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Recital
15 March 2005
Barbican Hall, London
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Also at the following venues:
14th Vienna Musikverein
16th Frankfurt am Main - Alte Oper
18th Madrid Auditorio Nacional del Música
20th Salzburg Arena
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Conductor, Franz Welser-Möst
Simon Keenlyside
Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester
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Mahler: Eight Lieder
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· Ich atmet’ einen linden Duft (I breathed a sweet scent)
· Des Antonius van Padua Fischpredigt (Saint Anthony of Padua’s sermon to the fishes)
· Ich ging mit Lust (I walked with joy)
· Blicke mir nicht in die Lieder (Do not spy on my songs)
· Fruhlingsmorgen (Spring morning)
· Liebst du um Schonheit (If you love for beauty)
· Um Mitternacht (At midnight)
· Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen (I am lost to the world)
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Strauss: An Alpine Symphony ..
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What the critics say
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Tim Ashley for the Guardian
Tuesday March 22, 2005
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/critic/review/0,,1443301,00.html
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”Keenlyside was clearly having an off night. Many of the quintessential Keenlyside traits were present in his performance - the confessional intimacy, the macho-yet-vulnerable stance - but he looked unwell and unhappy on the platform”
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Neil Fisher for The Times
TWELVE double basses, ten horns and six trombones — the European army that is the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester on its Easter tour makes a big enough impact before it's even played a single note. Then again, you don't pack lightly for An Alpine Symphony, a journey so replete with grandiose climaxes that an ensemble any smaller would probably tumble off Strauss's mountain before they got near the summit.
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Thankfully there was a warm-up before that heroic ascent, with eight Mahler lieder offering a contrast to the bombast to come. The baritone Simon Keenlyside was our guide through these murkier waters, and offered keen word-painting and mellifluous vocalism. Saint Anthony of Padua's Sermon to the Fishes was flecked with just the right level of sardonic swaggering; the dynamic control he found in the transporting depths of Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen was impeccably judged.
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But there were also depths Keenlyside left unplumbed. The boyish awkwardness he employed for Ich atmet' einen linden Duft and the early song Ich ging mit Lust seemed more suitable for his tragicomic Papageno than Mahler: the effect was emotionally distancing.
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It was difficult, too, to see exactly how the orchestra's accompaniment meshed with this interpretation. Franz Welser-Möst hurried through the tenderness of Blicke mir nicht in die Lieder and remained reluctant to dwell in the more intense textures of the Rückert settings.
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Then came the army's Alpine assault, and a greater clarity of purpose was immediately obvious. An Alpine Symphony is a glittering showcase for an orchestra's powers, and the twentysomethings of the GMJO rose to its technical challenges. Horns forged their noble route through the forest assuredly, our five trumpets soared thrillingly into the stratospheric heights of the mountain's glacier, and there was a true Straussian schwung to the outpourings of the violins.
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Welser-Möst made the most of these highlights, but still left one wanting more. Where was the sense of hushed wonderment in the oboe solo on the mountain summit, or the menacing calm before the storm unleashed on our resilient climber? The key to ensuring that An Alpine Symphony is more than just a series of effects lies in these
stiller episodes, but Welser-Möst largely threw their impact away. Time for this well-drilled army to march to a mellower beat.
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An extract from the Independent
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“An interesting selection of eight Mahler songs found the Royal Opera's current Papageno, Simon Keenlyside, bird-watching rather than bird-catching. Keenlyside - a wonderfully natural stage animal - is a most uncomfortable concert performer, and whilst we might initially have bought him as ideal casting for one of Mahler's typically wayfaring lads - his hand in his pocket, his shambling physical demeanour suggestive of shyness and unworldliness - the constant fidgeting, during and between songs, became distracting.”
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”Nor did Keenlyside seem especially comfortable vocally. There were, of course, the rapt ascents into his lovely head voice as if scenting the fragrances of nature around him, but though, as ever, the German texts were clear and well-enunciated, the characterisation was rather uneventful, casual, nervy and short-winded. While Keenlyside did find an appropriately heroic vocal stance for the Rückert song "Um Mitternacht", the vulnerability and laudable restraint he brought to the heartbreaking "Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen" was marred by an inexcusable breath in the most beautiful phrase of all. It didn't help that the orchestra - for all the delicacy of the playing, was at full strength. Fragile pianissimi just aren't possible in these numbers.”
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The Independent on Sunday
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“So to a brief appreciation of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, whose beautifully responsive performance of Mahler's Ruckert Lieder with a snuffly Simon Keenlyside showed that even the largest of orchestras can accompany an ailing singer with the delicacy of a pianist. In the short-breathed exhortations of Des Antonius von Padua Fischpredigt I wondered whether Keenlyside's cold was too compromising, but I would not have missed his account of Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen for all the Lemsip in Leamington Spa. Conductor Franz Welser-Most's distinctive lightness of touch was clearly inspiring to his pan-European band of Wunderkinder. Basses, horns, bassoons and upper strings inclined to the rhythm like a chamber ensemble, lending sprung intimacy to Strauss's rarely performed (rather silly) Alpine Symphony. Their solos were exquisite.”
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