Last week the British conductor Sir Simon Rattle celebrated his 70th birthday. Since the 1980s Rattle has played a hugely important part in classical music in the UK, with important conducting posts at the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Berliner Philharmoniker and London Symphony Orchestra. In 2023 he returned once more to Germany, as principal conductor for the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.
In that time, Rattle has made a huge range of recordings, from Haydn to Adès via Beethoven, Grainger and Schoenberg. Resisting temptation to compile a playlist of snippets, I have opted for a small number of heavyweight recordings, including Adès‘ Asyla, Schoenberg‘s Chamber Symphony no.1 and Stravinsky‘s Le Sacre du Printemps, his first recording on starting with the LSO in 2017. Topping the bill, however, is his CBSO recording of Mahler‘s Second Symphony, the Resurrection, the piece with which he opened Birmingham’s Symphony Hall in 1991. You can listen to the playlist on Tidal below:
Benjamin Grosvenor (piano, below), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Robert Treviño (above)
Mozart Symphony no.38 in D major K504 ‘Prague’ (1786) Mendelssohn Piano Concerto no.1 in G minor Op.25 (1830-31) Brahms Symphony no.1 in C minor Op.68 (1868-76)
Symphony Hall, Birmingham Thursday 23 January 2025 (2.15pm)
Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Picture of Benjamin Grosvenor (c) Jenny Bestwick
Having worked with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra on numerous occasions, Robert Treviño was well placed to take on a programme which was pretty demanding for all that its constituents were hardly unfamiliar – its two symphonies repertoire works to the core.
His cycle of Beethoven symphonies (Ondine) among the best of recent years, it was perhaps surprising to find Treviño boxing himself in interpretively with Mozart’s Prague symphony. If the first movement’s Adagio introduction was imposingly wrought, the main Allegro was taken at too consistently headlong a tempo for its intricacy of textures and its range of expression fully to register, though the CBSO admirably stayed the course. Nor was the central Andante wholly successful, the pervasiveness of its five-note motif not matched by the diversity of emotional responses to which this is put, with the development sounding harried rather than impetuous. Best was a final Presto that was a sizable-enough counterpart (first- and second-half repeats taken) to what went before, and its élan maintained through to the effervescent closing bars.
Fresh from having taken on Busoni’s epic Piano Concerto (most notably at last year’s Proms), Benjamin Grosvenor (above) met the very different challenge of Mendelssohn’s First Piano Concerto with comparable conviction. Written quickly but with nothing left to chance, this takes up the precedent of Weber’s Konzertstück (which, completed barely a decade earlier, had featured at Mendelssohn’s public debut) by eliding its individual movements into a succinct and cohesive whole. Vividly as Grosvenor projected its opening Molto allegro – no lack of ‘con fuoco’ – he came into his own with an Andante whose dialogue of piano and lower strings was meltingly rendered, then a final Presto both dextrous and exhilarating. The CBSO made a fine recording with Stephen Hough a quarter-century ago (Hyperion) and this was at the very least its equal.
Even so, it was Brahms’s First Symphony as proved the highlight of this afternoon’s concert. Whereas his Mozart had felt unduly beholden to ‘authentic’ concepts, Treviño was entirely his own man here – not least the opening movement whose implacable introduction linked effortlessly into an Allegro trenchantly characterized and with a cumulative impetus such as carried over into the fatalistic coda. Its eloquence never laboured, the Andante featured some felicitous woodwind and a poised contribution from guest leader Nathaniel Anderson-Frank.
Having had the measure of what feels more intermezzo than scherzo, pensive and playful by turns, Treviño steered a secure and always purposeful course through the lengthy finale. Its introductory Adagio preparing stealthily for a fervent if not over-bearing take on its majestic ‘alpine’ melody, the main Allegro was unerringly paced so that its formal elaboration never risked being discursive. Nor was the CBSO found wanting in a peroration that endowed the main motivic ideas with a resolution the more powerful for having been so acutely gauged.
There can be few seasons when Brahms’s First Symphony does not feature in this orchestra’s schedule, but Treviño’s was surely among the most impressive in recent memory; confirming demonstrable rapport between him and the CBSO one hopes will be renewed before too long.
On this day in 1905, the world premiere of Schoenberg’s orchestral piece Pelleas und Melisande took place, in Vienna’s Musikverein.
This is a remarkable piece, an example of Schoenberg’s ultra-intense style as he began to show signs of breaking with tonality. The story unfolds in an unbroken span of over 40 minutes, during which the large orchestra bathe in rich harmony and lush colouring on the part of the composer’s skilful instrumentation.
The piece can be heard here with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and David Markham:
With the UK braced for the arrival of Storm Éowyn today, it got me thinking of successful portrayals of storms in music.
The first piece that came to mind was Sibelius’s masterpiece Tapiola, a remarkable and vivid orchestral poem written late in his compositional career about Tapio, the spirit of the forest. Its depiction of a storm is like no other.
Listen here, in a particularly incendiary account from the Berliner Philharmoniker and Herbert von Karajan, keeping an ear out for the storm as it begins around the 16:50 mark:
Arcana brings you good news from Wales, where Das Koolies have released a new single, Som Bom Magnifico, and posted plans for a new album in May.
In case you don’t already know, Das Koolies is essentially the Super Furry Animals, minus Gruff Rhys – though it’s important to mention there is no ‘split’ as such, just different musical projects to enjoy. The current incarnation, made up of Huw Bunford, Cian Ciarán, Daf Ieuan and Guto Pryce, hit the ground running in 2023 with the brilliant DK.01 album, and its successor, Pando, looks set to build on that handsomely on 9 May.
For now, you can enjoy the cosmic synth play, vocals and heady chorus of the psychedelic Som Bom Magnifico, a danceable cut that bodes very well for the band’s second chapter!
Published post no.2,420 – Thursday 23 January 2025
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