MENDELSSOHN VIOLIN CONCERTO. BRAHMS SYMPHONIES / Singapore Symphony Orchestra / Review

MENDELSSOHN VIOLIN CONCERTO

BRAHMS SYMPHONIES

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Friday (22 September 2017)

This review was published in The Straits Times on 25 September 2017 with the title "Magical night by SSO".

This was one of those unusual concerts which featured two concertos performed by two different soloists. First was the Singapore Symphony Orchestra's Principal Trumpeter Jon Paul Dante in Johann Hummel's popular Trumpet Concerto in E flat major. Hummel was Mozart's student who once boarded in his household, and his sounded like the trumpet concerto Mozart never wrote.

Its long orchestral tutti and martial air relived of that in Mozart's Piano Concerto No.22 (also in E flat major), before Dante's confident entry established this as an extrovert showpiece. In the slow movement, where his long lines looked ahead to the operatic art of bel canto, the gentle string accompaniment was right out from that “Elvira Madigan” movement (from Piano Concerto No.21).

The finale was where Hummel surpassed his master, and Dante lapped up its acrobatic leaps and tricky repeated notes with glee. That infectious derring-do was exactly what trumpeters (and brass players in general) thrive on, and the effort was greeted with loud and noisy applause.

This excitement was later extended to Japanese violinist Daishin Kashimoto, First Concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic, whose performance of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor was just as pleasing. The natural fluidity of his technique meant that all the solo's twists and turns were comfortably negotiated with much to spare.

Rich in melodic interest, the songs without words within its three movements were wonderfully exploited but Kashimoto was not one to milk it purely for sentimentality's sake. There was some getting used to his slightly acidic tone, but this did little to detract from the overall picture, which was also vociferously applauded.

Of Johannes Brahms' four symphonies, the Fourth Symphony in E minor (Op.98) is often considered his greatest in the genre. Conducting from memory, SSO Music Director Shui Lan led a performance that was strong in objectivity, with swooning emotion kept at arm's length. The opening, formed by a series of seemingly bare two note phrases, could not have sounded less opulent.

That was the bedrock upon which an ultimately strong and convincing reading was built. From simplicity came forth origins of complexity, and the build up to the 1^st movement's passionate climax was a gradual but inexorable progress worth following. Similarly, the slow movement's droll unison opening gave way to fine woodwind playing, gratefully reciprocated by the brass and gorgeous strings to scale yet more spiritual highs.

The rambunctious 3^rd movement was thrilling in its unfettered release of adrenaline, affirmed by the humble and rarely-used triangle's ringing endorsement. The symphony's crowning achievement was its Passacaglia finale, where Brahms peered into the future by glorifying the past.

Shui's vision of its eight-bar introduction and 32 ensuing short variations was totally gripping, and if there were a defining moment, imagine this sound: Jin Ta's desolate flute solo, comforted by a trio of trombones, followed by the entire brass as a giant chorale. Simply unmissable.

SSO CONCERT: LENINGRAD SYMPHONY / Review

LENINGRAD SYMPHONY

Singapore Symphony Orchestra

Esplanade Concert Hall

Friday (26 February 2016)

An edited version of this review was published in The Straits Times on 29 February 2016 with the title "Madcap finale pulls out all stops".

If one thought Shostakovich to be a box-office risk for a concert, that opinion might have to be revised following this all-Shostakovich programme by the Singapore Symphony Orchestra conducted by renowned Russian conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky. This, if anything, was the best possible advertisement for the Soviet era Russian composer on the 110^th anniversary year of his birth.

The concert began with his First Piano Concerto, a youthful work scored for piano, obbligato trumpet and strings. Its appeal lies in an anarchic spirit, one born of the circus, vaudeville and popular sources, while cocking a snook at the musical conventions of Beethoven and Haydn. Equal to the task was pianist Viktoria Postnikova, wife of the conductor, who seemed to play it cool at the outset but soon unleashed its barrel-load of vitriol.

Droll understatement and surprises when one least expects were part of the game, and SSO Principal trumpeter Jon Paul Dante's entry was a surreptitious one. He was complicit in this musical joke too, interjecting at crucial points and having his own wallow in the slow movement, accompanied by languid waltzing strings. 

A madcap finale pulled out all stops, with cheeky quotes and comedic repartee between piano and trumpet. This laugh-a-minute routine culminated in a cadenza that seemed to skirt off  the edge of a precipice before closing in a perfectly punched-out series of C major chords.

C major was also the key of the Seventh Symphony, or the Leningrad Symphony as it was composed in the Russian city that was under siege by the Nazis in 1941. In the 900-day battle, over a million Russians perished, and this symphony was to be a universal symbol of Soviet resistance and courage. Shostakovich later revealed a different angle; it was “the Leningrad Stalin destroyed, and Hitler merely finished off”.

Interpretations of the work have been subject to controversy. Is this absolute music, programme music or hubristic propaganda? The programme booklet listed its playing time at an optimistic 69 minutes, but the actual performance was a distended 83 minutes. Despite that disparity, there was not a slow coach to be found in Rozhdestvensky's reading.

He conducted from the floor, but his economical beats conveyed volumes. The opening had suitable pomp and heft, with empty bombast left at the door.  The infamous Fascist march sequence began as a wheeze from Roberto Alvarez's crystal-clear piccolo, interrupted by Mark Suter's obstinate snare-drum beat. The cycle of repetition, a bolero of death and destruction through a spiralling crescendo, built up inexorably to one which seemed nigh insupportable. At one point, the deafening drone of air-raid sirens could be imagined.

Survive and thrive it did, with the orchestra fully responsive to the conductor's seemingly minimal cues. In this 4-movement work of vasts contrasts, it was not just the blustery bits that impressed. Both central movements mirrored each other with gentle beginnings and violent upheavals in the middle, and much care was taken to colour and differentiate these shifts.

A chamber-like quality to the playing revealed an unexpected intimacy. Take the 3^rd movement for instance, with solos from Jin Ta's flute, Concertmaster Igor Yuzefovich's violin and a smiling melody from the violas. However it was the valedictory finale, rising heroically and majestically from the ashes, which cued the shouts of bravo and a standing ovation. For this was a great performance of a great symphony led by a great conductor. 

Conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky
shows his Shostakovich score to the audience
and then goes home with it!