I turned down what I\u2019m sure was going to be a very, very good homemade Indian dinner tonight because I am on what many of you may consider a fools errand.<\/p>\n
Of all the pieces in my repertoire, I would say Brahms 1 is near the top of the list of pieces I would be happy to conduct the Berlin Philharmonic in with no warning or prep time (a level of familiarity and comfort I\u2019m sure I share with most conductors). Given how busy I find myself these days, it may seem like a glorious time waster that I am trying to listen attentively to every recording I have (and several new ones I\u2019ve recently discovered). At 40-50 minutes per recording, that is a huge job, and one I won\u2019t manage to finish this week.<\/p>\n
Now, I\u2019m 100% against learning pieces from recordings, or even learning interpretations from recordings- one can\u2019t simply take Furtwangler\u2019s tempo in the introduction and Gunter Wand\u2019s in the Allegro and have something make any sense. This is not collage making. However, I don\u2019t want to be limited to only the boundaries of my own intellect and imagination, so I am studying the art of performance and interpretation in this piece, as well as, and separately from, studying the piece itself. All this while trying to avoid getting hung up on \u201cooh, isn\u2019t it cool the way he brought out the 3rd<\/sup> horn there,\u201d and instead trying to understand the cause and effect relationships that make performances happen or not.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I want to be careful not to turn this post into a ranking of recordings or a catalog of criticisms, but I think it might be interesting, if I can\u00a0mange to nuance this carefully enough, to try to chart\u00a0some of the more interesting reactions I’ve had to the dozens of recordings I’ve listened to lately.\u00a0My challenge is this exercise has been to listen in an engaged but dispationate way- to try and keep my own prejudices and preferences to the side. Also, I’m trying to be an observer, not a judge- I’m looking for tempos, but especially tempo relationships, ways of responding to (or not responding to) dynamics and articulations, different kinds of rubato and other tempo manipulations, sound quality, balance, phrasing. Along the way, I might find that this or that moment really affected me, and then I can try to ask myself why.<\/p>\n Take one performance I tracked down on DVD (DVD is far more interesting and instructive- it\u2019s great to be able to see what bowings were used, when woodwinds are doubled, what the conductor is beating and who he or she is looking at and so on). Of all the gazillion recordings I\u2019ve heard it seemed to have really well chosen tempos and immaculate balances, lovely dynamics, beautiful and confident solo playing. However, forgive me if I sound like one of \u201cthose\u201d kind of critics- although the performance filled me with admiration, it didn\u2019t leave my inspired or moved, even though it was not cold music making. Why? I\u2019m not sure, but I think Brahms somehow has to sound challenging, pure mastery is not the thing in this music.<\/p>\n Then there is a DVD of Takashi Asahina. I\u2019ve only become aware of him in the last few years, as he has become something of a cult figure. This DVD, like others I\u2019ve seen, only serves to increase the mystery around his craft- even as a professional conductor (and conductor evaluator), I can\u2019t begin to figure out how it is all working. Yes, orchestras can play perfectly with almost anything in front of them, but, in spite of his rather non-dynamic-specific way of beating it is such an astoundingly moving performance, and has an electricity in the playing in almost every bar. I\u2019d love to talk to some of his colleagues (any out there among our readers?) and find out where that all-encompassing energy comes from. (This recording also has one of the best wrong notes I’ve heard in years, where the oboist repeatedly plays B natural instead of B sharp in the 2nd mvt solo at letter B- maybe the publisher should have labled that letter B#)<\/p>\n The best Brahms performances (the best performances of anything, but especially Brahms) are those that arrive<\/em><\/strong>, where all that has happened expresses its meaning in a point of total culmination. As a result, you have to commit to hearing the whole thing or you are wasting your time. A performance may be full of perplexing or even frustrating turns, and yet culminate in something totally shattering, or be politically correct at every moment, yet leave one cold.<\/p>\n The Brahms symphonies are at the top of the list of works we expect any decent orchestra to be able to play well, but, boy oh boy, have I heard some turds among the performances I\u2019ve been to over the years. In fact, the worst live performance of anything I\u2019ve ever heard by any classical ensemble or performer at any level, was of Brahms 1, and this was in spite of the fact that the orchestra (the Pittsburgh Symphony) played pretty much technically beyond reproach. Lest you think that\u2019s just me being bitter about not getting to conduct the Pittsburgh Symphony, you should have heard the players sat next to me and my colleagues in our trio at the bar afterwards\u2026 The capacity of an egomaniacal conductor to violate and deform a piece of music is pretty terrifying. I still get mad when I think of it.<\/p>\n There are also performances that stick in the mind for the wrong reasons- the SLOW performance, the NERVOUS HORN PLAYER, the FLUTE VIBRATO FROM HELL, or the BAD EDIT all come to mind, even though each of those recordings have wonderful, wonderful qualities.<\/p>\n Then there are incredibly well-intentioned efforts that just don\u2019t quite seem to work. There is a famous recent recording that is modeled on the performance history at the Meiningen Orchestra, which worked regularly with Brahms during his lifetime when Hans von Bulow was the conductor. This \u201cMeiningen\u201d tradition was handed down from generation to generation from Bulow, to his successor Steinbach and then on to Abendroth. Steinbach left something of a musical will in the form of a detailed essay dictated to his colleague Walter Blume (some of which is available in Performing Brahms<\/em> ed. Bernard Sherman and Michael Musgrave).<\/p>\n On this famous cd set, I almost get the feeling of listening to two performances inter-cut\u2014one naturally flowing for the musical instincts of the (very good) conductor, and then these moments where he seems to be saying \u201cah yes, Blume says to take time here.\u201d The effect can be jarring, like the transition to the recap of the first movement (around bars 333-4) where I must admit I laughed out loud at the lumpy and awkward tempo shift, when everything before seemed to be going so well. \u00a0It just goes to show you that good research does not always make for good performance. Again, you can\u2019t just add someone else\u2019s idea to your clipboard and paste it into to your performance. The end result betrays you every time.<\/p>\n In any case, I am skeptical of the Meiningen approach. I feel that Brahms affinity for von Bulow\u2019s orchestra stemmed from his respect for the uncommonly high standard than a sympathy for Bulow\u2019s rather Wagnerian attitude to rubato, or a preference for small groups. Brahms at one point rather caustically commented after playing one of his piano concertos with Bulow that he (Brahms) couldn\u2019t seem to slow down and speed up enough to satisfy the conductor. Also, the notion that Brahms wanted, rather than accepted, a smaller orchestra is belied by his asking a friend what he thought people would make of \u201cvon Bulow\u2019s little string quartet.\u201d Ouch.<\/p>\n Yes, he worked a lot with Meiningen, but he also worked a lot with the Vienna Philharmonic, which played his symphonies with groups of 100+ players. Like Beethoven, I think Brahms wanted his music to be accessible to as many sizes of orchestra, from 100 piece groups with doubled winds, down to 45 member chamber orchestras. Of course, one never hears large orchestra performances use half vs full string sections, something we know Beethoven asked for in large scale performances of his music, and that Brahms would have almost certainly expected in his time.<\/p>\n Brahms was a rubato player, and someone who expected flexibility, but he also was an architectural thinker, and this is the key for me in developing this performance- flexibility, but in proportion. No lurches. Nothing so big that it would really\u00a0deserve something like \u201cmeno mosso\u201d or \u201caccelerando\u201d in the score, but never falling into predictability or binding the music in a straight jacket. Those kind of very obvious tempo manipulations seem to just obliterate the sense of cumulative energy that this piece thrives on, so one just needs to stir the soup from time to time.<\/p>\n Anyway, I\u2019m working on it\u2026.<\/p>\n