Category Archives: In concert

Under the Surface at the Proms – Nielsen and The Four Temperaments

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Prom 38, 13 August 2015 – London Symphony Chorus Womens’ Voices, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra / Juanjo Mena at the Royal Albert Hall


Fabio Luisi conducts the Danish National Symphony Orchestra in Nielsen at the Royal Albert Hall. Photo (c) Chris Christodoulou

Helios Overture
http://www.bbc.co.uk/events/e4nrzc#b065xhdn

3 Motets, Hymnus Amoris and Symphony no.2, ‘The Four Temperaments’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/events/e4nrzc#b065xhds

The Proms and one of this year’s anniversary composers, the Dane Carl Nielsen, are still relatively new friends.

This is because Henry Wood and subsequent directors of the festival did not consider his music worthy of inclusion until very recently – and indeed the Second Symphony, heard in this Prom, was only receiving its second ever Proms performance.

It was the culmination of a thoroughly enjoyable evening that showed Nielsen in several forms. We experienced religious contemplation towards the end of his life in the 3 Motets of 1931, the flowering of spring and love in the Hymnus Amoris of 1897 and then entered the symphonic boxing ring – or so it felt – for the taut arguments of the symphony, modelled on The Four Temperaments. These performances were all authentic, given by the Danish National Vocal Ensemble, Symphony Chorus and Symphony Orchestra.

The evening began with a sunrise – a magical evocation conjured from almost total stillness by conductor Fabio Luisi. As the Helios Overture took shape he kept a close ear to the orchestral colour, and the shafts of sunlight grew ever stronger thanks to wonderful horn playing.

The 3 Motets were cooler, partly because the choir singing them was relatively small, but if anything this enhanced their purity. In this late trio of works Nielsen pays homage to the Renaissance composer Palestrina in a series of carefully woven lines, though there is room for instinctive joy too – as there was in the final motet, Benedictus Dominus. Yet it was the words of an old man that stuck in the memory from the first motet, Afflictus sum, with its translated text “I am feeble and sore broken”.

We then heard Hymnus Amoris, an early work begun by the brightly voiced Boy and Girl Choristers of Winchester Cathedral before blooming through two additional choirs, soprano and baritone soloists (David Danholt and Anna Lucia Richter) and orchestra. Essentially a journey through life, the 25-minute cantata has a healthy glow and pulse, its treble rich sounds bringing forward the promise of new life and love, despite the onset of old age towards the end. Ultimately triumphant, the work finished in a blaze of colour, following excellent solos from Richter in particular.

If the musical language here carried the enthusiasm of youth, the mood darkened appreciably for the symphony – and Luisi noticeably stepped up a gear in his conducting. Using a subject that has often appealed to classical composers, the Four Temperaments, Nielsen takes us on a voyage of very differing emotions, and Luisi ensured these were clearly signposted but also keenly felt.

The turbulent first movement (the Choleric temperament) has a lot going on, moving restlessly from one cadence to another, but it packs a punch and is ultimately a tale of resolve. The middle two movements (Phlegmatic and Melancholic) reveal more obviously vulnerable sides, and in the third there are dark clouds over the soul as the music spends much of its time brooding in a minor key.

There are tunes to be enjoyed, though, especially a winsome number in the second movement, and Nielsen’s development of his material is notable for its speed of thought. Several listens to each movement are recommended to get a feel for his style, but in the Second Symphony Nielsen really convinces with his emotional arguments. The final movement, Sanguine, is the culmination, telling the tale of struggles won and demons vanquished. In a performance as convincing as this it was easy to be won around, a task made even simpler by a charming encore, the Dance of the Cockerels from Nielsen’s opera Maskarade.

Want to hear more?

The obvious next port of call for Nielsen is his Fourth Symphony, the Inextinguishable – a powerful and hugely affirmative piece. It can be heard on Spotify here, with the San Francisco Symphony conducted by Herbert Blomstedt:

For the charming, rustic side to Nielsen’s character, the Wind Quintet is a charming place to start. Here it is as part of an all-Nielsen album from the Athena Ensemble:

 

The concert also included Nikolaj Znaider playing Brahms‘ Violin Concerto. More of that in a future post!

There will be more Under the Surface features as the Proms progress, exploring lesser known pieces and composers at the festival

Proms premiere – Colin Matthews: String Quartet no.5

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String Quartet no.5 by Colin Matthews

Apollon Musagète Quartet (Paweł Zalejski & Bartosz Zachłod (violins), Piotr Szumieł (viola) & Piotr Skweres (cello)) (Proms Chamber Music 3)

Duration: 12 minutes

BBC iPlayer link

http://www.bbc.co.uk/events/ecq5v2#b06402nt (Matthews begins talking at 13:19, then the piece at 15:34 and ends at 27:36)

What’s the story behind the piece?

In conversation with Petroc Trelawny before the performance, Matthews reveals that his string quartet rate of composition has been approximately one every ten years, but that the gap is now narrowing.

This work was written for the 75th anniversary of the Tanglewood Festival and is conceived in a single movement. “I wanted to do something very different from the others”, he says, and the silences are a starting point. “The work begins very hesitantly”, he explains, and works up to only one big climax.

Did you know?

Colin Matthews worked as Britten’s assistant in the last few years of his life, and was essentially his right hand man for proof reading and even composition. You can read an interview about his exploits here

Initial verdict

It is possible to detect the hand of a mature composer at work here. So many new pieces rely on shock tactics and volume to make themselves heard, but Colin Matthews shuns all of that with an economic approach that actually brings forward greater emotion.

The faltering start from the quartet, together, becomes a distinctive motif that runs through the piece, and although the music does indeed build and get to a more secure footing, it never fully shakes off the uneasy start from the muted quartet. It is at times reminiscent of a Bartók quartet slow movement, or even Britten, in the intensity of its expression, though it never fully sounds like those composers. The Fifth Quartet says a lot in a relatively short duration, convincing in spite of its emotional doubt, as it retreats into the shadows at the end.

Second hearing

tbc!

Where can I hear more?

Colin has a BBC page devoted to him here

Proms premiere – Luke Bedford: Instability

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Luke Bedford

BBC Philharmonic Orchestra / Juanjo Mena (Prom 20)

Duration: 22 minutes

BBC iPlayer link

Instability can be heard by clicking here

What’s the story behind the piece?

You can look at the music itself courtesy of Luke Bedford’s publisher, Universal Edition, here

In the introduction on the same page, Bedford sets the scene for his new piece. “Ideas in this piece are torn apart by a strange energy and reform in new, dynamic relationships. There is a constant tension between growing and collapsing. That which seems durable can vanish in an instant. The piece will include the Albert Hall organ, a detuned orchestra and possibly the first use of a cricket bat in an orchestral piece.”

Reflecting the world we live in and experience. Was going to be a set of movements but is now in one continuous duration. Cuts between ideas in an unexpected and dramatic way. Some of the orchestra – wind and brass – play a quarter-tone lower.

Did you know?

Initial verdict

As the BBC Radio 3 presenter Petroc Trelawny observes, Instability is a piece that vividly captures the uncertain and often overwhelming times that we live in. It is a very edgy piece indeed!

From the start (35:22 on the link) some quiet murmurings among the orchestra but then a sudden outburst that changes the whole dynamic of the piece. Bedford writes some striking music for the orchestra, a dramatic set of contrasts that perhaps intentionally leaves the listener completely on edge with the huge rumbles of sound. There is not so much melodic, as the big chords are walls of sound, but there is a good deal of pent-up anger released with them it would seem.

The organ is integral to the music, tending towards the upper end for a shrill sound, but cutting through around the 44’ mark with an emphatic blast of C major tonality. After this the piece becomes uncertain and wary again, with some creepy sounds and ominous, held low notes.

I couldn’t hear where the cricket bat comes in but assumed that to be in the percussive section around 41:30, where it feels like a lot of pipes are struck.

From around 48:55 on the link the cellos and violas intone a solemn melody, but the rest of the orchestra seems hell-bent on breaking this up and smothering it. Then the forces bang into each other chaotically before cutting out to near silence. Then what seems to be a coda starts, with another quite solemn and drawn out melody broken up by metallic chords from brass, wind, percussion and high organ.

To me this piece feels like an attempt to live a proper life in a society that is chaotic, uncertain and full of dread. At the end this tension is unresolved.

Second hearing

tbc!

Where can I hear more?

You can watch a portrait of Luke Bedford in this video uploaded to YouTube by the London Sinfonietta:

Proms premiere – Luca Francesconi: Duende

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Luca Francesconi

Leila Josefowicz (violin), BBC Symphony Orchestra / Susanna Mälkki (Prom 13)

Duration: 20 minutes

BBC iPlayer link

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p02wv00w/bbc-proms-2015-season-luca-francesconi-duende-the-dark-notes

What’s the story behind the piece?

leila-josefowicz
Leila Josefowicz playing Duende Photo (c) Chris Christodoulou

“Historically”,– says Luca Francesconi, “duende is the demon of flamenco. As Federico Garcìa Lorca explains, it is a subterranean force of unheard-of power that escapes rational control. To recover a primitive force in the instrument that perhaps most embodies the history of the West it is necessary to make a perilous descent into the underworld of dark notes, or a flight beyond the orbit of the earth. Which amounts to the same thing. Extremely difficult. But without duende we remain bolted to the ground.”

The work, for violin and orchestra, is a joint commission from the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI and the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

Leila Josefowicz, the violin soloist, has expanded on ‘duende’. “We acknowledged that we both have Duende, which cannot be learned…this is something we knew we could share with the world, he with his composition and me being the interpreter and musical messenger. I appreciate his incredible musical imagination, his scores bursting with colour and drama”.

Did you know?

Francesconi, born in 1956, has studied with both Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luciano Berio. His chamber opera Quartett, about the end of the world, was heard at the Royal Opera House in 2014.

Initial verdict

This is a striking piece, right from the start, where the violin begins with some feather light string crossing at a very high pitch, seemingly evoking night time insects or other sounds. There are some incredibly taxing passages for the instrument early on, which Josefowicz is completely equal to.

There is some frenetic activity both from violin and orchestra, but at around 7 minutes in the violin really soars, making a rather beautiful sound easily audible even above the glinting, treble-heavy accompaniment.

Around 13’10” there is a notable gear change, the violin digging in for some seriously virtuosic and demonic passages. Then at around 17” a slow, nocturnal atmosphere asserts itself, with various whistles and clicks from the violin to long-held notes from the orchestra.

I found it a little more difficult to hold attention with the piece in the closing stages, but it is doubtful that is the fault of the composer. A second hearing will confirm!

Second hearing

tbc!

Where can I hear more?

You can watch a performance of the Piano Concerto no.2, completed in 2013, below:

Under the Surface at the Proms – John Foulds’ Three Mantras

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Prom 38, 13 August 2015 – London Symphony Chorus Womens’ Voices, BBC Philharmonic Orchestra / Juanjo Mena at the Royal Albert Hall

john-foulds

John Foulds Three Mantras (1919-1930)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/events/exq5v2#b064y5hj

We definitely undervalue the BBC orchestras when the Proms take centre stage. I say that because this was one of the most colourful orchestral Proms it has been my pleasure to witness, and much of the credit for that should go to the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, a riot of bright shades under Juanjo Mena in Messiaen’s Turangalîla-Symphony. Yet while that performance will inevitably take centre stage, it was another work that stole the show.

John Foulds has spent a long time languishing in the musical wilderness, but in the last ten years he has begun to reach a bigger audience. A good deal of thanks for this should go to conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Sakari Oramo, who recorded two discs of his orchestral works with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. They enchanted us with Foulds’ inventiveness, and most importantly his eagerness to incorporate Eastern cultures within an extremely Western art form. In this respect he was in line with Gustav Holst.

One of the finest works in this respect is the 3 Mantras, thought to be part of a massive Sanskrit opera, Avatara. Very sadly that never came to be, and 300 pages are lost from the score, but the 3 Mantras survive and make a very accomplished and unusual orchestral piece. The colours are simply beautiful, achieved through a wide variety of percussion, harps and shimmering strings, all of which Mena marshalled to show the detail of Foulds’ inventive orchestration.

It is the second piece, the Mantra of Bliss (starting at 8:13 on the link above) that is the most striking, a meditation of radiant orchestral beauty, where Foulds uses a wordless female chorus to enchanting effect. Holst had done this before, in Neptune from The Planets, but rather than that cold emptiness Foulds creates exotic warmth.

The outer two mantras are very different; the first a bustle of activity that slows for a moving slower melody; the third an almost barbaric dance that wheels out of control and wields a fearsome set of percussion at the end. This was a terrific performance from the BBC Philharmonic, showing off Foulds’ gifts to a new audience that will hopefully look to discover more of the music of this remarkable composer.

Want to hear more

You can hear a playlist from BBC Radio 3’s CD Review, where Andrew McGregor explores recordings of John Foulds’ music, by clicking here

There will be more Under the Surface features as the Proms progress, exploring lesser known pieces and composers at the festival