Mahler beats Britten with finale knockout

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Sunday, October 29, 2006

Mahler beats Britten with finale knockout

In the first half we had Britten's Violin Concerto, completed in 1939 and premiered in 1940 by Antonio Brosa and the New York Philharmonic conducted by John Barbirolli. The structure of the concerto is three movements with the final Passacaglia marked Andante Lento (un poco meno mosso). Its opponent in the second half was another 20th century masterpiece dating from 37 years earlier, Mahler's Symphony No 5 in C sharp minor, with its Rondo Finale marked Allegro - Allegro giocoso.

The venue for the contest last night was Britten's own magical Snape Maltings, and the orchestra was the BPO. Everywhere else in the world BPO stands for Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, but Aldeburgh is a parallel musical universe where the BPO is the Britten Pears Orchestra, a crack orchestra of young professionals whose spontaneous music-making puts to shame the auto-pilot efforts of the big name bands. Yes, they do take risks, as the early horn entry in the attaca between the last two movements of the Mahler showed, but give me ten of those for one of the current auto-pilot performances by the BBC Symphony. Conductor was man to watch Paul Daniel who conjured up memories of Sir Adrian Boult with a crystal clear stick technique, feet kept firmly on the podium, and violins divided across the stage. The outstanding violin soloist in the fiendishly difficult, and exposed, Britten Concerto was Thomas Bowes whose task was made even more difficult as he took over the part as a last minute substitute for the indisposed Janine Jansen.

Britten was, of course, a great admirer of Mahler. He had received the score of the Ninth Symphony as a present from Peter Pears in 1938, and the Violin Concerto is clearly influenced by that great work, ending in a beautiful coda that struggles ambiguously between the desolation of D minor and the possibility of D major. An outstanding performance faded away last night, and the capacity Snape audience hesitated - had the work really finished, or was there another movement to follow to resolve the ambiguity? There was no such questions in the second half, the barnstorming Rondo Finale of the Mahler accelerated to its final bars leaving everyone in no doubt that this was the triumphant conclusion The audiences responded with an ovation, and there was no doubt that Mahler had won with a knockout in the finale.

The status of these two masterpieces from two of the 20th century greatest composers reflects the audience's reaction. There are few recordings of the Britten in the catalogue (the finest of which remains the composer's own), and it is rarely heard in the concert hall. Searching Mahler 5 on Amazon returns 320 hits, and the work is a warhorse of the auto-pilot orchestras with the peripatetic Minnesota Orchestra riding it into town this summer for a BBC Prom. Why?

Visconti's film Death in Venice undoubtedly helps the Mahler. I still cannot hear the Adagietto without seeing a heavily made-up Dirk Bogarde, just compare the photo below of Bogarde in the film with the header image of Mahler, and in a neat piece of synchronicity one of the highlights of the 1007 Aldeburgh Festival is a new production of Britten's opera Death in Venice with the Britten Pears Orchestra in the pit (except Snape doesn't have a pit). The Britten Violin Concerto is unpopular with today's auto-pilot soloists who find it difficult to learn and in little demand from the equally as auto-pilot concert planners.

But I wonder what the impact of those two finales is on the relative popularity of the two masterpieces? Granted there are many examples of frequently played works with equivocal endings including Maher's Ninth Symphony, the Rite of Spring and the Gottedamerung. But these are outnumbered many times over by the popular works with rousing and uplifting conclusions, including Mahler's own First Symphony (have you ever heard a performance that didn't get a standing ovation?), Beethoven's Ninth and numerous other examples. So is there a lesson here for contemporary composers - please your publisher with a rousing finale?

* A timely reminder that December 4th 2006 is the thirtieth anniversary of the death of Benjamin Britten. The composer was a friend of admirer of Shostakovich, and it is an irony that this important musical anniversary looks likely to be overshadowed on the BBC and elsewhere by the current Shostakovich saturation. Britten was a great composer, conductor and pianist, a musical visionary, pacifist and humanitarian whose legacy not only survives, but grows with the work of the Britten Pears Foundation which embraces young performers and composers. Many of Britten's admirers, including me, will be attending a concert at Snape on December 2nd by the Britten Sinfonia and Britten Pears Chamber Choir which will include Britten's 1948 cantata St Nicholas and Arvo Pärt's Cantus In Memoriam Benjamin Britten. We are also fortunate to be seeing the acclaimed new Glyndebourne Touring production of the Turn of the Screw in November.

Britten's Violin Concerto was first performed with John Barbirolli conducting the New York Philharmonic, now follow this link for more on new music in New York at that time.

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