SCO, 01/11/2019
Suk : Serenade for Strings
Janáček : The Fiddler's Child
Dvorák : Symphony No. 5
Scottish Chamber Orchestra
Joseph Swensen
Suk's music - at least, outside the Czech Republic - has never quite broken into the topmost rank of Czech music, alongside the 'big 4' that are Smetana, Dvorák, Janáček and Martinu. There's much to please. a slightly melancholy charm and rich orchestration in some of the later pieces, yet this early Serenade for Strings perhaps demonstrates just why he's not judged as memorable as his compatriots and, above all, Dvorák, who was teacher, mentor and father-in-law to Suk.
Written in 1892 (Suk was eighteen), at Dvorák's prompting, it more or less put Suk on the map, drawing the attention of the likes of Brahms, and the first two movements are lovely, silken and gracious, with Dvorák's influence somewhat evident, but also a soupçon of Richard Strauss in the harmonisation, a reminder that for all the apparent classicism of the music, we are at the turn of the century, and all that brought with it in terms of modernism. Yet the other two movements just seem to be going on a little too long, the third in particular, which is substantially the longest. There are interesting things happening at times, certainly, but I found my attention drifting, and it was certainly not the orchestra's fault.
Janáček was more Dvorák's contemporary than Suk's, but his musical maturity came late, with his first really significant works appearing in the first years of the 20th Century. His earliest works tended to be instrumental and choral, it's not really until the 1890s that you start seeing orchestral works in his catalogue, but it is through the operas that he really began to flex his orchestral muscles. The Fiddler's Child, written in 1915, after Jenufa and The Excursions of Mr. Broucek, was his first symphonic poem. Like several of Dvorák's symphonic poems, the source treats of the supernatural's intrusion into everyday life; an old fiddler dies, leaving behind his sickly child, and his instrument, which is hung on the wall of the child's room. One night, the woman looking after the child wakes to a strange vision. The ghost of the fiddler is playing his violin to the child, enticing it towards a better world. The woman banishes the ghost with the sign of the cross, and goes back to sleep, but in the morning, the child is dead.
SCO leader Stephanie Gonley was expressive enough as the fiddler, especially in the vision, sweet-toned and persuasive, but on the whole, I found the performance unconvincing. Janáček writes his music in small, repeated cells, putting it together is something a bit like quilting, a lot of little pieces have to fit together to create a cohesive whole, and there was something about the performance that didn't quite gel. I also felt there weren't perhaps quite enough strings, that the balance was on the thin side. At any rate, I was a somewhat disappointed with it.
There was a period when the first four of Dvorák's symphonies were pretty well ignored. I distinctly recall seeing an LP in my grandfather's collection which had the "New World" Symphony labelled as No.5, and that was, indeed, how he knew it. That meant that the actual Fifth Symphony was once known as the First, and having heard the Fourth fairly recently, there's perhaps a little something to that. The Fourth shows a lot of external influences, and how Dvorak was in the process of absorbing them. The Fifth begins with its first subject exposed in the winds, and that sound of the wind section is so utterly characteristic of mature Dvorák there's no possibility of mistaking it for another composer's work. This is the first unequivocal Dvorák symphony in its sound world, and the SCO's winds produced a perfect, pastoral burble of sound. For the first time tonight I saw the Joseph Swensen I've seen in previous concerts, vibrating with energy on the platform, almost dancing at times, and that energy and enthusiasm came through in the performance, bright and eager and happy. Even the sudden drama of the last movement was there in order to be dissipated in a triumphant conclusion.
[Next : 2nd November]
Janáček : The Fiddler's Child
Dvorák : Symphony No. 5
Scottish Chamber Orchestra
Joseph Swensen
Suk's music - at least, outside the Czech Republic - has never quite broken into the topmost rank of Czech music, alongside the 'big 4' that are Smetana, Dvorák, Janáček and Martinu. There's much to please. a slightly melancholy charm and rich orchestration in some of the later pieces, yet this early Serenade for Strings perhaps demonstrates just why he's not judged as memorable as his compatriots and, above all, Dvorák, who was teacher, mentor and father-in-law to Suk.
Written in 1892 (Suk was eighteen), at Dvorák's prompting, it more or less put Suk on the map, drawing the attention of the likes of Brahms, and the first two movements are lovely, silken and gracious, with Dvorák's influence somewhat evident, but also a soupçon of Richard Strauss in the harmonisation, a reminder that for all the apparent classicism of the music, we are at the turn of the century, and all that brought with it in terms of modernism. Yet the other two movements just seem to be going on a little too long, the third in particular, which is substantially the longest. There are interesting things happening at times, certainly, but I found my attention drifting, and it was certainly not the orchestra's fault.
Janáček was more Dvorák's contemporary than Suk's, but his musical maturity came late, with his first really significant works appearing in the first years of the 20th Century. His earliest works tended to be instrumental and choral, it's not really until the 1890s that you start seeing orchestral works in his catalogue, but it is through the operas that he really began to flex his orchestral muscles. The Fiddler's Child, written in 1915, after Jenufa and The Excursions of Mr. Broucek, was his first symphonic poem. Like several of Dvorák's symphonic poems, the source treats of the supernatural's intrusion into everyday life; an old fiddler dies, leaving behind his sickly child, and his instrument, which is hung on the wall of the child's room. One night, the woman looking after the child wakes to a strange vision. The ghost of the fiddler is playing his violin to the child, enticing it towards a better world. The woman banishes the ghost with the sign of the cross, and goes back to sleep, but in the morning, the child is dead.
SCO leader Stephanie Gonley was expressive enough as the fiddler, especially in the vision, sweet-toned and persuasive, but on the whole, I found the performance unconvincing. Janáček writes his music in small, repeated cells, putting it together is something a bit like quilting, a lot of little pieces have to fit together to create a cohesive whole, and there was something about the performance that didn't quite gel. I also felt there weren't perhaps quite enough strings, that the balance was on the thin side. At any rate, I was a somewhat disappointed with it.
There was a period when the first four of Dvorák's symphonies were pretty well ignored. I distinctly recall seeing an LP in my grandfather's collection which had the "New World" Symphony labelled as No.5, and that was, indeed, how he knew it. That meant that the actual Fifth Symphony was once known as the First, and having heard the Fourth fairly recently, there's perhaps a little something to that. The Fourth shows a lot of external influences, and how Dvorak was in the process of absorbing them. The Fifth begins with its first subject exposed in the winds, and that sound of the wind section is so utterly characteristic of mature Dvorák there's no possibility of mistaking it for another composer's work. This is the first unequivocal Dvorák symphony in its sound world, and the SCO's winds produced a perfect, pastoral burble of sound. For the first time tonight I saw the Joseph Swensen I've seen in previous concerts, vibrating with energy on the platform, almost dancing at times, and that energy and enthusiasm came through in the performance, bright and eager and happy. Even the sudden drama of the last movement was there in order to be dissipated in a triumphant conclusion.
[Next : 2nd November]