Beethoven’s Emperor gets full Nelson Freire treatment
BRAZILIAN pianist Nelson Freire captured all the magnificence and poetry when he tackled Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto in Sydney.
Wentworth Courier
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BEETHOVEN wrote his fifth piano concerto The Emperor — not his title for it — during Napoleon’s siege of Vienna when he was sheltering in a cellar using pillows to protect his already damaged hearing.
To listen to it you wouldn’t think that such a magnificent and beautiful work could be conceived in such trying circumstances, but then we are talking about Beethoven who composed some of his most wonderful works in the silence of deafness. This work, in fact, had to be premiered by another pianist and Ludwig was at pains to write out all the notes of the cadenza so it could be heard as he would have performed it himself.
All the notes were there in this performance by Brazilian veteran virtuoso Nelson Freire with a highly in-form Sydney Symphony Orchestra under the baton of frequent visitor, Scottish conductor Donald Runnicles.
The first two movements were quite magical. Freire has a wonderful command of shape and poetic line and in the gorgeous second movement, after its noble theme is announced by the orchestra, he wove it into something to treasure.
MOMENTUM
Runnicles had the orchestra breathing as one in the gently pulsing string accompaniment as the piano embroidered around the melody.
The last movement, which follows straight on from the slow movement introduced by hanging piano chords, was less effective. Freire seemed at times to be in a rush, although still in command of the relentless forward momentum of the finale.
This was not a muscular performance, more that of a seasoned interpreter intent on bringing out the poetic nuances.
For an encore Freire gave an enchanting account of an arrangement of Gluck’s Melodie from Orfeo ed Euridice.
SSO subscribers will no doubt have seen the orchestra’s clever video promo for the 2018 season of Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries in which members of the french horn section arrive at the Opera House by various modes of transport, including a ferry and, in principal Ben Jacks’ case, a skateboard.
There were no skateboards at this concert — at least not in the auditorium — but the horns, boosted to eight for the second half, were in cracking form when that irresistible excerpt from Die Walkure opened the five-part Orchestral highlights from The Ring of the Nibelung. Wagner approved the use of these excerpts as short and cheaper way of promoting his four operas — a 50-minute show reel of a 15-hour epic.
Runnicles showed why he is one of the most respected of the current crop of Wagnerians, injecting plenty of energy into the spectacular blazing brass passages of Brunnhilde’s Immolation, while pegging it back to the gossamer-like strings and gorgeous bird calls from the woodwind department in the Forest Murmurs section from Siegfried.
It makes for a mouth-watering prospect later this month when he conducts Mahler’s 10th symphony, coupled with the return to Sydney of Swedish mezzo Anne Sofie von Otter singing songs by Schubert.
The Freire concert is repeated at 8pm on Friday, March 16, and Saturday, March 17, at Sydney Opera House.
DETAILS
● CONCERT: SSO with Nelson Freire
● WHERE: Sydney Opera House Concert Hall
● WHEN: Wednesday, March 14