SLIMMED-DOWN STRAVINSKY STILL DAZZLES

CBSO at Symphony Hall ★★★★
You wait for ages for a bus and then two come along or, in this case, works by Hindemith. Having been delighted last month with the CBSO's masterly 'Symphonic Metamorphosis of the Themes by Carl Maria von Weber' - performances of the German master's music being in the blue moon region of frequency - here was an exquisitely crafted powerhouse performance of the 'Concert Music for Strings and Brass'. Hindemith ought to have inserted the words "Lots of" in the title for this was no modest chamber piece. A huge array of brass, including a horn section, was perched impressively all along the rear of the platform, looking down on a massive string section, with first and second fiddles six desks deep. The opening direction is "mit Kraft" (with power) and the CBSO obliged in what sounded like the opening skirmish of a battle. You want loud? We'll give you loud... as the brass section brayed, roared and sought to batter the strings into submission. The sting section replied with their own guerrilla tactics, scampering, twittering, quick and subtle, out-manoeuvring their heavyweight opponents. It was a fascinating tussle with conductor Jac van Steen mediating like a referee in a closely-fought boxing match. The second movement brought a tentative truce and a gentle amicable middle section, like the Christmas Day football match between the English and Germans in the World War I trenches, before an exciting all-stops-out conclusion. Hindemith and van Steen made a fine match, both excellent craftsmen, eschewing frolics and flummery.
If the CBSO's wind and percussion sections were not needed here they were the focus of a flamboyant and phantasmagorical performance of Stravinsky's 'Petrushka'. This was the 1947 revision rather than the 1911 original. Stravinsky, always claiming the cultural high ground, said the revisions made the work less like a ballet and more a concert piece; there was increased contrapuntal complexity and subtle tempo changes. The motivation was actually venal not aesthetic: Stravinsky wanted to extend his copyright to exploit lucrative American performances.  He insisted that the 1947 revision was used for an animated 'Petrushka' film in 1956, garnering him $10,000 in royalties.  “What of it,” he wrote – “I’m doing it for money. Yes, sir!” The orchestra is slimmed down and I missed the plebian roughness of the cornets, the tinkling glockenspiel and most of all the offstage snare drum and tenor drum which rattle out raucously to announce the scene changes, although the CBSO percussionist enthusiastically ensured we didn't miss the point. All of small consequence given the vigour, vehemence and variety of colour on display here with every nuance of Stravinsky's exquisite orchestration laid out for our delight. The Shrove-Tide Fair opening hustled, bustled and there was great fun spotting the intersecting musical strands. In Petrushka's room we understand his infatuation with the Ballerina - who could resist her when represented by Marie-Christine  Zupancic's sensuous seductive flute? There were numerous succulent musical morsels to savour; Oliver Janes' mournful lovesick clarinet, Nikolaj Henriques' parping bassoon and the comic little eructation from Simon Davies' contrabassoon. Jac van Steen was the unflappable ring-master in charge of Stravinsky's side-show musical wonders.
The second half got underway full-stream ahead with Honegger's six-minute animated train journey 'Pacific 231'. Brass and basses hissed, wheezed and clanked the train into life and then we were off accelerating, the scenery whizzing by and rapidly arrived at our destination. Honegger's ingenious orchestration and panache made our native equivalent - Vivian Ellis's 'Coronation Scot' - sound rather quaint and cosy. Benjamin Grosvenor was the soloist in Ravel's Piano Concerto in G Major and his reading shifted the focus of attention to the central movement's introspective Adagio assai. Normally it is the jazz-influenced, high-speed and raucous outer movements, from the fruitful New York meeting of musical minds between Ravel and George Gershwin, that grab both listeners, performers and audience by the lapels. The slow movement though is pure Ravel, the circus and nightclubs are closed, the music is closer to Ravel's 'Pavane pour une infante défunte'. The party's over, the balloons deflated, streamers abandoned on the floor, only dregs left in the champagne glasses and the soloist meditates at the keyboard, alone and palely loitering. Grosvenor was superb here, I've never heard the music so desolate, the wrong-note-romanticism so poignant. In the outer movements he lacked the last ounce of pizzaz and chutzpah the work demands. It was Grosvenor's bad luck that last year's blistering performance here by Fazil Say was so clear in one's memory.
Norman Stinchcombe