It has been a landmark year for Richard Tognetti, celebrating 20 years as the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s leader and artistic director.
Australia’s best composers have written musical tributes to him and at the close of last night’s concert - the group’s penultimate Sydney appearance in its 2009 season - the ovation after a dynamic performance of Beethoven’s fourth symphony was even louder than usual.
But this evening was less about the charismatic musician, more about arguably the greatest composer who ever lived. Beethoven to the power of four could have been the subhead for this concert, with his popular fourth piano concerto a companion piece to his least-known symphony.
The other piece on the program, Brett Dean’s Testament, originally composed for 12 violas, is inspired by the Heiligenstadt Testament, Beethoven’s near-suicidal outpouring to his brothers about the hell of living with deafness.
Borrowing from the great composer’s slow and mysterious openings, especially in some of his string quartets, Dean’s work starts in a haze of muffled, sliding sound and suggestions of tinnitus before snatches of the first Razumovsky quartet break through.
Violin bows are played without rosin to depict, in Dean’s words, “Ludwig’s imagined quill writing maniacally on leaves of parchment paper”.
One of the work’s Beethoven could have been working on in this way was his fourth piano concerto, which he performed at the very end of his concert career before deafness forced him off stage.
The Croatian pianist Dejan Lazic gave a poetic rather than dramatic reading of this work. A composer himself, the elfin soloist with his highly arched, delicate fingers was very much in the driving seat, directing from time to time with a spare hand.
He gave the andante movement a dreamy, other-worldly quality in contrast to the emphatic chords from the orchestra, and the rondo, marked vivace, was vivacious indeed with his easy control of its sparkling runs.
The fourth symphony, which sits between the revolutionary Eroica and the best-seller fifth, is comparatively modest in its proportions but abounds with a joyful energy and unstoppable drive.
The ACO, welcoming back some former members and filled out with guests from various Australian orchestras, was in top form under Tognetti’s meticulous leadership.
Fans of this superb chamber group will get another chance to hear them before year’s end when they appear with Barry Humphreys on December 14 and 15 at the Opera House. Who knows what might happen on those nights?
Steve Moffatt | Parramatta Advertiser
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
Monday, 23 November 2009
Friday, 20 November 2009
West Australian review of Beethoven 4
When it comes to producing ethereal, whispered intimacies, pianist Dejan Lazic is up there with the best of them. Whether in a faultlessly stated introduction to Beethoven's Piano Concerto No 4 or as a hushed, gently supplicating foil to brusque orchestral statements in the slow movement, Lazic was beyond criticism.
He is better than most and second to very few when needing to breathe life into those moments of grandeur and nobility that make this one of the greatest of all concertos. And Lazic did wonders in evoking the peekaboo insouciance of the finale.
Bombastic vulgarity might have been the hallmark of the cadenzas but they were presented in high style.
Avalanches of deserved applause for Lazic were rewarded with a gently introspective, valedictory utterance from Brahms' last years.
Beethoven's deafness, surely the cruellest fate to befall a composer, and his rising above this dreadful affliction, triggered the writing of Brett Dean's Testament.
Initially, we hear tattered fragments of sound such as eerie pipings, spectral rustlings and simulated moans which suggest despair beyond despair.
Then gradually, the music assumes a sense of harmonic good order and we hear snippets from the composer's Quartet opus 59 No 1, all of which came across as a triumph over adversity.
Catherine McCorkill's flawless contribution on clarinet in Beethoven's Fourth Symphony was like a silver thread through the performance as was the playing of the ladies of the trumpets.
I specially admired the buoyancy that informed the scherzo - and flawless, spring-heeled rapid passagework in the finale brought one of the ACO's most rewarding concerts this year to a most satisfying close.
Link to review.
Neville Cohn | The West Australian
He is better than most and second to very few when needing to breathe life into those moments of grandeur and nobility that make this one of the greatest of all concertos. And Lazic did wonders in evoking the peekaboo insouciance of the finale.
Bombastic vulgarity might have been the hallmark of the cadenzas but they were presented in high style.
Avalanches of deserved applause for Lazic were rewarded with a gently introspective, valedictory utterance from Brahms' last years.
Beethoven's deafness, surely the cruellest fate to befall a composer, and his rising above this dreadful affliction, triggered the writing of Brett Dean's Testament.
Initially, we hear tattered fragments of sound such as eerie pipings, spectral rustlings and simulated moans which suggest despair beyond despair.
Then gradually, the music assumes a sense of harmonic good order and we hear snippets from the composer's Quartet opus 59 No 1, all of which came across as a triumph over adversity.
Catherine McCorkill's flawless contribution on clarinet in Beethoven's Fourth Symphony was like a silver thread through the performance as was the playing of the ladies of the trumpets.
I specially admired the buoyancy that informed the scherzo - and flawless, spring-heeled rapid passagework in the finale brought one of the ACO's most rewarding concerts this year to a most satisfying close.
Link to review.
Neville Cohn | The West Australian
Link to a blog review of Beethoven 4
This was a Beethoven-flavoured concert, with 2 major Beethoven pieces and a piece by Brett Dean who was inspired by Beethoven's Heiligenstadt Testament. Read more.
Thursday, 19 November 2009
Adelaide Review on Beethoven 4
Beethoven wrote his last will and testament after he realized that his growing deafness was going to be profound and irreversible. More than two centuries later, Australian Brett Dean's Testament aimed to convey in music both deafness itself and the great composer's distress at his loss.
Richard Tognetti conducted, with both hands, from out front, the large ACO, with cellos, basses, timpani and trumpets divided from the rest. Two bows to all the strings were required; one, without resin, for the slithery sounds that had lost their grip on the real world, the other conventionally treated to control the vibrations. Through this inspired device, along with the inclusion of some fragments of Beethoven’s own music, Dean’s ambitious task cleared the boundary between impossible and possible. For 14 minutes, without letup, without relief, he took us inside the tragic, but ultimately triumphant, world of a head full of music that its creator would never hear played in real time by himself or other people. Towards the end, Testament escalated into organized chaos, finishing with an unmistakable rising, piercing shriek of anguish.
Then it was the turn of the genuine article.
Dejan Lazic, soloist in the second greatest piano concerto ever, Beethoven’s no 4 in G major, stated those magical opening chords in the sweetest, most tender pianissimo imaginable. What followed almost erased that memory. The extremes of his dynamics, delivered by widely splayed fingers and punctuated by flamboyant gestures approaching and departing the keyboard, liberties with tempo way beyond the subtleties of rubato – with the ACO’s complicity – were crowned by his own planned improvisation cadenza. Beethoven’s ideas were re-cast in Lazic’s terms – forceful, occasionally near-brutal. Having got that out of the way, and perhaps out of his system, he showed his more restrained side in the gentle Andante, and entered into positively jocular dialogue with the orchestra for the final Rondo.
Directing from the leader’s position in the fourth symphony, Tognetti kept his promise of fidelity to Beethoven’s metronome markings and if the tempi were too fast or too slow for you too bad. They were just right for me. The ACO were at their disciplined best – smart attacks, dynamics that allowed the score to speak for itself, pin point syncopation, even at a cracking pace. At the core were the six winds led by the mellow voice of Catherine McCorkill’s clarinet and flanked by equally expressive pairs of horns and trumpets.
Elizabeth Silsbury | Adelaide Review | 19 Nov 2009
Richard Tognetti conducted, with both hands, from out front, the large ACO, with cellos, basses, timpani and trumpets divided from the rest. Two bows to all the strings were required; one, without resin, for the slithery sounds that had lost their grip on the real world, the other conventionally treated to control the vibrations. Through this inspired device, along with the inclusion of some fragments of Beethoven’s own music, Dean’s ambitious task cleared the boundary between impossible and possible. For 14 minutes, without letup, without relief, he took us inside the tragic, but ultimately triumphant, world of a head full of music that its creator would never hear played in real time by himself or other people. Towards the end, Testament escalated into organized chaos, finishing with an unmistakable rising, piercing shriek of anguish.
Then it was the turn of the genuine article.
Dejan Lazic, soloist in the second greatest piano concerto ever, Beethoven’s no 4 in G major, stated those magical opening chords in the sweetest, most tender pianissimo imaginable. What followed almost erased that memory. The extremes of his dynamics, delivered by widely splayed fingers and punctuated by flamboyant gestures approaching and departing the keyboard, liberties with tempo way beyond the subtleties of rubato – with the ACO’s complicity – were crowned by his own planned improvisation cadenza. Beethoven’s ideas were re-cast in Lazic’s terms – forceful, occasionally near-brutal. Having got that out of the way, and perhaps out of his system, he showed his more restrained side in the gentle Andante, and entered into positively jocular dialogue with the orchestra for the final Rondo.
Directing from the leader’s position in the fourth symphony, Tognetti kept his promise of fidelity to Beethoven’s metronome markings and if the tempi were too fast or too slow for you too bad. They were just right for me. The ACO were at their disciplined best – smart attacks, dynamics that allowed the score to speak for itself, pin point syncopation, even at a cracking pace. At the core were the six winds led by the mellow voice of Catherine McCorkill’s clarinet and flanked by equally expressive pairs of horns and trumpets.
Elizabeth Silsbury | Adelaide Review | 19 Nov 2009
Wednesday, 18 November 2009
Blog review of Beethoven 4
Beethoven 4 - Don't miss it!
Brett Dean's Testament provided the perfect introduction to Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto and Symphony. Testatment is a depiction in sound of what Beethoven may have experienced physically and emotionally when losing his hearing, and the piece was brought masterfully to life by the orchestra under Richard Tognetti's direction. Contrasting soundscapes were created using a variety of orchestral effects to evoke the panic and fear - morendi, pizzicati, rosined and unrosined bow work, and slightly distorted sustained notes. Contrasting this was the transient call out to the slow movement of Beethoven's Op. 59 No. 1 String Quartet, followed by the final section with its sense of terror and urgency. These musical and formal elements all combined to great effect to depict the flickering of Beethoven's hearing and to stimulate audience empathy for the composer's plight.
After the struggle of Testament, Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto in G Major sprang to life. Dejan Lazic is a truly mesmerising young artist, whose depth of phrasing and dynamics in the Beethoven was astonishing. His musicianship and technical mastery of the concerto were finely balanced - sparkle and drama in the more demanding technical passages of the concerto contrasted superbly with lyricism and musical tenderness where the music demanded it. With the orchestra's support, this was an electrifying performance. To conclude the first half, the young maestro played Schumann's Pleasant Landscapes from Forest Scenes, to a standing ovation.
To round off the Beethoven experience, the orchestra played Beethoven's 4th Symphony in B Flat Major with its usual flair and spirit, with some fine solo work from the 'cellos and woodwind section, particulary the principal clarinet, in the last movement. Lovely articulations and contrasts abounded, making for a satisfying dénouement to the afternoon.
Review by Facebook fan Caroline Webster | 16 Nov 2009
Brett Dean's Testament provided the perfect introduction to Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto and Symphony. Testatment is a depiction in sound of what Beethoven may have experienced physically and emotionally when losing his hearing, and the piece was brought masterfully to life by the orchestra under Richard Tognetti's direction. Contrasting soundscapes were created using a variety of orchestral effects to evoke the panic and fear - morendi, pizzicati, rosined and unrosined bow work, and slightly distorted sustained notes. Contrasting this was the transient call out to the slow movement of Beethoven's Op. 59 No. 1 String Quartet, followed by the final section with its sense of terror and urgency. These musical and formal elements all combined to great effect to depict the flickering of Beethoven's hearing and to stimulate audience empathy for the composer's plight.
After the struggle of Testament, Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto in G Major sprang to life. Dejan Lazic is a truly mesmerising young artist, whose depth of phrasing and dynamics in the Beethoven was astonishing. His musicianship and technical mastery of the concerto were finely balanced - sparkle and drama in the more demanding technical passages of the concerto contrasted superbly with lyricism and musical tenderness where the music demanded it. With the orchestra's support, this was an electrifying performance. To conclude the first half, the young maestro played Schumann's Pleasant Landscapes from Forest Scenes, to a standing ovation.
To round off the Beethoven experience, the orchestra played Beethoven's 4th Symphony in B Flat Major with its usual flair and spirit, with some fine solo work from the 'cellos and woodwind section, particulary the principal clarinet, in the last movement. Lovely articulations and contrasts abounded, making for a satisfying dénouement to the afternoon.
Review by Facebook fan Caroline Webster | 16 Nov 2009
Beethoven review by a fan
Sunday’s ACO concert at Hamer Hall began with Brett Dean’s Testament, a work inspired by Beethoven’s Heiligenstadt Testament of 1802. Written when Beethoven learned that his hearing loss was irreversible and would only continue to become more profound, the statement was addressed to the composer’s two brothers as a kind of will, though it is much more an anguished expression of despair over the state of his health and over his increasing sense of isolation. In it he laments his increasing deafness but also gives voice to his determination to find new ways and means to compose. Addressed though it was to contemporaries, the statement remained a private expression of the composer’s anguish throughout his lifetime: Beethoven never mailed it and it only emerged among his private papers after his death.
Originally scored for twelve violas, Dean’s Testament was more recently re-arranged for orchestra. Though I have never heard the original, I can only speculate that the re-orchestration has added significantly to the impact and poignancy of the piece. With the participation of woodwinds and drums the piece emerges as a sort of meditation on music making, an evocation of Beethoven’s determination to fully exploit the materials at his disposal. It is also evocative of his intense frustration: early in the piece various techniques mimic the distorted aural universe of impaired hearing – low-grade buzzing from a muffled snare drum, harsh muted rumbling from strings played with non-rosined bows, and high-pitched ringing from flute and piccolo. These effects enter, depart, and re-enter, interfering with and competing against tones and phrases in search of musical organization. In the end, however, victory is achieved as the composer presumed to be hearing these sounds – the Beethoven of Heiligenstadt – finds the means to continue composing. A confident, spirited finale emerges, free of sonic distortions.
The other two works on the program were composed within a few years of the Heiligenstadt Testament, during one of the most productive periods of Beethoven’s life. One a standard of the repertory, the other not, both were played with the same energy, daring, and conviction that one has come to expect from the ACO. The soloist, Dejan Lazic, managed to bring a new immediacy and freshness to a work that I for one didn’t think could ever sound new again. Some of Lazic’s phrasing was eccentric but it was often meltingly graceful and always compelling.
Passing the direction back and forth from each other, Lazic and Tognetti kept the inherent tension in the dialogue between orchestra and soloist extremely high. There were admittedly a few moments when it sounded as if signals might have been missed, but these were brief and in no way marred the performance. It was in fact this level of intensity and apparent willingness to take some risks that made the performance all the more exciting. (I mean the following in the most positive sense: At many ACO concerts, you can actually see the members of the ensemble ‘working’ with each other.)
This particular performance of the Fourth Concerto suggested a relationship between the soloist and orchestra that was more tug-of-war than polite dialogue. Nowhere was this more evident than in the opening of the 2nd movement. The insistent, belligerent figure from the strings seemed to be repelled – at first almost ignored – by the gentle lyrical motive on the piano, played pianissimo and with utmost sensitivity by Lazic. After repeated tussles – successive diminuendos from the orchestra against increasing boldness from the soloist – the two come to an understanding, though it’s the piano part that carries the day in that movement. Heard so soon after Dean’s Testament, it felt very much like a victory of lyricism over the opening almost purely rhythmic idea from the strings.
Lazic rewarded the audience’s enthusiastic applause with a whimsical rendering of Freundliche Landschaft (“Pleasant Landscape”) from Schumann’s Waldszenen.
The performance of the Fourth Symphony communicated the joyfulness and bravado of the work. The entire ensemble seemed to revel in the rhythmic drive of the piece, but Tognetti always managed to strike the right balance among sections, allowing the various orchestral textures Beethoven was exploring at the time to emerge with clarity. The use of the woodwinds – in particular the bassoons and oboe – in the fourth movement was especially remarkable.
And once again, the afternoon’s clever programming made it possible to listen with new ears. Looking backward, Dean used some of the same woodwinds in Testament. When those instruments emerge in exposed passages in the Fourth Symphony’s last movement an hour later, the ‘echo’ (retroactive, as it were) is strong enough to bring the underlying programmed message of Dean’s work back to mind. This listener at any rate was nudged to listen more closely and to reflect on Beethoven’s efforts at that particular anguished yet fertile juncture to use these sounds in new ways.
Hats off to Brett Dean for offering such a though-provoking, and touching, reflection on Beethoven’s Heiligenstadt crisis, and hats off to the ACO for another exciting, edge-of-your-seats performance.
Christopher Billy | Audience Member | 17 Nov 2009
Originally scored for twelve violas, Dean’s Testament was more recently re-arranged for orchestra. Though I have never heard the original, I can only speculate that the re-orchestration has added significantly to the impact and poignancy of the piece. With the participation of woodwinds and drums the piece emerges as a sort of meditation on music making, an evocation of Beethoven’s determination to fully exploit the materials at his disposal. It is also evocative of his intense frustration: early in the piece various techniques mimic the distorted aural universe of impaired hearing – low-grade buzzing from a muffled snare drum, harsh muted rumbling from strings played with non-rosined bows, and high-pitched ringing from flute and piccolo. These effects enter, depart, and re-enter, interfering with and competing against tones and phrases in search of musical organization. In the end, however, victory is achieved as the composer presumed to be hearing these sounds – the Beethoven of Heiligenstadt – finds the means to continue composing. A confident, spirited finale emerges, free of sonic distortions.
The other two works on the program were composed within a few years of the Heiligenstadt Testament, during one of the most productive periods of Beethoven’s life. One a standard of the repertory, the other not, both were played with the same energy, daring, and conviction that one has come to expect from the ACO. The soloist, Dejan Lazic, managed to bring a new immediacy and freshness to a work that I for one didn’t think could ever sound new again. Some of Lazic’s phrasing was eccentric but it was often meltingly graceful and always compelling.
Passing the direction back and forth from each other, Lazic and Tognetti kept the inherent tension in the dialogue between orchestra and soloist extremely high. There were admittedly a few moments when it sounded as if signals might have been missed, but these were brief and in no way marred the performance. It was in fact this level of intensity and apparent willingness to take some risks that made the performance all the more exciting. (I mean the following in the most positive sense: At many ACO concerts, you can actually see the members of the ensemble ‘working’ with each other.)
This particular performance of the Fourth Concerto suggested a relationship between the soloist and orchestra that was more tug-of-war than polite dialogue. Nowhere was this more evident than in the opening of the 2nd movement. The insistent, belligerent figure from the strings seemed to be repelled – at first almost ignored – by the gentle lyrical motive on the piano, played pianissimo and with utmost sensitivity by Lazic. After repeated tussles – successive diminuendos from the orchestra against increasing boldness from the soloist – the two come to an understanding, though it’s the piano part that carries the day in that movement. Heard so soon after Dean’s Testament, it felt very much like a victory of lyricism over the opening almost purely rhythmic idea from the strings.
Lazic rewarded the audience’s enthusiastic applause with a whimsical rendering of Freundliche Landschaft (“Pleasant Landscape”) from Schumann’s Waldszenen.
The performance of the Fourth Symphony communicated the joyfulness and bravado of the work. The entire ensemble seemed to revel in the rhythmic drive of the piece, but Tognetti always managed to strike the right balance among sections, allowing the various orchestral textures Beethoven was exploring at the time to emerge with clarity. The use of the woodwinds – in particular the bassoons and oboe – in the fourth movement was especially remarkable.
And once again, the afternoon’s clever programming made it possible to listen with new ears. Looking backward, Dean used some of the same woodwinds in Testament. When those instruments emerge in exposed passages in the Fourth Symphony’s last movement an hour later, the ‘echo’ (retroactive, as it were) is strong enough to bring the underlying programmed message of Dean’s work back to mind. This listener at any rate was nudged to listen more closely and to reflect on Beethoven’s efforts at that particular anguished yet fertile juncture to use these sounds in new ways.
Hats off to Brett Dean for offering such a though-provoking, and touching, reflection on Beethoven’s Heiligenstadt crisis, and hats off to the ACO for another exciting, edge-of-your-seats performance.
Christopher Billy | Audience Member | 17 Nov 2009
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