Tag Archives: Gustav Mahler

In concert – CBSO / Kazuki Yamada: Mahler Symphony no.9 & Takemitsu

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City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Kazuki Yamada (above)

Takemitsu Requiem (1957)
Mahler Symphony no.9 in D major (1908-09)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Thursday 10 April 2025

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Picture of Kazuki Yamada (c) Hannah Fathers

Ninth Symphonies have been a recurrent feature of this season from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Kazuki Yamada. Tonight’s concert brought this to a culmination of sorts with that by Mahler and which naturally occupied almost the whole of the programme.

Whatever else, it was a performance whose scope matched the music’s ambition and not least in an opening Andante as lays claim to being its composer’s greatest achievement. Admittedly this took a few minutes to find focus, those initial bars not so much speculative as halting, but an overall sense of the movement unfolding seamlessly across its strategic peaks and troughs was undeniable, and Yamada was mindful to underline Mahler’s holding back of its expected culmination so the closing minutes mused eloquently if uncertainly on what might have been.

The middle movements can often emerge as incidental to the formal scheme, and Yamada’s take on the Ländler gave some pause for thought. Each of its constituents was vividly shaped and articulated, but a stop-start discontinuity arguably denied it that innocence to experience trajectory which, in turn, makes tangible the fatalistic humour at its end. The Rondo-Burleske was the undoubted highlight – its abrasiveness spilling over into violence towards the close, but not before Yamada had summoned the requisite anguish from its yearning trio section.

It might have been better to continue directly into the Adagio. As it was, a relatively lengthy pause left this finale sounding less a direct reaction to what had gone before than a delayed avoidance of the issues raised. Yamada’s overall handling of this movement was fine if not exceptionally so. Such as the twilit episode prior to the main climax was lucidity itself, but the conductor having already slowed to near-stasis then made it difficult to reduce the tempo further, so that the closing bars risked feeling emotionally gratuitous rather than inevitable.

What could hardly be gainsaid was the commitment of the CBSO’s response over what, for all its latter-day familiarity, remains a testing challenge whether individually or collectively. Wisely, Yamada has resisted any temptation to fashion a self-consciously virtuoso orchestra; emphasis seems to be instead on encouraging flexibility and sensitivity of response in terms of the music at hand – a more circumspect though productive approach which suggests he is happy to stay the course in terms of a partnership which is still in its relatively early stages.

Not a few performances of Mahler Nine opt for a scene-setting piece rather than first half as such. Yamada did so with Takemitsu’s Requiem – if not this composer’s first or even earliest acknowledged work, then certainly the one that established his wider reputation. The CBSO strings did justice to its subtle interplay of expressive threnody and more angular elements in a reading that fulfilled its purpose ideally. Hopefully the coming seasons will revive some of the more innovative pieces to have languished in the three decades since Takemitsu’s death.

This was the latest in what is becoming a tradition and rightly so – a page in the programme listing those ‘‘friends, members and colleagues’’ whom the CBSO Remembers with no little gratitude. From this perspective, tonight’s programme could hardly have been more fitting.

For details on the 2024-25 season A Season of Joy, head to the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra website. Click on the name to read more about conductor Kazuki Yamada

Published post no.2,502 – Monday 14 April 2025

Playlist – Sir Simon Rattle @ 70

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by Ben Hogwood

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:

Published post no.2,424 – Monday 27 January 2025

In concert – BBC Symphony Orchestra / Sakari Oramo: Mahler Symphony no.6

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BBC Symphony Orchestra / Sakari Oramo (above)

Mahler Symphony no.6 in A minor (1903-04)

Barbican Hall, London
Thursday 26 September 2024

Having just extended his contract with the BBC Symphony Orchestra until 2030, which at 17 years will make him its longest serving chief conductor after Sir Adrian Boult, Sakari Oramo began the new season with this frequently impressive account of Mahler’s Sixth Symphony.

Impressive but equally unpredictable – not least in an opening movement whose tensility and even terseness was emphasized by mostly swift tempos and the nowadays rare omission of its exposition repeat, which predicated martial aggressiveness over any more yielding expression. There was no lack of deftness in the central interlude, for all that the off-stage cowbells were distinctly unevocative in their tinkling, yet the developmental passages either side exuded an unwavering purposefulness so that the arrival of the reprise more than usually made its mark. Stealthily launched, the coda duly emerged rather than burst forth though this was audibly in accord with the ambivalence of its affirmation as Oramo perceived it. Those closing bars had no lack of finality, for all that there was more of ruthlessness than joyousness in their arrival.

Speaking recently, Oramo stated his conviction in the revised order of the central movements with the Scherzo placed second. He might profitably have headed into this without pause, as to underline the consistency of rhythmic profile with what went before, but there was no hint of inflexibility here or in the trio sections which effortlessly elided between the winsome and sardonic. Equally in evidence was that fatalistic sense pervading the music as it unfolds, and so made possible a coda whose evanescent poise could not conceal more ominous portents.

From this vantage, the Andante provided if not balm to the soul, then a measure of unforced pathos. Enticingly rendered with some notably felicitous playing by the BBCSO woodwind, it was shaped by Oramo with unerring rightness through to a climax whose emotional force was the greater for its being held in check. Surprising that this movement has never attained the popularity of the Adagietto from the Fifth Symphony: then again, its salient qualities are conveyed even more completely when experienced within the context of the work as a whole.

By a similar token, it arguably matters less in what order the middle movements are played if the finale proves a culmination in all respects. That it certainly was here – Oramo imbuing its lengthy introduction with acute expectancy balanced by the visceral impact of what followed. Nor did tension fall off in those quiet but eventful interludes, strategically placed between the larger formal sections, and in which cowbells are overlaid by tubular bells for what became a haze of resonance as affecting as any more demonstrative expression elsewhere. Oramo also restored that third hammer-blow which does not so much alter the course of this movement, as confirm its resignation before fate in even more graphic terms. Nothing could have sounded more matter of fact than the baleful rumination of brass prior to that explosive closing gesture. While not the most inclusive performance, this was undoubtedly one to renew admiration in the audacity of Mahler’s conception or his conviction in bringing it off. It also gave notice of continued rapport between Oramo and the BBCSO as they begin their 12th season together.

For more on their 2024/25 season head to the BBC Symphony Orchestra website – and click here to read more on their chief conductor Sakari Oramo

Published post no.2,315 – Saturday 28 September 2024

Arcana at the Proms – Prom 62: Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra / Sir Simon Rattle – Mahler: Symphony no.6

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Mahler Symphony no.6 in A minor (1903-04)

Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra / Sir Simon Rattle

Royal Albert Hall, London
Friday 6 September 2024

reviewed by Ben Hogwood Photos (c) Chris Christodoulou (taken from the previous night’s Prom)

This was Sir Simon Rattle‘s fifteenth encounter with the music of Gustav Mahler at the BBC Proms – and a third outing under his baton for the Sixth Symphony, which he first conducted in charge of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain 40 years ago.

This time he was visiting, having returned to Germany to take charge of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, a feeling for the concertgoers akin to welcoming a distant relative and hearing about their latest job. The Munich ensemble have formidable Mahler credentials, no doubt introduced by Eugen Jochum from their founding in 1949 but notably honed by Rafael Kubelík, with whom they recorded all the symphonies for Deutsche Grammophon. This account of the Sixth proved them to be the ideal foil for Rattle, the Liverpudlian welcomed with great cheers around the hall.

Sir Simon knows his Mahler better than arguably any other living conductor, and the breadth and depth he brought to his interpretation was breathtaking. So too was the sheer audible spectrum, for which we have to thank Mahler, for this is one of those works that has simply everything, from the tiniest murmur from bass strings to the thunderous hammer strokes of the finale. Some way between that lies the tender theme he wrote for his wife Alma, a glowing light in the first movement under the tender caress of its beautiful wind choir. Around this and in the last movement were fleeting glimmers of sunshine from the cowbells, an unusual addition to the percussion section that charmed from their offstage position, evoking the open meadows but with shivers of cold wind from the rest of the orchestra, outlines icily drawn by strings and brass.

These moments were welcome respite from the tumult of Mahler’s marching music, obsessively hammered home in the fast movements, the orchestra turning this way and that at quick speed. The marching music, so virulent in the first movement, quickly develops a sour taste, and Rattle was alive to that in the scherzo – placed third. This is a time-honoured practice for him, in accordance with Mahler’s order of performance when conducting but not his initial order of composition. The controversy continues to follow the work around, and although many (this author included) prefer the scherzo placed second – ratcheting up the tension – Rattle’s shaping of the piece overall made his own choice a convincing one.

The orchestra were simply stunning. The strings – rarely given due credit in big symphonic performances such as this – were united beyond criticism, the violins in remarkable unison – and particularly beautiful in the serene opening to a magical slow movement. Brass were also as one in their clarion calls, but turned vulgar when they needed to. The wind section was beautifully shaped and coloured, with an appropriately plaintive oboe solo in the trio section of the scherzo. Underpinning the performance were the rolling timpani, the thunder to the lightning strikes of the percussion, whose power was simply brutal at times, The hammer blows, struck twice in the finale, were terrifying strokes of fate and delivered with appropriately cold theatre.

This was a performance that will stick in the memory for years, one from which my ears are still ringing. Mahler’s ghastly premonitions of later existence were brought to life in shocking technicolour, though Rattle revelled at the same time in its beautiful evocations of nature. These were ultimately swept aside, with red-blooded highs and cold-blooded lows, all blended into the same intoxicating musical cocktail. For sheer emotional power, this symphony – and this performance – had it all.

You can listen to the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Sir Simon Rattle in their recent live recording of the Sixth symphony below:

Published post no.2,294 – Saturday 7 September 2024

On Record – MahlerFest XXXII: Joshua DeVane sings Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Kenneth Woods conducts Symphony no.1

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Joshua DeVane (baritone); Colorado MahlerFest Chamber Orchestra (Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen), Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra / Kenneth Woods

Mahler Symphony no.1 in D major (1887-8, rev, 1898)
Mahler arr. Schoenberg Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (1884-5, arr. 1920)
Mahler Blumine (1884, rev. 1889)

Colorado MahlerFest 195269164287 [79’02”]
Live performances on 18 May 2019 (Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen), 19 May 2019, Macky Auditorium, Boulder, Colorado

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Recorded representation of the current MahlerFest era continues to grow with this release on CD (previously available as a download) of the First Symphony with related pieces, given at its 32nd edition and what was the fourth such event with Kenneth Woods as artistic director.

What’s the music like?

What was doubtless intended to inaugurate a chronological traversal began in 2019 with this performance of the First Symphony, the first to be heard in the critical edition published that year by Breitkopf & Härtel. Woods has written about this extensively at his website [Ken on the Great Mahler Debate of 2019 | Kenneth Woods – conductor]: suffice to add the numerous corrections and textural amendments enhance that fuller and more stratified orchestral sound such as Mahler favoured in 1899 when compared with earlier versions from 1889 and 1893.

Interpretatively, this performance is a satisfying one with few overt surprises but no obvious idiosyncrasies. Any lack of atmosphere during the first movement’s mesmeric introduction is offset by its easeful if never uneventful continuation – thus a subtly differentiated exposition repeat, then stealthy marshalling of expressive tension to a coda whose joyousness is rightly kept within limits. The scherzo is robust yet propulsive and the trio even finer in its unforced suavity, while the funeral march never over-inflects its Klezmer elements unfolding from the ominous and ironic, via gentle repose, to a closing fatalism. Woods succeeds better than most in holding together the unwieldy finale, allowing due emotional space for the recall of initial ideas that is its sure highlight, and the ensuing apotheosis lacks nothing in blazing affirmation.

Included as an encore is Blumine, the ‘romance’ salvaged from earlier incidental music which formed part of this symphony until being jettisoned in 1894 – here emerging with its elegance and pathos devoid of wanton sentiment. The actual concert continued with Korngold’s Violin Concerto then Beethoven’s Third Leonora Overture reorchestrated by Mahler, but the present release opens with a performance from the previous day’s concert of Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. This is heard in a chamber arrangement as supervised by Schoenberg for the 1920 season of his Society for Private Musical Performances, its textural transparency underlining the soulfulness then buoyancy of its opening two songs. If the (over-wrought?) drama of the third song is under-projected, the wistful radiance of its successor comes across unimpeded.

Does it all work?

Indeed it does, overall. Mahler symphonies may have been performed and recorded by a host of international orchestras, but that of the Colorado MahlerFest lacks nothing in commitment or tenacity; any lack of atmosphere and finesse owes more to the clear if confined acoustic of Macky Auditorium than absence of quiet playing or overriding of dynamics. Joshua DeVane is a thoughtful exponent of the song-cycle, at his best in the restrained inwardness of its outer numbers, while the ensemble drawn from the CMO makes a persuasive case for this reduction.

Is it recommended?

It is. The orchestral playing may have grown in conviction with each new instalment, but this is a notable statement of intent for MahlerFest under Woods’s direction. That the 33rd edition had to be scaled down then presented online had little effect on the resolve of those involved.

Buy

For further purchase options, visit the MahlerFest website – and for more information on the festival itself, click here. Click on the names for further information on conductor Kenneth Woods and soloist Joshua DeVane

Published post no.2,247 – Monday 22 July 2024