Tag Archives: Perth Concert Hall

Tokyo String Quartet

 

 

Perth Concert Hall

reviewed by Neville Cohn

 

To listen to the Tokyo ensemble is akin to being ushered into the presence of musical demi-gods. These four superlative players have succeeded in subjugating their individuality in favour of a corporate music persona which, for decades, has enchanted audiences worldwide.

 

Tokyo String Quartet

Tokyo String Quartet

An account of Mendelssohn’s Quartet in A minor opus was a case in point, a glorious, flawless scaling of Olympus that left this listener groping for adjectives to convey the transcendental merit of the magnificent four.  

 

Most of this quartet is light years away from Mendelssohn’s trademark evocations of fairy fun. This is darker music by far, not least in the slow movement which was presented, with rich, organ-like sonorities, as a little miracle of profound expressiveness. Queen Victoria, a lifelong fan, once called Mendelssohn “a wonderful genius”. Could it have been this quartet which prompted that regal pat on the back?

 

Beethoven’s opus 95, his most compact utterance in chamber music, was given such superlative treatment as to be beyond criticism in the conventional sense. I dare say that had the shade of the notoriously tetchy composer hovered over the proceedings, it would surely have purred with pleasure. By even the most ferociously critical of standards, this, surely, was an interpretation that set the standard by which all other performances of the work would have to be judged.

 

Much the same could be said of Hugo Wolf’s Italian Serenade in which the four musicians, like some Midas-clones, transformed everything they touched in this amiable work to musical gold. Certainly, in the hands of the four, even the most routine succession of notes was transformed into a compelling listening experience.

 

Carl Vine’s Quartet no 5 is a work of many moods, ranging from the bleak to the jaunty. Early on, the music is informed by a romantic ardour that calls Schoenberg’s Transfigured Night to mind. At every point, the writing is informed by an engaging immediacy. It was beautifully played by the Tokyo Quartet in a performance which brimmed with subtle nuances of tone and tempo. I imagine that any composer would give eye teeth to have their music performed by so superb an ensemble; it was one of the evening’s many highlights.

 

In so democratic an institution as a string quartet, it is perhaps invidious to single out an individual for special mention. But it would be ungracious not to particularly praise the artistry of violist extraordinaire Kazuhide Isomura.  In the hands of this veteran of countless concerts, the viola, that most treacherous of string instruments, did his bidding beautifully as it sang for its master with a rare purity of pitch and tone.


W.A.Symphony Orchestra

Perth Concert Hall

 

reviewed by Neville Cohn

Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn

 

As almost everyone knows from the much-loved fairy tale, Sleeping Beauty can awaken only after she has been kissed by a handsome prince. But did you know there’s another Sleeping Beauty? She is not nearly as famous as the young lady in the fairy tale, of course. But she is no less important. In fact, she may even be MORE important than her somnolent counterpart.

 

She has a wondrous golden glow about her, especially when in the spotlight. And, unlike a number of her close relations, her neck has never been replaced. But unlike her cousin in the fairy tale, she doesn’t respond at all to the kiss of a prince. In fact, for this Sleeping Beauty to awaken, she needs to be stroked by a horsehair bow – and then she sings with a seductiveness that has ensured her fame ever since she came into the world in a workshop in Cremona, Italy in 1704.

 

Just the other day, there’s been coverage in the news about the oldest man in the world. He is 113 years old and lives in Britain but Sleeping Beauty is far older than that. In fact, she is more than THREE hundred years old but she looks and sounds considerably better than that British geriatric.

 

An audience that packed the Concert Hall almost to capacity at the weekend, saw just how beautiful this Sleeping Beauty looks. And when Isabelle Faust, to whom Sleeping Beauty is on loan from a German bank, stroked her with her bow, she sang with the sweetest, most silvery of voices. I dare say, though, that it might be her great age that caused her exquisite voice to sing unusually softly so that at times it was necessary to lean forward in one’s seat in the 17th row to catch every fine detail of the solo part of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E minor. And apart from a less-than-assured opening moment, it was clear that the soloist is profoundly musical and technically adroit although her stage presence was curiously lacklustre. Faust was impressive in steering a faultless way through the cadenza – and trills were immaculately spun in the slow movement.

 

Although Mendelssohn wrote a number of concertos, it is this one that is far and away the most loved of them all. And it was good to hear this queen of concertos offered with such understanding on the part of the soloist. An earlier concerto for the violin is a juvenile effort of little moment. And a concerto for violin and piano soloists was recorded on the HMV label in the 1960s with Yehudi Menuhin and Gerald Moore as soloists. It’s sinking into deserved oblivion. And Mendelssohn’s two concertos for piano, like drooping aspidistra leaves, thoroughly deserve to disappear from the repertoire as well.

 

An orchestra is as good as its conductor – and when the baton is waved by a gifted musician, the W.A.Symphony Orchestra more often than not responds impressively and has done so at exceptional levels in recent years. But this was not always the case at the weekend where, too frequently at climaxes during Weber’s overture to Oberon, the brass section sounded uncharacteristically coarse – and one would have hoped for a more uniform tonal sheen from the strings. This playing was so out of character for the WASO that one wondered whether sufficient rehearsal time had been devoted to the program. Much the same could be said of Beethoven’s Symphony No 1.


W.A.Symphony Orchestra

 

 

Perth Concert Hall

 

 

 

reviewed by Neville Cohn

 

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Both Felix Mendelssohn and the TB-riddled Frederic Chopin tumbled off the twig before they turned 40. But they were mighty quick off the starting block. As teenagers, they both scaled Olympus: Mendelssohn’s Octet, heard here only the other day, was written at 16 – and Chopin’s Piano Concerto No 1 was completed when he was a mere19.

 

Alexander Gavrylyuk, no slouch himself – he won the Horowitz International Piano Competition when he was all of 15 years old – dazzled in music by both  Chopin and Mendelssohn at the Concert Hall at the weekend.

 

His account of the Chopin concerto was a marvel of musicianship: an imperious opening statement which gave way to wondrously expansive treatment of much of the opening movement. The nocturne-like slow movement was a model of refined expressiveness – and in the finale, fearless, infallible fingers wrought wonders in articulating the concerto’s villainously intricate solo part.

 

An audience that filled stalls, galleries and choir stalls to near-capacity could not contain its enthusiasm and burst into wild applause before the final bars of the concerto were played – unprecedented at a Master Series concert.

 

There was a sensational response with Gavrylyuk essaying Vladimir Horowitz’s horrendously demanding arrangement of Mendelssohn’s Wedding March. Here, those oh-so-familiar phrases were re-visited with such grandeur and brilliance that many in the audience rose spontaneously to their feet in acknowledgment of such pianistic wizardry. What a wonderful contribution towards this bicentenary year of Mendelssohn’s birth in 1809.

 

As curtain raiser, we heard a smartly detailed account of the overture to Rossini’s opera The Italian Girl in Algiers and, after the interval, Schubert’s Symphony No 9, known as The Great.

 

Of considerable length, the Ninth, in the wrong hands, can so easily sound  interminable. There was not a hint of that in Oleg Caetani’s direction of the piece. Clearly identifying closely with the score, which he conducted from memory, Caetani set and maintained tempi that ensured buoyancy of momentum. Occasionally, there was a need for the brass section to rein in its muscle-flexing to provide a more tonally discreet contribution – but this is a minor reservation about an interpretation made meaningful by close attention to detail without losing sight of the grand sweep of the work.


Australian Chamber Orchestra

Perth Concert Hall

reviewed by Neville Cohn

It was a study in contrasts: an account of a symphony at a level that critics dream about but seldom encounter in reality – and a concerto performance that buttressed the view that orchestral direction should, in many cases, be left to a conductor, allowing soloists to function purely in that capacity in order to be able to give undivided attention to the solo line.

If, due to some magical form of time travel that would have enabled Mozart to be present at this performance of his ‘Paris’ Symphony, I would have been surprised had the ACO’s account failed to win the Salzburg Master’s approval.

Here was a performance to savour with its meticulous attention to fine detail, tempi that seemed entirely appropriate, unfailingly musical phrasing and corporate tone that, with the use of period – or period-copy – instruments, would have made the composer feel entirely and comfortably at home. Certainly, for concertgoers not accustomed to the sound of a period wind choir and valveless horns of the time, this might well have been revelatory.

This was an excceptional account; I hung on every note. If ever a justification for the existence of an ensemble such as the ACO was needed, then it lay in the keeping of this splendid offering.

There were no microphones in evidence at this concert so this extraordinarily fine reading is lost to posterity. Has thought been given to the ACO embarking on a complete recording of Mozart’s symphonies? If this account of the ‘Paris’ is anything to go by, it’s an idea that ought to be seriously entertained.

Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E minor made for less satisfying listening, the chief reservation stemming from direction of the accompanying orchestra that was not always as felicitous as it might ideally have been.

The solo violin line is cruelly demanding; it calls for unremitting focus on the job in hand. And whether the soloist, who has a great deal to think about and do in this concerto, is the ideal person to take on the added burden of directing an orchestra playing a tricky score, is debatable. Occasionally – inevitably, perhaps, with such an arrangement – the orchestra had to be left to its own devices – and at other moments, the assistant concertmaster helped out by waving her bow, in lieu of a baton, at the musicians.

Had the soloist, however, been able to focus purely on the solo line while another was able to give undivided attention to anticipating the requirements of the soloist, the result might well have been that much more satisfying overall.

Also on the program was Beethoven’s Symphony No 7.

Copyright 2005 Neville Cohn


AUSTRALIAN CHAMBER ORCHESTRA

ROMANTICS
PRAGUE CHAMBER ORCHESTRA

 

 

 

Perth Concert Hall/Octagon Theatre

 

reviewed by Neville Cohn 

 

 

As we’re often told in newspaper, radio and TV advertisements, the homegrown product is often superior in quality to the imported variety.

This was very much the case when considering the relative merits of the Australian Chamber Orchestra and the Prague Chamber Orchestra, both of which featured in the 2004 Perth International Arts Festival.

Consider the ACO. Listened to in the air-conditioned comfort of Perth Concert Hall, which made this splendidly refurbished venue and its near-perfect acoustics all the more welcoming after a savagely hot and humid day, the Australian Chamber Orchestra staked yet another claim – quite irrefutable in my view – to be recognised and acknowledged as the nation’s foremost chamber orchestra and a major player on the world stage.

From the cluster of microphones suspended above the ACO, it could be presumed that its performance was being recorded. I very much hope that this was the case because, in decades of listening to live performances, I cannot recall a more satisfying account of Haydn’s Symphony No 49, know as the Passione.

Not the least of the pleasures of listening to the ACO is the precision of its intonation. Tuning backstage before making its entrance, the ACO is invariably spot-on, pitch-wise. This, in turn, enhances one of the ACO’s other strong points which is the care it lavishes on phrase-shaping. And the uniformity of tonal sheen in string playing was yet another fine feature of the performance.

Literally from bar one, this meticulous attention to moulding the various instrumental lines, and the resulting quality of harmonic tissue, yielded listening dividends of the most satisfying sort, not least in relation to beautifully realised tonal light and shade that added significantly to the tension generated in the opening Adagio. And how splendidly the second movement took off with its bracing attack and follow-through that did not so much attract the attention as seize it.

Horns and oboes were unfailingly stylish in the third movement. And in the finale, the joie de vivre with which these youthful players embraced the music, offered at an
unfaltering pace, thoroughly warranted the gales of applause that greeted its conclusion.

As always, Richard Tognetti kept the performance on track with the utmost economy of gesture. Certainly, with this intense focus on the minutiae of presentation together with an ability to present the ‘big picture’, as it were, yielded phenomenal listening dividends. And for this critic, in the presence of such musical distinction, there was little to do other than to sit back while acknowledging artistry of the highest order.

Emma-Jane Murphy, who has had a long association as principal cellist with the ACO, made a rare appearance as soloist in Tchaikowsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme.

In the accommodating acoustics of the Concert Hall, the Prague Chamber Orchestra, playing in ensemble with the Australian Intervarsity Choral Societies Association and four vocal soloists, seldom sounded less than adequate in Dvorak’s Stabat Mater. But in the far more unforgiving, dry acoustic of the Octagon Theatre, the PCO fared significantly less well.

Because of an acoustic that robbed string tone of much of its bloom (an effect made the more obvious when listened to from as close to the stage as the fourth row), small lapses in intonation and ensemble became glaringly obvious. And with little lift to the phrase as well as a tendency to clip phrase ends made this all-Mozart program a less than satisfying listening experience.

Prague, of course, was the city which, more than two hundred years ago, hosted the world premiere of Mozart’s Don Giovanni. So there had been an added frisson of anticipation as the PCO launched into this curtain-raiser. Sadly, the players’ presentation of the overture faltered on a number of grounds, not least due to an unwanted raspiness as bows bit strings.

At a performance, only days earlier of Messiaen’s dauntingly complex Harawi, there was a phenomenal display of musicianship and musicality on the part of French pianist Cedric Tiberghien. He faced another great challenge in Mozart’s Piano Concerto in A, K414, a challenge fully risen to only from the beginning of the cadenza of the slow movement.

Although, up to that point, he had brought notational accuracy and clarity to the piano part, Tiberghien’s playing on this occasion lacked that elusive X factor, difficult to define but instantly recognisable when it manifests itself, that had made his Messiaen offering such magical listening.

Trills were not quite evenly spun, the opening Allegro’s mood of blithness was not compellingly evoked, there was more than a little bass-register humming along on the part of the soloist – and that dreaded acoustic again ensured that some of the gloss was removed from the tone Tiberghien generated at the keyboard of a Steinway which would surely have sounded more satisfying in a more acoustically sympathetic environment.

But, after his retrieval of the initiative towards the close of the Andante, Tiberghien gave us playing that, notwithstanding extraneous features over which he could have had no control, was stylistically convincing and commendably expressive.

Listening to Mozart’s Symphony No 40 in G minor from the rear of the hall was a happier experience compared to what had earlier been heard from close up. The Octagon’s acoustical dryness sounded less ferocious from that vantage point. But one longed for rather more elegance to the shaping and tapering of phrases and a more uniform tonal sheen, especially on the part of the higher strings in the slow movement. Certainly, more might have been made of the serene and melancholy theme that makes this one of Mozart’s most beguiling essays in tranquillity. There was robust treatment of the minuet and the woodwinds (which had sounded unattractively blurred from close up in the Don Giovanni overture) came up trumps in the trio section of the minuet. And in the finale, the grittiness of string sound worked to the advantage of the performance, enhanced by strong, even fierce, rhythmic emphases.

© 2004