SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Brahms, Bruch, Sibelius: Nicola Benedetti (violin), Vienna Tonkünstler Orchestra conducted by Kristjan Järvi.  Cadogan Hall 25.2.2008 (JPr)

My very first visit to  Cadogan Hall was a pleasant experience and one I hope to repeat soon since it is so conveniently near a tube station to make the travelling there not too arduous. The hall itself was first built as a New Christian Science church but with diminishing congregations was sold off in 1996 reopening in 2004 as the splendid mid-sized concert venue it now is.

It played host this evening to the Vienna Tonkünstler Orchestra who were on tour under their chief conductor, Kristjan Järvi, brother of Paavo and son of Neemi, each of them established international  conductors too, of course.   For certain concerts - and as a further attraction - they are joined,  as here,  by the young Scottish violinist, Nicola Benedetti. The concert was part of The Zurich International Series at the Cadogan Hall given in association with IMG artists and both Ms Beneditti and the conductor are on their list.

The Tonkünstler-Sozietät was there in Vienna in the days of Mozart and Haydn organising concerts. It gave its name to the Verein Wiener Tonkünstler-Orchester which gave its first concert on 10 October 1907 in Vienna’s Musikverein with a programme that included works by Goldmark, Grieg, Liszt and Beethoven (the same programme was played last October to mark the orchestra’s centenary). The orchestra made musical history in 1913 by giving the première of Schoenberg’s Gurrelieder under the baton of Franz Schreker, and its Sunday afternoon concerts became very popular with Viennese audiences. The Tonkünstler Orchestra did not survive the First World War and underwent a merger to become what is now the Vienna Symphony. In 1946 however,  the Lower Austrian Landes-Symphonie-Orchester was given the name Lower Austrian Tonkünstler Orchestra, and the long abandoned series of Sunday afternoon concerts began once more.

Their chief conductor since 2004, Kristjan Järvi, was born in Tallinn (Estonia) but grew up in New York after his family moved there when he was a child. He studied piano at the Manhattan School of Music and  also conducting. With his European origins and American training, he is interested  both in Old and New World music and this is reflected in his two principal jobs as chief conductor and music director of both the Tonkünstler Orchestra and New York’s Absolute Ensemble, which he founded in 1993. The latter  plays a wide range of music from Baroque through to rock. His portrait photo stared broodily out of the Cadogan Hall programme and belied a smiling lively and cajoling presence on the podium.

The music began with two Hungarian Dances (strangely the printed programme said ‘Four’) No.6 and No.10 of the 21 that Brahms wrote:  mostly based on ‘Hungarian themes’ or so he thought as he got to know this music from gypsy refugees passing  through Hamburg. They were written either for four hands or for solo piano but very few were orchestrated by Brahms himself. This choice was not an auspicious start as the orchestral balance was not good and ‘Sunday concerts’ took on another meaning as it sounded I imagine much like one of those ‘tourist trap’ classical concerts  sold in most European capitals, that employ  scratch bands of musicians.

Nicola Benedetti was born in Scotland of Italian heritage and began violin lessons at the age of five. She was at the Yehudi Menuhin School from 1997 to 2002 and studied there with Natasha Boyarskaya: she now studies privately with Maciej Rakowski. She came to prominence by winning BBC’s Young Musician of the Year in 2004 and now performs concerts and recitals throughout the world. Her violin is the Earl Spencer Stradivarius (c1712), courtesy of Jonathan Moulds.

Ms Benedetti played the popular Bruch Violin Concerto -  actually better described as No.1 in G minor  - which had its first performance in an earlier version on 24 April 1866 by Otto von Königslow with Bruch himself conducting. The celebrated violinist Joseph Joachim helped with considerable revisions and the work was completed in its current form in 1867. The première of the revised concerto was given by Joachim himself in Bremen on 5 January 1868.

The first of the three movements is unusual in that it is a basically a prelude to the second movement and directly links to it. The impression it gives has been likened to something like a smooth army march. The melody is taken up first by the flutes, and then we hear the violin perform a ravishing solo; particularly so in Nicola Benedetti’s playing. The Adagio has a beautiful melody including some interplay towards the end between basses and solo violin. The Finale, the third movement, opens in subdued fashion with a few bars of orchestral introduction after which the soloist's statement of the movement’s main exuberant theme in double stops is heard. The second subject is the epitome of Romantic lyricism and the music builds to the soloist’s grand final statement. The concerto is also unusual in that there it has no cadenza. Max Bruch composed two further violin concertos but these have disappeared from the repertoire leaving his first often simply referred to as ‘The Bruch’.

Nicola Benedetti is reported as saying how she needs ‘comfort and freedom’ in her stage dress and her sleeveless, backless, low-cut black number certainly did that:  it was certainly more the topic of conversation at the interval than her playing. She has a very clean technique and is suitably interpretative of this beautiful music; equally at ease with the emotional melody of the Adagio and the exciting sweep of the Finale. There was a rich, mellow tone from her violin rather like an old recording. However on the platform I was surprised that she had the nervous look of an auditionee rather than a seasoned (20 year old!) performer.

Ever since the first performance in 1902 of Sibelius's Symphony No.2 in D major with the composer himself conducting there have been questions raised about what it all might mean. Surely a symphony as dramatic and powerful as this one, composed at the height of nationalistic fervour in Finland must have a hidden – or not so hidden – message? Whatever it was for – or might be – it was initially so successful that the Second Symphony had to be repeated at three successive concerts in a very short space of time. Meanwhile,  its acceptance abroad was only given very reluctantly. The Finnish conductor and composer Robert Kajanus, a keen champion of  Sibelius's music, suggested a programme for the symphony based upon political upheaval and Finnish patriotism:  and as late as 1946, a  Finnish musicologist Mari Kronn suggested much the same thing. During his own lifetime, Sibelius himself insisted strongly that there was never any such intention and the faith put in the words of the composer has meant most people have stopped looking for a programme in the symphony. This does not necessarily mean of course that the programme was never actually there but the fact is that Finland eventually declared independence from its former Russian masters in 1917.

By the by, it seems strange that Sibelius began what undoubtedly feels like a nationalistic work, far away from the lakes and forests in Finland, in a small villa in Rapallo, Italy. Nor was the piece particularly original as he recycled much of its material from other uncompleted projects. In the first movement Allegretto we hear apparently disconnected themes that are developed but only come together in the recapitulation. It has been suggested that these might represent pastoral life. The musical language of the second movement is much starker with a number of huge anguished climaxes growing out of the plucked strings of the opening. It is very much like the start of Die Walküre with ominous footsteps – although here they are not so much running as stealing in – leading to the persistent idea that   the movement is signifying the presence of oppressors or the fear of oppression. It is very Wagnerian in character and perhaps Bruckner is not too distant from this music either. The Vivacissimo third movement is entrusted to the woodwinds and is a scherzo that moves straight into the finale where Sibelius creates a remarkable structure which gradually builds up a triumphant theme step by step through quieter sections until finally leading it into one of the most magnificent perorations in music. To my mind we have  undoubtedly witnessed the growing patriotism of the Finns and their eventual victory.

Both in their accompaniment to the Bruch and here in the Sibelius the orchestral playing was more secure, energetic and highly musical. The woodwind was consistently warm  - perhaps  benefiting from the hall’s acoustic -  while the brass were sadly not helped by it.  The sound – especially  the tuba – reverberated from the walls giving a blaring rather than exultant quality to the symphony's finale.

What is it about encores? Some have been the best bits of  recent concerts that I have attended,  and here it seemed to me that  the  Tonkünstler players shone particularly brightly. Järvi noted that ‘Since we are in the North,  we will stay in the North’ and the orchestra played part of Grieg’s orchestral suite Sigurd Jorsalfar. Here there was plenty of northern colour and the orchestra seemed ideal for the ceremonial drum rolls, beautiful solo cello and horn calls that punctuate  this music, making  up for a certain blandless elsewhere earlier in the evening.

Jim Pritchard


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