Concert Review: Remastering the Romantics

Pablo Heras-Casado conducts the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Pablo Heras-Casado demonstrates his ninja podium technique.
Photo by Jean-François Leclerq © 2011 PabloHerasCasado.com

Thursday night's concert at Mostly Mozart built a bridge between the instruments of the 18th century and the early Romanticism of the 19th. Under the baton of Pablo Heras-Casado, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra offered a program of Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn--conventional composers given new life through the use of period instruments.

The Freiburg Baroque Orchestra is celebrating its silver anniversary this year. Founded by music students in this university town near the Black Forest, this group's choice of archaic instruments seems somehow in keeping with the medieval, cobbled streets of their home city. Wooden flutes, natural horns, and a crisp, refreshing approach to music by Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn made for an entertaining addition to the usual Mostly Mozart schedule.

The program opened with Schubert's light-hearted Third Symphony. The characteristic orchestrations and long melodic lines that characterize this composer sounded fresh and new played by the Freiburgers, as if thick coatings of linseed oil were suddenly scraped from a masterwork of art. The music sprang with robust, Romantic life, from the slow, thoughtful introduction to the forceful Allegro with its complex clarinet part.

Concert Review: Beethoven's Heirs

Leif Ove Andsnes at Carnegie Hall

A fearless artist: Leif Ove Andsnes confronts the flood. Photo © EMI Classics.

The Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes took Carnegie Hall by storm this week, in a Thursday night recital that explored the relationship between Beethoven, Brahms and Schoenberg. The concert featured Mr. Andsnes signature style, a bold attack with the left hand and agile figurations with the right, combined with liberal use of the pedal to make the Steinway sing.

The concert opened with a charging "Waldstein" sonata, its opening ostinato taken at a rapid clip by Mr. Andsnes. He leant on the pedal for the legato runs up and down the keyboard, presenting a kaleidoscope of emotions for the listener to process. Suddenly, the movement would stop, and the second, soft singing theme would emerge, quietly at first and then with more confidence.

The hesitating introduction to the finale led into a rich, singing final movement with the famous, expansive theme proudly stated in the upper register. Mr. Andsnes balanced this famous movement expertly, racing along the keyboard as he drove the work into its final chords.

The four Ballades by Johannes Brahms followed. Mr. Andsnes showed how these early Brahms works, played together, form a sort of symphony for solo piano: four movements of a cohesive whole. He found the Romantic coloration in this music, whether in the first Ballade or the lyrical passages in the later movements of this "symphony."

Schoenberg's Six Little Piano Pieces last only seven minutes, but mere mention of this innovative 20th century composer is enough to scare concert-goers. Mr. Andsnes played with lyricism and a jazzy flair, bringing out the inner beauty of these little gems.

The concert climaxed with Beethoven's 32nd, and final piano sonata. Op. 111 is a challenging work. Like the Brahms ballades, this two-movement sonata packs enough musical ideas for an entire symphony. In fact, the works bears some points of similarity to Beethoven's Fifth in that genre, as the composer revisits the tonal conflict between the keys of C minor and C Major.

Mr. Andsnes brought a fiery approach to the first movement, conjuring up the stormy figures and near-fugal textures common to late Beethoven. The second movement was far more lyrical. The slow Arietta was played with quiet, poetic restraint. The transition to the Bach-like central section was handled smoothly. Mr. Andsnes saved his finest playing for the last third of the final movement, a series of descending figures: the sound of Beethoven at play. The last bars died away softly--the sound of transcendence and a kind of cosmic bliss.

Three encores followed. A welcome exploration of György Kurtág's "Scraps of a Colinda Melody--Faintly Recollected" featured a gossamer-like series of short, lifted keystrokes to make the two ends of the instrument talk to each other in easy dialogue. A rugged, cheerful performance of Chopin's a-flat waltz was next. The trio of treats concluded with Schumann's second Romance, played with deep profundity and understanding. Beethoven would have been proud.

Concert Review: There is Nothing like a Dame

Mitsuko Uchida at Carnegie Hall

Even Knight Commanders have a sense of humor: Dame Mitsuko Uchida.

The acclaimed concert pianist Dame Mitsuko Uchida made a triumphant appearance at Carnegie Hall on Friday night. The program: a celebration of the pianistic innovations of Beethoven, Schumann, and Chopin. Although these are three familiar composers, Ms. Uchida's interpretation made these familiar works sound cutting-edge.

For two hours, Ms. Uchida (currently touring to promote a CD of Schumann recordings) enthralled the capacity audience, which included last-minute audience seating on the famed Carnegie stage. Throughout, she played these Romantic works with a delicate, neo-classical approach, leaning on the pedal and brushing the keys with a gossamer touch.


On her previous visit to Carnegie Hall, Ms. Uchida played the last three Beethoven sonatas. For this concert, she chose No. 27, the two-movement E minor sonata, which stands on the cusp between the composer's 'heroic' middle period and the experimentation of his last years. Hers was a fresh interpretation, playing Beethoven's passages with a gentle, flowing legato Even though she bareley seemed to move her hands, a shower of silver sounds poured forth.

Robert Schumann's Davidsbündlertanze (Dances of the Group of David) chronicle the internal struggle between Schumann's two writing aliases: Florestan and Eusubius. Ms. Uchida played the "Florestan" pieces with playful aggression, attacking the fast tempos with zeal. The more sedate "Eusebius" works were more reflective, with her trademark, limpid approach to the music. As the two "voices" alternated throughout the 18 dances, a fascinating internal argument developed, allowing the listener to almost hear Schumann's subconscious thoughts.

The second half of the evening opened with the rarely played Prelude in C Sharp Minor by Frederic Chopin. This is one of Chopin's most groundbreaking compositions: a complex, amorphous little piece with only hints of melody in its shifting tonality. It served as a true prelude, to the Sonata No. 3 in B Minor, the last, and most popular of that composer's entries in the genre.

Once again, legato and an emphasis on the lyricism in Chopin's writing governed Ms. Uchida's performance of the heroic first movement. The brief scherzo was enchanting, a miniature masterpiece. She stretched out the tempo in the Andante, taking a languid tour through Chopin's imagination. The final Rondo was played at dizzying speed, nearly slipping in one of the pell-mell runs down the keyboard. The encore was Schumann's "Aveu" from Carnival and the Andante from Mozart's Sonata No. 15 in C Major, played with liquid grace.