United Kingdom Gubaidulina, Shostakovich, Stravinsky: Vilde Frang (violin), London Symphony Orchestra / Rafael Payare (conductor). Barbican Hall, 23.2.2023. (CC)
Gubaidulina – Fairytale Poem (1971)
Shostakovich – Violin Concerto No.1 in A minor, Op.99 (1948, rev.1955)
Stravinsky – The Firebird (full, 1910)
We met conductor Rafael Payare in August final 12 months in Montréal, Canada (click on right here); I also needs to point out a big Shostakovich Symphony No.11 together with his earlier orchestra in San Diego that rightly acquired important reward. Payare made his London Symphony Orchestra debut in 2014 and is clearly increase fairly a rapport with the orchestra.
Sofia Gubaidulina’s Fairytale Poem of 1971 affords rarefied, post-Webernian magnificence, the 2 flutes and ascending strings resulting in excessive clarinets garlanded by the strings, who then take over this exceptional soundworld. Gubaidulina affords a tapestry of sound, instantly interesting and but fastidiously, cogently constructed. The piece was written for a youngsters’s radio present, in a dramatisation of the fairy story Křida (Chalk) by the Czech writer Miloš Macourek. A chunk of chalk fantasises about all of the issues it may draw although it’s really used for equations and phrases as an alternative, diminishing in measurement till it’s ineffective. Almost at its finish, it’s discovered by a baby who makes use of what’s left to ‘paint’ and draw, and on the shut, the chalk disappears into the photographs it had as soon as dreamt of. The thought of inventive endeavour surviving regardless of harrowing circumstances may certainly be a metaphor; however Gubaidulina preserves the sense of enchantment brilliantly.
The piece is completely exceptional, from that fantastical opening to the staccatissimo repeated piano cluster chord that punctuates fluttering strings, flute, and percussion like a hammer. Payare’s clear and expressive beat introduced out the easiest within the LSO, who’re clearly conscious of him always. The sheer stage of focus (from the orchestra, no less than) was exceptional. Gubaidulina’s timbral transformations have been superbly realised, with some positively luminous chords in the direction of the shut.
Shostakovich’s First Violin Concerto is an astonishingly highly effective piece. It was written in 1948 however not premiered till seven-and-a-half years later, in October 1955, and carried out 4 months later in Moscow. The piece is devoted to David Oistrakh. There have been a few vital performances of this piece over the previous few years: Simone Lamsma with the Strasbourg Philharmonic beneath Aziz Shokhakimov in May final 12 months, and Patricia Kopatchinskaja (who was the initially marketed soloist in Strasbourg) with the Aurora Orchestra and Nicholas Collon finally 12 months’s BBC Proms. This time it was Dutch violinist Vilde Frang within the highlight.
I reviewed Frang’s efficiency of Bartök’s First Violin Concerto in Berlin Philharmonie with the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra beneath Vladimir Jurowski in September final 12 months, saying it was ‘a terrific performance of huge virtuosity and élan, entirely convincing at every turn,’ and the identical may simply apply to her efficiency of the Shostakovich First with Payare. The lengthy traces of the expansive opening Nocturne (marked ‘Moderato’) carried enormous weight, whereas the orchestra supplied a chthonic underpinning because of the eight double basses. Frang’s sound was positively smoky on the opening; her core sound was barely wiry (however not for one second skinny), which suited the melodies completely, whereas her decrease register was positively throaty. Most essential of all was the best way Frang understood Shostakovich’s traces; Payare, in the meantime, proved himself the proper accomplice together with her all through. There was a timelessness about this efficiency that was completely transfixing, whereas Frang’s enjoying was notable for the sheer purity of her intervals throughout the line (the sustained excessive notice on the motion’s finish was additionally the best I’ve heard dwell).
The fierce Scherzo was a riot of vitality. Virtuoso, actually, however completely relentless – and the way Payare assured definition within the decrease strings at velocity. How completely different the Passacaglia, with its softening. Daniel Jemison’s bassoon solos have been significantly noteworthy, as was the mixed perception of Frang and Payare in seeing the piece as one nice cumulative, fastidiously calibrated uncurling (Frang’s stopping, too, was so completely in tune). The rapport of soloist and conductor prolonged into the Burlesque finale – Shostakovich’s writing right here is cruel, his calls for for co-ordination between violin and orchestra nearly insuperable – and it was simply this factor that spurred Frang and Payare to edge-of-the-seat antics.
Finally, Stravinsky’s Firebird – not in its extra traditional Suite type however the full ballet. The full piece is extraordinary, as Sir Simon Rattle and the Berliner Philharmoniker proved of their 2014 BBC Proms look. It is hardly an on a regular basis piece – the orchestra is big, the calls for excessive. But Payare and the LSO’s gamers triumphed – Payare has a present for orchestral color (witness his performances of Latin American works), and it was completely in proof right here. His opening tempo was pretty quick, however there was numerous element audible; and, as within the Passacaglia of the Shostakovich, there was a palpable sense of natural progress. Differentiation between Shostakovich’s usually glowering soundworld and the post-Rimsky brightness and deftness of Firebird was one other noteworthy factor right here – the LSO was on quicksilver type within the second half. Violin solos from visitor chief Benjamin Marquise Gilmore have been spellbinding. Even within the loudest of passages, the outcome was by no means purely cacophonous: layers have been at all times audible, the sound striated, whereas Payare, on the different finish of the dynamic scale, had his strings play at what will need to have been pppp. From the suave pleasure of ‘Katschei’s Dance’ to the aromatic attraction of ‘Ronde des Princesses’, this was a merely exceptional efficiency. Rhythms have been supremely properly pointed all through – an important element of understanding Stravinsky.
An distinctive live performance from a exceptional conductor, virtuoso soloist and world-class orchestra. Payare’s return is already eagerly anticipated.
Colin Clarke