Rameau, Mahler: London Symphony Orchestra, Daniel Harding (conductor), Barbican Hall, London 22.03.2007 (AO)

 

Rameau and Mahler don’t seem to be natural partners, but the bizarre combination on this programme was carefully thought out. In its own time, Rameau’s Dances from Hippolyte and Alceste was considered shockingly modern.  Its elegant construction belied its exuberant high spirits.  It was a surprisingly appropriate companion to Mahler’s 7^th Symphony, especially in this performance.

Last week, the audience went wild over a flamboyant Mahler 2^nd. But there is a lot more to Mahler than noise.  Harding’s Mahler is not populist at all. He doesn’t try to blast the audience out of their seats.  On the contrary, what makes his approach exciting is that it inspires thoughtful listening.  I’ve heard him conduct Mahler many times now, but even when I don’t fully understand, I’ve always had the sense that it was propelled by deep musical intelligence.  Indeed, I’m still pondering Harding’s recent Mahler 9^th with Staatskapelle Dresden.  There were too many insights to absorb in one hearing. I still don’t completely understand, but that’s part of the fascination.  It’s much more satisfying to hear a performance that keeps you thinking in the long term.

Like Rameau, Mahler uses intricate, carefully defined structures to express often wildly abandoned feeling. Focussing on the relationships within the score illuminates their purpose, making it easier to appreciate the symphony as a whole. Right from the start, Harding captures the incessant forward pulse, inspired literally by the sound of oars, rowing a boat across a lake.  Mahler’s score teems with tempo references, like nicht schleppend and gemessener.  Harding doesn’t just observe them, but bases his interpretation on this musical infrastructure.  In the first movement, for example, the “oars” give way a slow march which will later develop into a central them.   Similarly the lyrical section marked mit grosssen Schwung really sweeps forward in a smooth arc, contrasting with the craggy deliberation that came before.  Each apparent repeat isn’t a repeat for its own sake, but a subtle variation which plays a part 9n the overall progression.  The contrasts between dark and light, solemn and lyrical, are naturally compelling, but Harding’s precise, understated style keeps the focus on the overall architecture of the symphony as a whole. 

The first movement creates a kind of infrastructure framing the two Nachtmusiks that follow.  The famous horn dialogues of Nachtmusik 1 exemplify the contrasts that run throughout this equivocal symphony.  Mahler shifts from major to minor, from upfront, blazing fanfares to shadowy cowbells heard from a distance.  Strident trombone calls contrast with intricate trills in the strings.  Later bassoon and horn recreate a version of the brass dialogues.  On another level altogether, Mahler contrasts time and place as well as sound.  The march motif in the first movement returns, but this time sounds distinctly Wunderhorn-like, as if the composer is evoking associations, either from some recess in his memory, or from earlier works. The nostalgia is not cosy, nor comforting. The sharp pizzicatos, dark harp chords and almost jazz-like figures are meant to disturb.  This is “night music” after all, the stuff of dreams and nightmares. Resolution is not going to come until the whole work is complete.

Just as the first and last movements form an infrastructure, the core of the symphony is the scherzo Schattenhaft, literally “shadow-like”.  Just as Rameau used gavottes and hornpipe tunes, Mahler uses the waltz.  This is no Viennese gemütlich waltz but one which harks back to a much more ancient, and darker concept of dance as of demonic possession.  It reflects the subversive Dionysian aspects of the 3^rd

Symphony.  Placing it at the heart of this most equivocal of Mahler’s work is therefore significant, and much could be made of the implications.  The strings, of course, take pride of place, the connection being with Freund’ Hein, the fiddler of death, though death is by no means the only interpretation in this quixotic symphony. Harding’s take was, again, to keep things in proportion.  In many ways, this itself had a eerie effect because you couldn’t place the mystery in any obvious context, until you heard the symphony as a whole.  In the best horror films, the scariest bits are those you can’t quite identify.

Harding’s interpretation seemed very much embedded in the Nachtmusiks on either side of the scherzo.  Nachtmusik 2 was particularly sharply defined.  Harding placed the mandolin and guitar in the centre of the orchestra, rather than, as more commonly, on the outer desks.  It made a compelling case for hearing their parts as a kind of inner core.  Their melodies are simple, as if they were an intimate serenade overheard quite by chance, “found music” so to speak.  Yet their vulnerable, humble sound is also important.  Mahler contrasts them with massed strings, yet also sympathetically reinforces their importance by a superb solo by the first violin.  Then the cellos pick up the concept, their deeper, more sophisticated sounds echoing the mandolin and guitar.   Not many conductors make so much of these subtle relationships, but for Harding, they are crucial.  Heard in the context of the magnificent Rondo-finale, their human-scale pathos creates a deep emotional impact. 

The Rondo-finale is huge : its fanfares, alarums and crashing percussion drive away the ambiguities of the Nachtmusiks like brilliant sunshine drives away the shadows of the night.  Dominant major keys return.  The solemn march of the first movement becomes a blitzkrieg stampeding wildly forwards.  But is it as simple as that? At last the restraint Harding had earlier employed revealed its ultimate purpose.  This final movement may be carefully scored with no less than seven ritornellos and several secondary themes. Trumpets, drums and bells normally evoke sounds of triumph, and are of course used for that purpose elsewhere, such as in Symphony No 2.  Here though, there was a definite hint that perhaps victory wasn’t a neat restoration of order.  The exuberance of this ending seemed to contradict everything that had gone before. Harding kept the separate orchestral voices clear and full, retaining the intricate architecture of the orchestration even when the music explodes into near cacophony.  This turbulent, life-enhancing energy is more indicative of Mahler’s personality than conventional wisdom allows.  Dionysus, the god Pan, the subversive Lord of Misrule has broken loose again, intoxicated with love of life.

Many people learned their Mahler from Bernstein.  Good as he is, his is by no means the only way to appreciate Mahler.  There’s so much more to the composer that any well-informed approach is worthwhile.  Harding’s feeling for Mahler is deeply intuitive, yet is expressed through intelligent, analytical understanding of the composer’s creative processes.  It took me a while to get into his recording of the 4th Symphony, but when it clicked, I realised just how interesting it was.  Harding isn’t musical fast food, but listening to him is well worth the extra effort. 

Anne Ozorio

 

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