A small German spa town – even during one of
the prestigious Carl Flesch International Music Weeks – is not,
perhaps, the first place to think of looking for a benchmark performance
of the Brahms Violin Concerto. This time it certainly is. Maybe we are
no longer surprised by the incredibly high standards achieved by the
young prodigies now appearing on concert platforms and leading CD labels;
but occasionally they can be compared without reservation to great names
from the past. The young Swiss violinist Brigitte Lang is one such,
and, by extraordinary good fortune, the other Brahms work on this disc
receives a comparably brilliant reading, enhanced by sensitive, well-rehearsed
orchestral playing. The ‘noises off’ and audio imbalance sometimes found
in live performances are also mercifully absent.
There is no shortage of energy in the Concerto’s first
movement, and the rhapsodic violin passages that flower in concertante
passages and cadenzas are well cared for by Lang’s expressive, well-projected
playing. A little too smooth. compared with the more masculine
attack of a Kogan or a Heifetz? Maybe, but this is a wonderfully coherent
interpretation that sees the work as an organic whole. The final
movement can sound far from giocoso in lesser performances, but
here it is handled with consummate élan. Throughout, the orchestra
contributes powerfully to the most convincing Brahms Violin Concerto
I have heard for a very long time.
Compared with the violin the viola rarely gets much
of the limelight. Simone Jandl has already had many successes in international
competitions and, though I must declare a personal preference for the
clarinet version of the Op.120, she makes a convincing case for the
instrument’s darker sound. The result is a performance that reveals
aspects of this beautiful work not always possible with the cooler voice
of the clarinet. Thanks, also, to the sensitive contribution of the
pianist the ‘inwardness’ of this late work is thoroughly explored in
a beautifully balanced performance that can be highly recommended. It
would be unfortunate if this German-made CD does not reach the major
catalogues and receive the wider distribution it richly deserves.
Roy Brewer
Brigitte Lang (violin)