LOST DREAMS:
MUSIC OF WEBERN, BERG & STRAUSS
Wayfarer Sinfonietta
Victoria Concert Hall
Sunday (3 May 2022)
The Wayfarer Sinfonietta is a chamber orchestra of young professional musicians formed last year by Singaporean conductor Lien Boon Hua. It has been very active, partnering local singers in concerts and opera productions including recent performances of Andre Previn’s Penelope, Benjamin Britten’s Les Illuminations and Rossini’s L’Inganno Felice. Its forte is late Romantic repertoire and 20th century music, evident in its debut with Mahler’s Lieder eines Fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of the Wayfarer) and its most recent concert.
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| Photo: Moonrise Studio |
The music of the Second Viennese School dominated the concert’s first half, opening with Anton Webern’s Passacaglia Op.1 arranged by Huang Dingchao. This still-tonal work by music’s most notorious serialist was the direct continuation from the passacaglia finale of Brahms’ Fourth Symphony. Had Brahms lived another 11 years, he might have heard it and possibly approved. Played by just 14 musicians (7 strings, 5 winds, piano and percussion), the performance was characterised by clarity and leanness of textures, allowing many individual passages to stand out. Very satisfying.
This brave new world, reliving the austere pioneering spirit of Arnold Schoenberg’s Society for Private Performances in post-war Vienna, continued with Alban Berg’s Seven Early Songs (arr. Paul Leonard Schaffer) sung by soprano Joyce Lee Tung. These short songs (none longer than a few minutes each) carry on from the Lieder of Mahler and Richard Strauss, coming close to breaching the limits of tonality but not crossing the line. Lee’s idiomatic German (texts by Lenau, Rilke, Storm and others), accurate intonation and vocal lustre brought an alluring sensuality to the music.
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| Photo: Moonrise Studio |
The Richard Strauss half of the concert saw the Sextet and Mondscheinmusik (Moonlight Music, arr. Lee Jinjun) from Capriccio sandwich the scene and duet Ich Danke, Fraulein from Act 1 of Arabella (arr. Jonathan Shin). The operatic roles of two sisters were helmed by Lee (Zdenka) and soprano Teng Xiang Ting (Arabella), in a semi-staged affair (with a large sofa placed front and centre) directed by Tang Xinxin. The chemistry was developed between both singers was palpable, and one unfamiliar with opera’s plot might have suspected a hint of homoeroticism. Transliterations of texts in English were provided in the digital programme (but not a sypnosis), which is why programme notes are so important in relaying the contexts for every opera.
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| Photo: Moonrise Studio |
The highlight of the evening was the Four Last Songs (arr. James Ledger), sung by Teng. It would seem that Xiang Ting was born to sing this music, its dark autumnal hues eminently suited for her velvety smooth voice. And she knows how to emote the trials of ageing convincingly and with emotional heft. I remember some years ago hearing one young soprano (now better known as a pop and media star in a neighbouring country) singing these in a concert when she was barely ready for its deep emotional content.
The sequence of the songs was that of its 1950 London premiere by Kirsten Flagstad and conducted by Wilhelm Furtwangler, opening with Beim Schlafengehn (When Falling Asleep), supported by concertmaster Edward Tan’s sublime violin solo, followed by the rapturous September. The darker tones of Fruhling (Spring) would give way to the final song Im Abendrot (At Sunset), literally Strauss’ farewell to life itself. Its last line Ist dies etwa der Tod? (Is this perhaps Death?), poignantly voiced by Teng, alongside Strauss’ own theme from his early tone poem Death and Transfiguration showed that music did come a full circle for the German composer.
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| Photo: PianoManiac |
It was curious to note that as the works traversed chronologically from 1908 (Webern and Berg) to 1948 (Strauss), the music got progressively more tonal and less dissonant. Such are the pendulum swings of musical trends, where the radicals Berg and Webern (and their guru Schoenberg) could harmoniously co-exist with arch-Romantics like Strauss and Korngold. That a group like the Wayfarer Sinfonietta and Lien Boon Hua would explore this interesting segment of 20th century music really makes concert-going even more exciting these days.
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| Photo: PianoManiac |
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