SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Other Links

Editorial Board

Google Site Search

Mariss Jansons and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in New York (I): Emanuel Ax (piano), Mariss Jansons (conductor), Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Carnegie Hall, New York City, 13.3.2009 (BH)

Jörg Widmann: Con brio (2008; U.S. Premiere)
Mozart: Piano Concerto No. 25 in C Major, K. 503 (1786)
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 4 in F Minor, Op. 36 (1878)


"Like a hamster with unclipped nails locked in the dryer," writes Elizabeth Bergman about the timpani part of Jörg Widmann's Con brio, quoting from Jens F. Laurson's review of the world premiere performance.  Last Friday, in the first of their three concerts at Carnegie Hall, Mariss Jansons and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra gave the United States premiere of Widmann's slightly wacky, yet somehow moving exercise.  The short version: I can't wait to hear it again.

Commissioned by the BRSO to open its 2008-2009 season, the piece draws inspiration from Beethoven's Seventh and Eighth symphonies, and if I have a minor gripe about this program, it would be that neither one of those appeared next to Widmann's opus.  The opening chords almost sound like Beethoven, bearing an uncanny resemblance to the aforementioned symphonies, before the timpanist and others enter with sounds that do not: clicks, clatters, rasps and air through valves.  Yet the forced marriage isn't nearly as contrived-sounding as it might appear.  One might describe the sensation as hundreds of fragments trying to reassemble themselves into Beethoven.

Emanuel Ax was on hand for Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 25, pleasantly, if not memorably, dispatched.  Ax's fluidity and sumptuous tone melded with the orchestra's luxurious texture—perhaps too well, since curiously, the pianist seemed to recede into the orchestral texture rather than floating above it.  Notable in the mix was the group's woodwind timbre, full-bodied yet reedy.  Ax offered a nicely judged encore, the second of Schubert's posthumously published Impromptus, D. 935, in A-flat Major.

This is the third Tchaikovsky Fourth Symphony that I've heard this season, along with Lorin Maazel's disappointing version with the New York Philharmonic last fall, and Gustavo Dudamel absolutely on fire with the Israel Philharmonic just a couple of months ago.  Using no score, Jansons drew a creamy, fat sound from the Bavarian players that distinguished itself from Gergiev's crackling electricity or Dudamel's sheer exuberance, and emphasized the score's outsized passion.  In the first movement the ensemble was especially impressive in its pianissimos, despite the big moments in the finale, which drew scattered applause.  The second movement also had its share of Tchaikovskian drama, with particularly fine work from the violins and again, some piquant wind embellishments.

The pizzicato movement was taken slower, less nervously than some, and emerged more stately than impish, with diaphanous closing bars that were (gorgeously) almost inaudible.  And the raucous finale here had more Bruckner than usual, a weightiness that worked in Jansons's favor.  Although the horns seemed to droop a bit near the end, the final pages had all the thrills one expects.  For two contrasting encores, Jansons first enlisted the silky Bavarian strings for Haydn's arrangement of his String Quartet in F Major, followed by the entire ensemble in a spirited "Czardas" from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake.

Bruce Hodges


^{Back to Top                                                    Cumulative Index Page}