Brahms: Symphonies Nos. 1-4.
Staatskapelle Dresden conducted by Christian Thielemann. Unitel Classica.
$64.99 (3 DVDs).
Beethoven: Missa Solemnis. Lucy
Crowe, soprano; Jennifer Johnson, mezzo-soprano; James Gilchrist, tenor; Matthew
Rose, bass; Monteverdi Choir and Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique conducted by John Eliot Gardiner.
SDG. $18.99.
Bach: Cello Suites (selections).
Amy Porter, flute. Equilibrium. $24.99 (2 CDs).
American Art: Music for Flute and
Piano by Eldin Burton, Robert Beaser, Michael Daugherty, and Christopher
Caliendo. Amy Porter, flute; Christopher Harding, piano. Equilibrium.
$16.99.
Music that is very frequently
performed can lose its luster over time – even the greatest music. All too often,
readings of often-heard works can become stodgy, ordinary, uninspired,
perfunctory – in stark contrast to the inspiration with which they were created
and the intensity and emotional force that turned them into standards of the
repertoire in the first place. It is therefore a particularly happy
circumstance when a conductor takes a genuinely fresh look at well-known music,
as Christian Thielemann does in a new video release that presents the four Brahms
symphonies on two Unitel Classica DVDs, plus Thielemann’s 52-minute “Discovering Brahms” discussion on
a third. That third title is a touch misleading, since for most listeners – not
to mention most conductors – these performances will be a matter of rediscovering Brahms rather than
discovering him. But in some ways this is a distinction without a difference,
for Thielemann insists on delivering Brahms with clarity, brightness and
intense energy, a far cry from the often-plodding readings these symphonies
sometimes receive and from the frequently muddy, massed sound with which some
orchestras deliver them. Staatskapelle Dresden handles this music marvelously,
with lyricism and vibrancy, and Thielemann directs with propulsiveness that
moves the music along smartly even though, by the clock, his tempos are not
particularly fast. Thielemann here makes an effective case for some of the
symphonic movements that tend to get short shrift elsewhere – the middle
movements of Symphony No. 4, for example, gain significantly in stature in this
interpretation without any diminution in the effectiveness of the outer ones. There
is no one-size-fits-all answer to the question of whether classical music
benefits from or is harmed by video presentations as opposed to ones of pure
sound, but this particular set of DVDs is a highly impressive one. Thielemann’s
podium manner is very involving, featuring broad gestures and quite a lot of
motion – the plus being that this makes the DVD fascinating to watch, the minus
being that watching it can be distracting to one’s involvement in and
absorption of the music. Thielemann’s discussion of his interpretation of these
symphonies is intelligent and cogent, and it is easy for listeners/viewers to
return to the performances, if they so desire, and find out for themselves just
how Thielemann translates his thoughts into podium behavior. These are live
recordings – the First and Third at NHK Hall in Tokyo, the Second and Fourth at
the Semperoper in Dresden – and they offer much of the excitement of live performances
without any excessive playing-to-a-live-audience elements that can sometimes
intrude. Thielemann’s Brahms Symphonies are among the best available, his
thoughtful approach and highly knowledgeable handling of the scores making it
possible to see once again just why these works are so central to the standard
classical-music repertoire.
Beethoven is just as much a
core of classical music as Brahms, but his Missa
Solemnis, although an undoubted masterpiece, is not heard nearly as often
as his symphonies – and it presents some significant performance challenges,
even more so in a largely secular age in which the overtly Catholic text does
not have the direct and immediate audience connection that it did in the
composer’s time. It takes a performance as good as the new one under John Eliot
Gardiner to turn this into a piece that connects musically with the audience, whether or not its texts have personal
meaning for any particular listener. Gardiner has recorded the Missa Solemnis before, in fact using the
same Monteverdi Choir that appears on his new release – well, not the same group, its members having changed
in the 20-plus years since the earlier recording, but a group of the same name
and with the same history of excellence and continuity of sound. Gardiner’s
earlier recording was an excellent one, but the new release on SDG – which
stands for “Soli Deo Gloria,” a singularly appropriate label for this music –
is even better. The primary reason is sound: like Thielemann’s Brahms
Symphonies, Gardiner’s Missa Solemnis
is a live recording (made at London’s Barbican Hall in October 2012), and in
this case as in Thielemann’s, the presence of an audience helps bring out the
best in the performers. That “best” is very good indeed. The chorus is slightly
larger in this recording than in Gardiner’s earlier one, but its sound is at
least equally clear, and so is the sound of the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, whose
instrumental lines beautifully support and complement the vocal ones. This is a
faster-than-usual Missa Solemnis,
lasting just 70 minutes – while other performances can last 80 or more. But
nothing here feels rushed. If anything, the tempos – which are only slightly
faster than those of other conductors in any given section – lend the work a
propulsive forward motion that sweeps listeners along effectively without
compromising the solemnity of either words or music. The four soloists are all
more than adequate, even if none of them stands out as transcendent in the way that
the horns and woodwinds do. From the gorgeous solo violin in the Benedictus to the intense climax of the Dona Nobis Pacem, this is a Missa Solemnis that is musically
heartfelt, stylishly performed and thoroughly convincing – a reaffirmation of
the greatness of the work.
The greatness of Bach’s Cello Suites is beyond doubt as well,
these being both seminal and towering works for their instrument, for all the particular
difficulty of performing No. 6, which was written for a five-string instrument,
not a modern, four-string cello. These are emphatically cello suites, despite the oft-repeated claim that Bach’s music is
so pure, so inherently “musical” (however one chooses to define that word in
this context), that it can be played on any instrument. The fact is that these
particular suites are very clearly designed to test the mettle of cellists (and
cellos!) and are written with the specific sonorities and capabilities of the
cello in mind. They have nevertheless often been transcribed, most notably for
viola, and it is probably inevitable that Bach’s music in general will continue
to be played on instruments other than the ones designated in the composer’s
scores – especially since Bach himself often redid movements or entire pieces
originally written for one instrument so they could be played on a different
one. Still, Amy Porter’s flute transcriptions of 25 movements from the six cello
suites verge on the quixotic, most notably in the two she arranges from Suite
No. 6, the Prelude and Courante. The problem is not Porter’s
playing, which is absolutely first-rate, and not her transcription ability,
which is substantial (although this release is rather oddly titled “In
Translation”). The problem is simply that this music does not lie at all well
on the flute, whose constricted, high range is about as far from the very
substantial, low range of the cello as it is possible to be. Porter is quite
obviously aware of this, and it explains why she chooses only some movements of
the suites to transcribe, not all of them: many are simply beyond the compass
of the flute and would require rewriting rather than transcription – an
endeavor that would scarcely repay the effort even if it were not to seem
almost sacrilegious. In any case, what Porter gives us here is a fascinating
tour of portions of these six-movement suites: five movements apiece from Nos.
1, 3 and 4, four movements apiece from Nos. 2 and 5, and the two movements from
No. 6. Porter uses these arrangements as teaching exercises in her master
classes, but these suites were never intended as études, and the flute transcriptions do not come across that way:
they are musically solid even though their sound, two octaves above that of the
cello, can be somewhat wearing if listened to for too long – it is usually
single suite movements, not sequences of them, that are played on various
instruments not intended by Bach, as the Bourrée
of the third suite occasionally is on bassoon, trombone or even tuba. Listeners
intrigued by an unusual handling of some Baroque masterpieces will enjoy this
two-CD Equilibrium set, which – notwithstanding the excellence of the
performance – gets a (+++) rating in light of its niche nature and its
ultimately limited appeal.
Porter shows her skill and
virtuosity as well in another (+++) CD on the same Equilibrium label – this one,
called American Art, containing no
masterpieces but providing interested listeners with a chance to hear some
virtually unknown flute music by some contemporary American composers. The most
interesting work here is by Michael Daugherty (born 1954): Crystal, a 2006 arrangement taken from the second movement of the
composer’s 2004 Concerto for Orchestra
and set by Daugherty for flute (here played by Yi-Chun Chen), alto flute
(Porter), metal windchimes and piano. Both acoustically and musically, this
piece shows Daugherty’s considerable skill in structuring his music and in
making it aurally unusual and appealing. Unfortunately, Crystal is the shortest work on this CD, and the others are not at
this level. Eldin Burton (1913-1981) contributes a Sonatina for Flute and Piano (1948) that is pleasant enough,
classically proportioned, but not especially distinguished. The Variations for Flute and Piano (1982) by
Robert Beaser (born 1954) are considerably more substantial, superimposing a
three-movement form on a set of 15 variations, but at more than 27 minutes,
they go on rather too long and do not have any particular thematic distinction.
More interesting is Flute Sonata No. 3,
“The N.C. Wyeth Sonata” (2006), by Christopher Caliendo (born 1960). It was
written for Porter, who gave its première,
and it certainly requires considerable virtuosity and breath control. But it is
one of those self-consciously programmatic modern works whose movement titles
try to give the audience information that the music itself does not effectively
convey: “Youth, Trains, and Tin Pan Alley,” “A Dead Son, Reflection, Memory,”
and “Bronco Buster.” Porter plays the work sensitively and with clear emotional
involvement, and pianist Christopher Harding ably supports her here and throughout
the CD. It goes without saying that works like those on American Art pale by comparison with the music of Bach, Beethoven
or Brahms, but listeners will not come to this disc with the same expectations
they will bring to the other recordings. Those interested in hearing fine flute
playing of some moderately interesting, well-constructed but scarcely
groundbreaking contemporary music would seem to be the target audience for this
disc – and the people who will find it most satisfying.
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