's too precious to fritter mindlessly away!  The tightness of the orchestration was reflected in the strength of the performance, the LPO surpassing themselves.  An RVW Ninth that was monumental in every way.  If the LPO doesn't release this commercially, it will enter the bootleg market as a milestone in RVW interpretation. 

Andrés Orozco-Estrada Mahler 1, London Philharmonic Orchestra

The London Philharmonic Orchestra's new Principal Guest Conductor, Andrés Orozco-Estrada, conducted Mahler Symphony no 1 at the Royal Festival Hall, London.  The LPO play with immaculate finesse: they're so good that they could almost function without a conductor. (I'm thinking of a recent concert where they saved the show by playing a composer's music better than he could conduct it).  What a luxury it must be to work with an orchestra as good as this! Already they seem to have a rapport with Orozco-Estrada, who is highly individual but who shares their very high ideals.

In profilre, Orozco-Estrada resembles an Inca God (He comes from Medellín)  but what really matters is the instinctive nobility he brings to his art. He  uses his body as an extension of his mind, like great athletes and method actors do. Nothing extraneous, everything focused on expressing the depths of the music. 

In his first Symphony Mahler sets out his "calling card", establishing his presence as a new voice.  Orozco-Estrada emphasizes the reverence from which individual voices emerge, like plants shooting forth from frozen ground. Yet, just as the sun wakes the earth, warmth and good humour emerge. Orozo-Estrada's hands flutter, suggesting the quirky impertinence of individual instruments. Who dares challenge what has passed?  "Ging heut’ Morgen übers Feld". The poet (Mahler himself) heads off to the open fields, in the morning, turning his back on the girl who's marrying another.  Perhaps getting dumped is a learning experience.  The marking "Nicht zu schnell" suggests firm footsteps, an earthy physicality, evoked  by the Ländler whose presence isn't decorative but represents solid confidence.

Just as the mood in Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen darkens with "Ich hab' ein glühend Messer", the symphony enters a more violent phase, which Orozco-Estrada is wise not to overemphasize too early.This interpretation is not brutish or violent per se, but connects to the wider theme which runs through all Mahler's work of triumph over setbacks.  Although the nickname "Titan" is wrong, it does, however, make sense, since the Titans of Greek myth  destroyed each other because they were stupid. The gods that emerged later had more intellect. Thus the cymbal crash that heralds the final movement.  All change! Orozco-Estrada shapes the music so its energy flows gloriously. The horns introduced in the first movement  were now reinforced by trombones and muffled tuba.  Far too often this symphony is distorted by banal brutishness. Orozco-Estrada instead understands its fundamental message and the way it relates to Mahler's work as a whole.  This symphony is often a test of a conductor's measure as a Mahler interpreter..

In September, he conducted Mahler 1 with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, where he's been chief for just over a year. They are very good, but the London Philharmonic Orchestra are in an altogether more elevated league.  Mahler's often quoted as saying "my time will come". Perhaps that holds true too for the LPO and Orozco-Estrada.

Jurowski Britten Peter Grimes Skelton RFH

Vladimir Jurowski conducted a fascinating Britten Peter Grimes with the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall. Fascinating, because Jurowski  finds things in Britten other conductors don't get in the first place. Jurowski approaches Britten as a composer,  without the usual baggage of Britishness and Brittenish. Jurowski makes us hear Britten as a composer who knew the music of his era and  had much to say about the times he lived in. Britten was not provincial though he chose to live in Aldeburgh. Peter Grimes is by no means a "heritage museum" in music even if its inspiration was an 18th century text.

Jurowski's Passacaglia and Sea Interludes reveal Britten  as a composer in the wider European context: grand, majestic gestures, as Romantic in the best sense of the word, but emotionally intense with a very modern edge. Peter Grimes was Britten's first mature opera and arguably the first real British opera, so it's important to hear it in this context. Britten knew the music of his time. The orchestration is huge in comparison to Britten's later works. There are even references to American popular music, such as in the Act Three scene in the pub. Britten, who knew more about America than most Suffolk fisherfolk, was obliquely commenting on social change. For change is at the heart of Peter Grimes.

Grimes is persecuted by pious hypocrites, determined to condemn him on principle. All around Aldeburgh, there are ruined churches, destroyed by fanatics in the Reformation. Witch hunts weren't so far in the past. Whatever Grimes may or may not have done, there are those in the Borough  who need  an outlet for the poison in their own souls. Perhaps there are subtexts in this opera linked to Britten's sexuality, or to his relationship with the conservative music establishment (qv Gloriana here) but Peter Grimes is an opera which protests blind obedience to conformity. Anniversary years like this smother genuine knowledge under a fire blanket of banal cliché. All the more reason to respect Jurowski, even though the concert was part of the South Bank's anodyne, dementedly superficial The Rest Is Noise marketing. 

Stuart Skelton's Peter Grimes is a breath of fresh air. Because Grimes is inarticulate, it doesn't mean that the role should be sung with neutral colour. The clarity of Skelton's timbre  suggests Grimes's intelligence. Like his apprentices, he might have been forced into his line of work without choice. Skelton sang "Now the Great Bear and Pleaides" with such elegant purity that I thought of Captain Vere, the real hero of Billy Budd. Strength, for Britten, isn't physical prowess so much as emotional integrity. Audiences might like their Britten characters safer and more comfortable, but Skelton shows where the real potential in the role might lie. 

Some excellent support from Brindley Sherratt (Swallow), whose shimmy with the Nieces ((Malin Christensson and Elizabeth Cragg) was low down and dirty yet hilarious at the same time. Nice to hear levity in a bass. Alan Opie was a good Balstrode and Mark Stone a very convincing Ned Keene. If that leather jacket cost thousands, it gave him an authentic swagger. The main female roles, Ellen Orford (Pamela Armstong), Auntie (Pamela Helen Stephen), and Mrs Sedley (Jean Rigby) could have been done with more bite, but to some extent, Britten wasn't at his best creating women. Mrs Sedley, though, can benefit from being done malevolently. There's vicious camp humour in "Murder most horrid", where trombones slither like snakes. If nothing else in this anniversary year, we should learn to recognize Britten's incisive sense of humour. 

Singers have to show character and interact even in semi-stagings  and concert performances. If anything, good Personenregie is even more important in semi-stagings and concert performances. One of the reasons I like minimal productions is that they focus attention on the performers themselves, not on the decor. The director was Daniel Salter who directed an excellent Die Entführung aus dem Serail at Garsington Opera at Wormsley. (review here) . Alex Doidge-Green's designs were excellent. The LPO were roped in, partly to shield them from the movement of the singers on a cramped stage, but also symbolically. When Skelton rolled up the rope, he released the Peter Grimes, heading towards fate. 

12/12/12 Jurowski LPO Grisey Quatre Chants Mahler 5

Vladimir Jurowski conducts the LPO in Mahler's Symphony no 5  on 12/12/12. We'll never see dates like that again. Some could deduce  Portents of Doom but maybe we're safe, as the concert doesn't start at 12 past 12.

Even though music is abstract, listening is a subjective experience.  Music itself is neutral, but we would not be human if we did not respond emotionally and carry unconscious connotations into the process. We might read Portents of Doom into this symphony since Mahler nearly died while writing it. However, the thought of haemorrhoids should stop excess sentimentality.

Jurowski is no fool. He's programmed Mahler with Gérard Grisey's Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil.  As Mahler said,"music is more than just the notes". When we listen, can we think how our responses are being channeled?  For me this is one of the truly great song cycles of the last 50 years. In the last 6 years,  it's been heard live in London at least 4 times, twice I think with Barbara Hannigan. Jurowski's soloist is Alison Bell. The classic recording is Catherine Dubosc, with Cambreling.

Grisey was interested in "psychoacoustics", which sounds terrible, but what that means is intense awareness of how what we hear affects how the brain rocesses what comes through our ears, and vice versa. A lot of his music seems attuned to natural body rhythms, so you hear tiny nuances. It's surprisingly therapeutic without actually being designed to be that way. This is not waffly New Age stuff.   It's mentally challenging because it needs careful attention, but somehow it connects to your pulse, as natural as breathing. Often I play this music on continuous loop, so it "evolves" like it's alive.

 Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil. refers to the idea of "crossing the threshold", between life and death, between struggle and sublimation, a flux between levels of consciousness. It works like deep meditation, releasing the soul so it can be free. Shortly after it was completed Grisey died suddenly but that's pure coincidence. There's nothing spooky about that at all, even though Grisey's  title comes from a line in Claude Vivier's Glaubst du, an die Unsterblichkeit der Seele? That earlier piece refers to being stabbed and crossing over into the unknown. Shortly after, Vivier (ironic name) was murdered by a casual stranger in almost exactly the same circumstances. (Lots about Vivier elsewhere on this site.)

Grisey's Quatre chants pour franchir le seuil.starts with long semi-silence then suddenly waving chords enter, not discordant, but disjointed, This isn't firm ground but exploratory. "De....qui....se....doit....." sings the soprano, vertical sounds over the hazy horizontals around her. Gradually the patterns merge, the Voice part disintegrates and reforms in abstract, transcended form, soaring like an arc, stretching outwards into space. Then the incantation, based on sacred Egyptian texts instructing the soul on its journey from death to immortality. The texts are fragmented, and the music hovers as if intuiting the gaps in the transmission. Each stage in the ritual is numbered and intoned, for what's even more important than the detail is the sense of inexorable forward movement. "Laisse moi passer, laisse moi passer"....then "formule pour être un dieu"'.

More wonderfully shaped moving sound, deep timbred instruments like contrabass clarinet, muted tubas and trumpet, contrasted with the high voice. "Le voix s'épand dans l'ombre". Only the rumble of drums like distant thunder and barely perceptible rustling, hurrying sounds like wind. We're crossing something..... Circular arching trumpet sounds, more rustling, speeding up, punctuated by sharp thwacks on percussion and harp. Then waddling tuba and screeching (but harmonic! ) saxophones and clarinets. We enter a new place, vivid with clear light. The soprano's singing text from the Epic of Gilgamesh. This is the "death of civilization". Human bodies have turned into a vast sea of clay, but to the prophet, it's a terrace open onto an endless horizon. The violin part is painfully beautiful, and there's a steady hum vibrating in the background. Of the final Berceuse, Grisey said it's not a lullaby but "music to the dawning of humanity finally liberated of its nightmare".

Unusual Partners? Jurowski LPO Zimmermann Brahms

For their second concert on the theme of human suffering, Vladimir and The London Philharmonic Orchestra presented Brahms German Requiem with Bernd Alois Zimmermann Ich wandte mich um und sah an alles Unrecht (Ecclesiastical Action). Unusual partners. But what they share is a deeply felt concern for the human condition.  So much of the Unrecht (injustice) of this world haopens because people deny others the right to exist. The least we can do can do is listen.

Zimmermann's  Ich wandte mich um und sah an alles Unrecht (Ecclesiastical Action) opens with baleful blasts of trumpets and trombones, suggesting the Biblical connection. Part of the text comes from Ecclesiates Ch 4 but the mood is apocalyptic. One can think of Messaien Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum (read more here), The brass forms great arcs of sound reaching into space, a reference to the Final Trumpet of the Last Judgement?  Zimmermann uses a large orchestra but colours are used in stark black and white contrast, powerful blasts of sound against tiny barely audible detail. Zimmermann embeds meaning into his musical form. The two speakers  (Omar Ebrahim and Malcolm Sinclair) quote text from Ecclesiates, which the central figure transforms into strange, incantation. What he represents is not of this world.

Zimmermann then employs the tale of the Grand Inquisitor from Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. Christ has returned to Earth, and is imprisoned as a madman. The two speakers come at the central figure on all sides, but the Prisoner remains silent. When Jesus was tempted in the desert, Satan proposed that He use his powers to end evil. Why should mankind suffer if God can change things?  "But You would not deprive humanity of its freedom".

The Grand Inquisitor (Speaker 2) cannot comprehend.  "I swear mankind is weaker and more worthless than You could ever have imagined?" UN REST, CON FUSION, MIS FORTUNE this is the lot of mankind, " Sinclair spits out savagely (it's even more effective in German)  "oh for many centuries the chaos of man's free thinking". The emphases are in Zimmermann's score, for he uses the shape of sound to suggest the speaker's dilemma. For a man of temporal power, faith in the flawed "children" of  humanity is plain illogical. Can he understand why The Prisoner kisses him as he is released? The speakers shout staccato, disjointed phrases, which express their confusion.

A long, cataclysmic chord rises, to overwhelming crescendo. Each section of the orchestra explodes - tubular bells are struck, the strings whizzing and whirring, the woodwinds wailing. It'a as if the heavens are being ripped apart, yet Jurowski maintains tight control, focussing the energy into meaning, for there is method behind this supposed madness.  Up to this point, The Prisoner (Or Christ) hasn 't said much, so the metallic dryness in Dietrich Henschel's voice is appropriate. Now, though, the bass part launches into an extremely difficult vocalize, where pitch and rhythm oscillate. Because there are no words, we have to listen for the emotional inflections in the voice. There are two recordings of this piece - Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Andreas Schmidt - which show how much the individuality of the performer fills out where words can't suffice. Henschel creates intensity, but relatively little coloration.

As the "normality" they represent collapses, their words gradually disintegrates, though phrases can be heard, "Man does not live by bread alone". They lapse into formal, mechanical gestures. Even the conductor has to stand down from the podium in symbolic renunciation. This isn't gesture for its own sake, but integral to the meaning of the piece. Jurowski has no problem assuming the lotus position with hands across his face. I''ve been told that he's a practising Buddhist, so maybe he knows why his face is covered, prayer-like, at this point. Muffled voices are heard, coming from members of the orchestra, indicating perhaps that Christ's message is understood by some of the common folk, at least. 

In the baritone's second solo, words like "Weh!" and "Allein"  and "Wer" are uttered in multiple variations. You need to listen carefully to piece the phrase together but that is the whole point : if we think, then we deserve the freedom Christ believed in.  (For ease of reference, it's "Woe to him that is alone when he falleth").  Then suddenly Jurowski leaps up and conducts the short but intense finale, a quotation from the Bach chorale Es ist genug. Trumpets and trombones blare but this feels different to the fanfare at the beginning. What does Zimmermann mean?  Hope or abandoned hope? Six days later, he committed suicide.

Johannes Brahms. German Requiem also takes its cue from the Bible, but not from conventional Christian piety. The choral part is glorious, but some of the impact was muted by less than perfect diction. The London Philharmonic Choir are reliable, and were pleasant enough, but on this occasion the honours went to the London Philharmonic Orchestra.  Jurowski's pace was contemplative and serene - a necessity, I think, after Zimmermann. This time we could hear the German Requiem as a resolution to the anguish that went before, though Brahms is too strong-minded to be soothing..

Jurowski emphasized details lovingly. In  Denn alles Flesich es ist wie Gras. the winds were particularly lush and verdant, which made Henschel's singing seem dry in comparison, though that worked well in Herr, lehre doch mich, but less so Denn wir haben keinen bliebende Statt, where his voice didn't glow in the critical word "Geheimnis". Still, it had been a long evening for him. Miah Persson sang Ich habe nun Traurigkeit sweetly, like an angel.


photo credit : Chris Christodoulou, IMG

Mega Symphony of Human Dignity : Jurowski, LPO Beethoven Schoenberg Nono

Vladimir Jurowski's programme  at the Royal Festival Hall proved that intelligent musicality can reach people as well, if not better than, the celebrity gimmicks so popular these days. Jurowski simply stood in front of the audience, speaking in a quiet voice. "This programme is about the dignity of those oppressed and the triumph of the human spirit". (or words to that effect). The concert should be heard, he suggested, as a whole entity culminating in Beethoven's Fifth, rather than a series of disparate parts.

We all know Beethoven. This was a new challenge, to listen through colorations filtered through a new context, and to develop our own sensitivity to the issues involved. Conceptually, this was sophisticated. Conventional wisdom assumes that "ordinary" people are too stupid to respond to new ideas. Thus the obssession with celebrities, dumbing down and "explaining" things in over-simplistic terms.  It's counter-productive. "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing", goes the saying, for it inoculates people with prejudices. Instead, Jurowski treats audiences like sensible people who can listen for themselves and draw their own conclusions.

Thanks to the generosity of Deutsche Bank, who sponsor tickets for those who don't normally go to concerts, there were a lot of people in the audience for whom this was a new experience. Would they be scared off by Schoenberg? Fortunately they hadn't swallowed the myth that Schoenberg is too "difficult" though he's been dead 60 years.  Many of them responded to what Jurowski said, and listened with fresh ears, experiencing the "mega-symphony" as a response to universal human conditions. That, all said and done is what music is.  All the fuss made about clapping between movements, appropriate dress, youth participation etc is sideshow. Concerts are not about behaviour or social function, but about music, above and beyond all. Everything else falls into place as long as you listen.

This audience was most definitely listening, and emotionally engaged from the start. It wasn't relevant whether they knew Fidelio as opera or not. It was sufficient that they realized that Fidelio is about political prisoners. Listening to the drama in the music, they could use their own imaginations. The performance didn't matter so much as the way it stimulated the audience to think about human suffering. Most of us, thankfully won't have to live through that first hand. Ultimately that is the purpose of art: to make us more sensitive, and make us think of lives othetr than our own. 

Wisely, Jurowski chose three items in the English language for the core of the programme, so the audience could understand without filter.  Lord Byron's poem, on which Schoenberg's Ode to Napoleon is based, uses florid, impenetrable text.  References like "Corinth's pedagogue" and "Thou, Timur, in his captive's cage" are closed to those without a classical education. But then dictatorships are opaque, so it's psychologically true. Schoenberg sets the text unadorned, recited in quasi Sprechstimme, in this version with string orchestra and pianist (Catherine Edwards). Robert Hayward conveyed meaning through the intensity of his gestures.

Schoenberg's A Survivor from Warsaw is much more visceral because it's so direct. "I cannot remember everything....." intones the narrator. "But I have no recollection how/ I got underground/ to live/ in the sewers of Warsaw/ for so long a time". Jurowski moderates his natural tendency for lyricism with stark angular rhythms, intensifying the psychic dislocation of this extreme situation. Hayward is an opera singer but the art requires the intensity of an actor. He obviously knows German, but the shouts of the Nazi guards are better delivered with more bite. Jurowski gets the LPO to create savage staccato. temi almost spinning out of control as the guards march the men off to the gas chamber. You could analyse this music in terms of serial rows, but it works just as well to listen emotionally, hearing the repetitions as manic  obsessive. Structural form serves musical feeling. The Gentlemen of the London Philharmonic Choir had been seated behind the orchestra all evening. Now they rose and the chorus "Sh'ma Yisroel" exploded like a miracle, transcending the grimness that had gone before. This is the "grandiose moment when they all started to sing as if prearranged, the old prayer that they had neglected for so many years".

Luigi Nono's Julius Fučík was semi staged (Annabel Arden) which is valid, for it connects to Nono's opera L'Intolleranza. This simple staging referenced the photographs we've seen of the 1961 production.  Above the orchestra, a projection of a cloister which seems curiously serene given the subject. Fučík was a Communist, arrested and murdered by the Nazis. Scraps of writings he made in prison were collected after his death and published as Notes from the Gallows. Ironically, Fučík's oposition to one form of totalitarianism was co-opted by another. The book received saturation coverage in Communist circles. Yet the reason the book is so powerful is perhaps its message of hope.

An anonymous Voice (Malcolm Sinclair) dominates at first, the orchestra oppressively brooding. Surprisngly idiomatic playing from the LPO. I'd never thought of Jurowski as a Nono conductor, but he approaches this music with instinctive passion. Then, quietly, Omar Ebrahim as Fučík takes control. No matter how he was humiliated, Fučík was not destroyed. "Winter prepares man for its rigours as it does a tree". If a man loves life, he cannot be diminished even if he's beheaded. "Remember me, not with sorrow, but with precisely that joy with which I always lived".  Ebrahim barely has to raise his voice, so powerful is his characterization. Now the image of the cloister makes sense. Read more here about what I've written about Julius Fučík, including a baby picture)

From out of Nono's Julius Fučík the famous first bars of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony arise. The power of this symphony can be dimmed by over-familairity, but how it shone here in the context of Jurowski's programme! The driving tempi, the scurrying whips of string and brass, absolute confidence in certain triumph. The symphony can bear many different interpretations, but here Jurowski brought out its energy and vigour - the spirit of human dignity that triumphs over all odds.


photo credit Roman Gontcharov, IMG