Viola jokes are a staple of musical life. (Some of them are very good.) Ultimately, though, the joke is on the jokesters, because the viola is a marvelous instrument. Sofia Gubaidulina, the Russian composer born in 1931, has long been a friend to violists. She once said, “The peculiar mysteriousness and veiled quality of the viola’s timbre has always been something of an acoustic enigma to me, and an object of rapture.”
Gubaidulina wrote a viola concerto in the mid-1990s, and it was heard at the concert of the New York Philharmonic last night. On the podium was Jaap van Zweden, the orchestra’s music director (for a couple more weeks). Doing the solo work was Antoine Tamestit, a Frenchman. Ten years ago, Tamestit played a recital in the Kaplan Penthouse, at Lincoln Center. An unaccompanied recital. This was part of the Mostly Mozart Festival (R.I.P.). An unaccompanied-viola recital is astonishing, and so was Tamestit.
Gubaidulina’s concerto is in one movement. It begins with a cadenza. Few must be the concertos that begin with a cadenza. The New York Philharmonic programmed one last month: the Violin Concerto of Alberto Ginastera, composed in 1963.
To my ear, or nose, Gubaidulina’s concerto smells Soviet. It has that characteristic fear, a quality of being hunted, or possibly hunted. There is a big orchestra on the stage, but the piece seems intimate, chamber-like. It seems private, rather than meant for the public. There is repetition (or minimalism, if you like). Annoying repetition? No, not in my judgment. Eventually, the piece becomes angry or exciting—stirred up. A hornets’ nest has been kicked. Virtuosity is required from the soloist.
Antoine Tamestit was very well prepared. He was meticulous, alert, and earnest. Just the sort of soloist a composer would hope for, I would imagine.
As he was playing, I looked at the violists. What were they thinking? Were they thinking that he was doing their instrument proud? Were they thinking, “Why not me?”
Tamestit played an encore, which he announced from the stage. If I understood him correctly, he played some combination of a Ukrainian lullaby and Bach. In any event, it was beautiful, soulful. Several of the violists positively beamed.
Monsieur Tamestit then sat in the audience, for the second half of the concert. A woman two rows behind him asked for his autograph.
On this second half was Mozart’s Requiem (in the Süssmayr completion). The first time I ever heard Jaap van Zweden conduct the New York Philharmonic, I believe, he conducted Mozart: the Sinfonia concertante. He made me think of a phrase: “just rightness.”
For twenty-five years, I reviewed James Levine. Many, many times, I reviewed him in Mozart—and I would often speak of the conductor’s “just rightness.” Tempos, phrasing, weight, spirit—they were just right.
Van Zweden began the Requiem with a tempo giusto, i.e., a just-right tempo. It was brisk but not rushed. It breathed. Throughout the Requiem, Van Zweden was straightforward and natural. Nothing was dainty or precious or cute. You could listen to the Mozart Requiem—with all its brilliance and feeling—and not an interpretation (an obvious one).
Serving as the chorus was Musica Sacra, worthy of the task. The four vocal soloists, too, were worthy. Let me single out the soprano, about whom I wrote last season, when Van Zweden led the Philharmonic in the St. Matthew Passion of Bach:
Our soprano was Amanda Forsythe—lovely and unaffected. So natural, her singing. It was “like falling off a log,” as I once heard Leontyne Price say in a master class. (She was complimenting a tenor who had sung “Una furtiva lagrima.”) From Ms. Forsythe, there was no fuss, no muss. She just opened her mouth and sang, as though anybody could do it. Bach’s beautiful, twisting lines were a pleasure from her.
Similar words could be written about Ms. Forsythe last night. I have a question, however—an honest question, not a criticism disguised as a question: Could some of her “straight tones,” in the upper register, have tolerated a touch more vibrato? (I think so.)
After the Requiem—or after Süssmayr’s completion—Van Zweden launched right into Ave verum corpus. Attacca. In other words, Ave verum corpus was Van Zweden’s own completion.
(Ave verum corpus, remember, is the sublime motet that Mozart wrote in June 1791, several months before beginning the Requiem.)
I thought of Bruckner and his Symphony No. 9. He knew he would not live to finish it. He thought about tacking on his Te Deum, as the fourth movement—but decided against (wisely, I think).
From Jaap van Zweden and his forces, Ave verum corpus was a simple, profound prayer. This was an outstanding night of music, all around.