SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Berg, Mahler : Philharmonia Orchestra/Esa-Pekka Salonen. RFH, 11.6.2009 (CC)


The Berg Three Orchestral Pieces, Op. 6 is surely one of the seminal works of the twentieth century. It begins with deep percussion rumblings and slithers its way into existence, thereby beginning a trajectory that becomes unstoppable, transforming everything in its wake, from Viennese waltz to march and round dance. Salonen has a composer’s ear for Berg’s highly organised and complex textures: his opening was gently nebulous with the opening Praeludium beautifully shaped (good effort from the trombone for his perilously high spot).

The second piece, “Reigen” (Round Dance) needs the heft of a brass section such as the Philharmonia’s. Salonen made the textures crystal clear, as he did in the final piece, Berg’s deconstructed, nightmarish vision of a march. Here, the links between Berg and Mahler became truly manifest, especially the dead weight of the very final gesture, a sort of fortissimo version of the close of Mahler’s Sixth Symphony.

Salonen’s account of Mahler’ Sixth Symphony had been a memorable occasion; the Seventh was, if anything, even more so. The huge span can seem sprawling, even on the verge of implosion. Add to this Salonen’s almost Sinopoli-like deconstructionist stance for the first movement, and the effect was most disturbing. Salonen deliberately stripped some of the violins’ Romantic gestures of their emotion in the first movement, leaving musical skeletons in his wake, and yet he was quick to move to the opposite end of the spectrum too, finding pure beauty of sound in some string chords. It was in the later stages of the first movement that Salonen allowed the piece to cohere, and it was here that the music attained true cumulative power.

The two “Nachtmusik” movements frame the Scherzo. The first, full of forest evocations and Wunderhorn magic was balanced by the pure nostalgia of the second; the Scherzo was shadowy in the extreme but with positively outrageous outbursts (the trombone waltz was actually quite shocking).

The long finale will not survive attempts of forced cohesion, something Salonen clearly realises. Juxtapositions and contrasts were maximal, the brass was resplendent, counterpoint could be distinctly icy. The Seventh, and particularly its outer movements, is not there to make friends, and it was in this very frigidity that Salonen’s Mahler impressed.

The Salonen/Philharmonia partnership continues to scale new heights. Future instalments are eagerly awaited.

Colin Clarke


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