The programme included two popular pieces. The first one, Violin Concerto in D major, was not at all successful at the time when it was written, which is hard to believe today. Beethoven?s only violin concerto sounded strange after the composer?s celebratory symphonies. This time, the greatly challenging piece was performed by the young Liszt award-winning violinist Kristóf Baráti. His road to success has been marked by numerous victories at competitions, many work opportunities abroad, and the very valuable Lady Harmsworth, a master violin made by Stradivari in 1703 which has been made available to him by the Stradivari Society of Chicago. The soloist, the conductor and the orchestra were in total harmony, resisting all excessive bravura and instead providing a truly contemplative, deeply thoughtful, restrained and at the same time emotional interpretation.
Dutoit is not the type of conductor to make superfluous moves. He controlled the orchestra with minimalist motions and, despite the great apparatus, they impressed with being extremely homogeneous in the tutti sections, and fine as the touch of a feather in the piano sections. The soloist proved to be an equal match to the orchestra, exactly as the composer originally intended. During the piano in the second movement, the 80 musicians playing on stage sounded as if they were only five people and the knocking pizzicatos, like rain drops, melded in with the violin as if they had united in an ethereal sound. The orchestra brought to life every character in the music and at the same time managed to avoid being aggressive.
Unbelievably soft bassoons, amazingly fine horns, a warm and soft bass (eight of them) made all the effort to help the violin drift along and above them. And so it did. Baráti?s playing was straight to the point and avoided superfluous effects. It was restrained and noble playing but still rich of colour. As far as I could tell, the great cadenzas that allowed his passion to flourish were all his own. Following the large cadenza in the middle movement, the passion further intensified in the third movement and this time the orchestra joined in. Baráti?s exceptionally beautiful performance called for an encore. He once again impressed audiences with his commanding virtuosity in Ysa?e's composition Obsession.
Dvořák?s Symphony No. 9 or New World Symphony is such a popular piece that one is inclined to ignore it. But then one has to repeatedly realise that there is good reason for its popularity. It reflects the Czech composer?s awe at arriving in New York where he was granted a directorial post at the National Conservatory. Besides having the capacity to impress and involve the listener, it is indeed a witty and great piece of music, whose rich texture includes fragments of folk tunes from home, mixed with Indian and black music that Dvořák encountered in America. It is a piece that easily attracts the audience?s appreciation even if performed without much finesse. But this was not the case with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Dutoit built up great contrasts that allowed the diverse musical characteristics to perfectly show themselves. The composition includes a number of solo parts that followed each other in such smooth transition that one could not stop being impressed. The heavenly clarinet solo compensated for a slightly less successful horn section at the start of the second movement, then it was followed by the magical sound of flutes, the all powerful but not aggressive trombones, the drone of the first violin, the excellent oboe and once again the amazing horns and basses, as if tossing a ball from one to another. The conductor?s choice of tempo was rather original, setting a much slower pace than usual, which then created a real explosion when it came to the more dynamic section. Joy, exultation, fear, homesickness, a thirst for adventure, fascination, every shade on the palette was allowed to flourish.
The secret to success was an excellent conductor and the centuries-long tradition of music playing in England. It is as simple as growing the lawn in Britain: enough to keep mowing and watering it for 500 years and there it is in its unique green glory. The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra seemed to play with such control and ease as if they had been doing it for centuries. Yet, they only started 66 years ago.
Author: Éva Mikes / Photo: Palace of Arts
