Grosser Saal,
Konzerthaus, Vienna
Isabel Mundry – Non-Places, a Piano Concerto (2012, Austrian
premiere)
Mark Andre - … hij … 1 (2010, Austrian premiere)Rebecca Saunders – Still (2011)
Another Wien Modern concert in
which women composers outnumbered men. We are getting there, it seems – I hesitate
to say that we are ‘there’, wherever that might be – with respect to New Music,
although there is a long way to go in honouring female composers of the past. (Barbara
Strozzi is a current cause of mine; I am sure most of you will have others. And
there are, of course, real problems in other respects.) Part of the answer, to
many problems, is of course to have a far healthier balance between
contemporary musical production and outings from the museum. Festivals such as
Wien Modern help enormously, and the turn out for this concert was very
encouraging; but every orchestra, every hall, every musician, every audience
member should think about the bizarrely narrow ‘repertoire’ that suffocates us.
Isabel Mundry’s Non-Places, a Piano Concerto, drew me
in, although I really felt that I needed at least another hearing to grasp
where it had taken me. (That is a criticism of me, rather than of the work, I
hasten to add; I should certainly like to have another opportunity.) Untuned
percussion leads us to orchestral chatter – passages, I learned later, from Oswald
Egger – and laughter. Such unexpected sounds, alternating, combining, mutually
transforming, certainly had me sit up and listen (and watch!) Various
orchestral instruments sound amongst the chatter. It is actually quite a while
until the piano enters, almost as if we were hearing a conventional opening
ritornello. When the piano does enter, it is not in obviously soloistic
fashion; indeed, the work progresses more as a chamber or ensemble piece than
what we might have learned to expect from a piano concerto. It is clearly a
challenging work for all concerned, but Nicolas Hodges, the ORF SO, and Sylvain
Cambreling all did an excellent job. The pianist’s despatch of, for instance,
repeated notes, a repeated device in different yet clearly related guises, was
everything one might hope for. Moods vary, as do textures. I was especially
captivated by duetting between plucked piano strings and cimbalom: a visual as
well as an aural spectacle. Other instruments, whether percussion or strings,
act as the changing orchestra alongside the two apparent soloists. There was in
work and performance very much a sense of a varied yet single span.
I am afraid I could not make
much of Mark Andre’s … hij … 1. I admit that I am becoming a
little impatient with works in which instrumentalists ‘play’ but make no sound;
it certainly has an element of theatre to it, and here, at least, sounds
occasionally emerge from the silence, but it is a device that has quickly
become clichéd. Alas, most of what I heard fell under the heading of cliché.
Although doubtless very well performed – there is no doubting the prowess of
this orchestra, nor its commitment – ultimately, it sounded a bit like a
minimalist attempting to ape Lachenmann (and not getting very far). There are
some nice touches, for instance percussion emerging out of what I suppose we
must call the ‘extended techniques’ of not playing or barely playing. Likewise,
I felt that rhythm emerged from that opening too. I could not discern, though,
why the orchestra – or rather piano and wind – suddenly start playing ‘normally’,
nor why they stop. Sudden shifts, whether of tempo or instrumentation, do not
seem to signify anything in particular. It felt, I am sad to say, interminable.
That could certainly not be
said of Rebecca Saunders’s Still, for
which the ever-outstanding Carolin Widmann joined the orchestra. (I learned
afterwards that the piece is dedicated to her, and that it was premiered by Widmann
and Cambreling, with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.) Still came as a relief, from the very opening violin solo, which
somehow imparted a sense of a work and performance that knew exactly where they
were going, even if we did not (yet). In many ways, it sounded more like a
traditional concertante piece than Mundry’s work. The orchestra engages with
the soloist, and vice versa, such
interaction continuing, echoing, contrasting; that held for the performance as
well as the work. One aspect of the writing that especially caught my ear was
the timbral transformation of particular pitches, inevitably bringing, even so
many years hence, Webern to mind. Widmann’s rendition of the solo part had me
wondering what it would be to hear her in Bach or Schoenberg; indeed, there is something
pre- or (slightly) post-Romantic to a role one might call obbligato. (I thought at times of Schoenberg’s op.47 Phantasy for violin and piano.) There
was true emotional as well as intellectual depth here. Despite the increasing
value – if indeed in such post-modern times we are permitted to speak of
æsthetic worth – awarded performance art, installations, and the like, this seemed
triumphantly to underline the ongoing importance of the musical work, whether
as concept or, perhaps more importantly, as experience.
