United Kingdom Elgar, R. Strauss, Rachmaninov: Louise Alder (soprano), Royal Philharmonic Orchestra / Vasily Petrenko (conductor). Royal Festival Hall, London 8.2.2024. (CK)
Elgar – Cockaigne Overture
R. Strauss – Six Songs, Op.68
Rachmaninov – Symphony No.2 in E minor
I wonder, gentle reader, if you have ever attended a concert performance so good that you have avoided hearing the same piece again for quite some time. After I heard Jascha Horenstein conduct Bruckner’s Fifth at the BBC Proms, it was more than two decades before I risked hearing another performance. In the case of André Previn and the London Symphony Orchestra playing Rachmaninov’s Second Symphony, it has been more than twice as long; and their famous recorded version – the first to present the work without cuts – is still the only one of this symphony that I possess.
I have been so impressed with the partnership of Vasily Petrenko and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in two Mahler symphonies – the Third and the Sixth – that the prospect of hearing them in Rachmaninov’s Second gave me considerable excitement. It was not misplaced: it was a wonderful performance, all of a piece, the wide arcs of its structure perfectly controlled, its extraordinary melodic and harmonic generosity never rushed or impeded. The lovely wind solos were borne gently on the current: the cor anglais in the first movement, the clarinet in the third – tenderly played by Sonia Sielaff, especially touching as she faded back into the orchestral texture – but the expressive burden in this symphony is borne by the strings: and the full-bodied richness of the Royal Philharmonic strings had me remembering with astonishment how difficult this was to achieve in the old Royal Festival Hall acoustic – and, to a lesser extent, still is.
There was plenty of drama too, and no holding back in the great climaxes: as the surge in the third movement finally reached its crest, Petrenko and his players had me regretting that I missed their Scriabin last season. But perhaps the most impressive thing of all was Petrenko’s pinpoint accuracy in achieving the orchestral balances he wanted: absolute clarity, no mush. A tiny detail: it was such a good idea to place the glockenspiel player in splendid isolation on the top level, on the opposite side to the rest of the percussion, highlighting the bright edge the instrument gives to the sound at key moments.
A great performance, and one to remind us that Rachmaninov is as much Petrenko’s birthright as Shostakovich is. It was rewarded, rightly, with a standing ovation.
The concert had begun with a colourful performance of Elgar’s Cockaigne Overture, relishing both its boisterousness and its pools of quiet: the former, of course, prevails – it may just have been a matter of where I was sitting, but I don’t think I have ever been treated to such fabulous sounds from a bass trombone (Josh Cirtina).
It was a shame that Jennifer France was indisposed and unable to sing Richard Strauss’s Op.68 Songs: but a late change does not always bring disappointment (I remember a performance of Mahler’s Second Symphony in this hall by Claudio Abbado and the London Symphony Orchestra in which the substitute singer was Jessye Norman). Here we were fortunate to have Louise Alder, whose wordless vocalise from the Royal Albert Hall balcony in Nielsen’s Sinfonia Espansiva a couple of Prom seasons ago I shall long remember.
Strauss’s Op.68 Songs sit rather awkwardly between the glories that he wrote for his wife Pauline and the late flowering that produced the Four Last Songs. His chosen poet was Clemens Brentano (better known – probably rightly – as the man responsible, with Achim von Arnim, for the folk collection Des Knaben Wunderhorn). Alder’s performance was hugely engaging. She inhabited each song in turn: after the high-flown Romanticism of An die Nacht, she was perfectly at home in the lighter and more intimate songs that follow, imbuing them with tenderness, humour, coquettishness, and making light of the considerable vocal agility they require. She did her best with the last song, the lengthy Lied der Frauen, enacting the anxieties of women married to men in dangerous callings – sailors, shepherds, miners, warriors – and she made something very touching of the conclusion: The Lord has taken, praised be the name of the Lord.
At the end Alder modestly offered her hands for the maestro to kiss: but Petrenko went straight for her cheeks. Rather delightfully, she turned to share her surprised – but far from displeased – reaction with the two thousand of us in the Royal Festival Hall.
The concert – which you can hear for a number of days on BBC Sounds – was dedicated to the memory of Yuri Temirkanov, who was the RPO’s Principal Guest Conductor from 1979 and the Orchestra’s Principal Conductor from 1992–1998.
Chris Kettle