Lately, circumstances have conspired to delay the composition of these reviews. The downside of that is that anything I didn’t make a note of at the concert has gone down the old memory hole. The upside is that it gives me time to reflect on what I saw and heard. Sometimes temporal distance lends enchantment, sometimes not.
The St. Louis Symphony Orchestra concerts last Saturday and Sunday (January 25 and 26) definitely went up on the enchantment scale. There were only two works on the program: the Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61, by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827), paired with another uncompromising essay in D major, the Symphony No. 1 by Gustav Mahler (1860–1911).
[Find out more about the music with my symphony preview.]
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Stéphane Denève conducts Photo by Virginia Harold |
Both works left audiences and many critics a bit nonplussed at their premieres. Both were widely regarded as too long, too complex, and just too darned non-traditional. Both have since been redeemed by history.
One big complaint about Beethoven’s concerto back in 1806 was that its first movement, which clocks in at around 25 minutes, was longer than most concertos in their entirety. Audiences found the expanded symphonic structure difficult to follow, and in all fairness, Beethoven did push the recognized boundaries of the form to their limits. Until his past weekend, I often felt the same way.
Stéphane Denève and soloist James Ehnes made me see the piece differently this time around. I found myself completely captivated, and not just by that first movement. The entire concerto unfolded in a panoply of drama, romance, and in the Rondo (Allegro) finale, bumptious fun. Ehnes completely nailed the daunting octaves of the violin’s entrance and displayed a wide dynamic and emotional range throughout the work.
Beethoven left room for two cadenzas in the concerto, with the result that the soloist has a plethora of choices, including (as Anthony Marwood did here in 2019) improvising his own. Ehnes chose cadenzas by the great violinist/composer Fritz Kreisler (1875–1962), and while they’re clearly products of a later era, they nevertheless effectively complement the concerto’s early 19th century esthetics. Ehnes played them and the rest of the concerto with the mix of flash and finesse I have seen him display in previous appearances with the SLSO.
He cuts a more conservative figure on stage than some violin virtuosi, but there was plenty of passion and joy in his actual performance. The audience apparently agreed. Ehnes responded to their ovation with a quiet contrast to the finale of the concerto: the third movement (Largo) from the Violin Sonata No. 3, BWV 1005, by Bach.
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Violinist James Ehnes Photo by B Ealovega |
Equally impressive was Denève’s interpretation of the work overall. This was a performance with a strong sense of momentum, beautifully shaped and with lucidity that gave me the sense of hearing and “seeing” Beethoven’s architecture more clearly than I had in the past.
He brought that same sense of clarity to his reading of Mahler’s Symphony No. 1. Like Beethoven’s concerto, Mahler’s symphony—originally billed as a five-movement “symphonic poem”—was poorly received at its 1889 premiere with Mahler himself conducting the Budapest Philharmonic.
Multiple revisions followed. The final four-movement version, now labeled as the Symphony No. 1, was premiered in Berlin in 1896. That’s the version commonly performed today and the one we heard last weekend.
And a wonderful performance it was, too. The mysterious opening, emerging (miraculously) from near-complete silence, commanded attention from the start and made the statement of the main theme (adapted from Mahler’s song “Ging heut’ morgen über’s Feld”) that much more effective. The second movement was cheerfully bucolic, the mood aided by the way the low strings leaned into the first beat of their accompaniment of the Austrian ländler melody.
The third movement funeral march, with its fugal treatment of a minor-key version of a tune better known as “Frère Jacques,” dripped with that mix of sarcasm and schmaltz that made my jaw drop when I first heard it back in the 1960s. It ended as it began, pianissimo, followed after the shortest of pauses (per the composer’s instructions in the score) by the fortissimo “all hell breaks loose” opening for the fourth movement.
This was powerful stuff, with the usual high standard of playing by members of the orchestra. Mahler’s sonic canvases may be massive, but they’re filled with marvelous details that allow soloists and ensembles to shine. Examples from last Saturday’s performance include Principal Oboe Jelena Dirks, Principal Bassoon Andrew Cuneo, and Principal Bass Erik Harris in the third movement; the offstage trumpets in the eerie opening; and the eight (count ‘em, eight!) horns in the finale standing, and per Mahler’s instructions, playing loudly enough to drown out the trumpets (“Die Hörner Alles, auch die Trompeten ũbertönen”).
That’s rock ‘n’ roll, baby!