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A little mourning music London
Queen Elizabeth Hall
01/31/2000 -
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Divertimento K. 136, John Ireland
Minuet from A Dowland Suite, William Walton Passacaglia: Death of
Falstaff from Henry V, Gerald Finzi Dies natalis, John Woolrich
A Litany for Oboe and strings, Richard Strauss
Metamorphosen
Nicholas Daniel (conductor/oboe), Ian Bostridge (tenor)
Britten Sinfonia The Cambridge-based Britten Sinfonia does not only share the East Anglian
roots of its namesake. To judge from this fragmented but fascinating
programme titled "Innocence and war" it also collectively shares his
cerebral and demanding approach to emotions and his virtuoso sense of
musical form and texture.
The programme seems at first to divide into two parts, "innocence" before
the interval, after Finzi's Dies natalis, and "war" in the
explicitly mournful second part. But only the teenage Mozart's
Divertimento could be said to be fully innocent.
Metamorphosen, Strauss's war-time lament for the destroyed
opera-houses of Germany (when he seems to have regarded events from
Kristallnacht onwards as mere impediments to a quiet life), has a sinister
specious innocence. The English works, where the Britten Sinfonia seem most
at home, combine elegy and danger, or at least knowingness, in various
degrees.
Two short pieces, Ireland's Minuet and Walton's Passacaglia,
embodied problematic innocence, self-conscious childlikeness or simplicity,
the essence of Falstaff. The centre-piece, Finzi's Dies natalis
addressed the paradox of innocence directly: the narrator reflects
painfully on his sense of corruption in the presence of the new-born child.
Ian Bostridge was expressive, finding speech-like inflections and dramatic
gestures within the same musical line. His pained understanding was
perfect.
John Woolrich's A Litany, for oboe and strings, explored more
abstract textures of mourning. Nicholas Daniel directed as well as playing
the solo oboe part, an amazing exploration of sound-colours in an
instrument normally regarded as limited in its potential effects, played
against similarly extreme string textures. The following Strauss seemed
almost as abstract, rough even, lacking the lushness you might expect. But
it was extremely moving.
H.E. Elsom
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