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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 27 Jan. - 2 Feb. 2000 Issue No. 466
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Only a bag of dust
By David Blake
Cairo Symphony Orchestra, Chamber Group, Schumann Piano Quartet in E flat Major Op. 47, Brahms Piano Quartet in G minor Op. 25, Cairo Opera House, Small Hall, 20 January
Once, it is rumoured, during the last ramshackle days of the Romanov empire an altercation broke out during the almost divine playing of the Pavlovski quartet at a rehearsal. At a certain point it increased in violence over a certain nuance. Great names were present. Tchaikovsky is reputed to have roared at the Grand Duke Cyril, "O do shut up, you dear old bag of dust". This was a missile fired direct into empire territory and did Tchaikovsky no good at a difficult point in his career. It also illustrates the almost mystical state in music in which the quartet is held, by musicians and composers. Beethoven, for one, devoted his most exalted talents to it in his last and greatest years.
These days Cairo music lovers owe an enormous debt to the Cairo Symphony Orchestra in encouraging some of its best players to give chamber music concerts of which this quartet was one. A high point.
Before a reasonably sized audience we were present at a musical event of the greatest importance, particularly that of 20 January, when we were given the two celebrated quartets by Schumann and Brahms.
This was music-making of great class and the result was an evening of absolutely exalted beauty and excitement.
They gave first the Schumann. Whatever your emotions regarding Schumann are, and they can be disturbing, there was no doubt about the quartet's feeling on this matter. Our bag of dust was pure gold -- gleaming, glittering, capricious. The very essence of Schumann.
This concert had no reason to take off for it was born aloft before it began. Schumann never sounded so strong, agitated and full of feeling. The cello sang and so did the entire quartet. It was breath catching -- simply praise and listen. It was easy and enjoyable, a sense of relaxation and fulfilment swept through the small hall.
But as it turned out this Schumann was only the overture. What came next was the Brahms quartet. We had the authentic, indelible colour of Brahms for once pure, with no smudgy effects but the full, muscular Brahms playing difficult enigmas on his favourite instrument. The result was an explosion of sheer high spirits, death-defying leaps out into space, almost ear-splitting fortissimi dying down to Brahms' 'grey-silk beauties'. Holy Joe was far away over the hill. We had him on a day off, secretive and resplendent.
The piano went through dream like complexities, direct trombone tones, apprehensive and then sleepy, an articulate leap into the full sun blazing ahead and unrepentedly physical.
It ended this music in the realms of the dance, nothing held it back, least of all the gifted players. What happened was raging, triumphant and enigmatic Brahms in punk mood, hair streaming, feet flying quicker than the notes, majestic music making and unforgettable.
Cairo Symphony Orchestra, Yasser Mokhtar (Solo Piano), Sergio Cardenas (Conductor), Cairo Opera House, Main Hall, 22 January
Franz Liszt
This concert, on paper, seemed to belong to that of the 20 January but in practice did not. Cardenas, the famous Mexico City conductor, opened the concert with Wagner's Prelude and Liebstod to the opera Tristan and Isolde.
The orchestra had swollen to exciting proportions. Cardenas is famous for his tone. So when the whispered excitement of the motifs stole around the house, whispering up out of the orchestral pit, we were in the right hands and not disappointed.
Cardenas is a good Wagnerian because from out of the notes themselves he produces an atmosphere, the right one and we were involved, from the beginning, in the greatest confrontation in music.
He made it sound this way and never disappointed us. He kept to its pulse. It fluctuated but never sagged even though his tempi and largesse would have given Karajan and Toscanini heart attacks.
Nothing mattered. The immense vessel, the thrill, the sheer unashamed size of the conception was honestly posed and the Cairo Symphony gave generously of itself. We were at sea with a master who knew the deeps. Nothing was allowed to impede the thrust even though the size of the conception almost caused problems. We had to take the right pauses in their proper lilt, which almost brought the prelude to a stop.
Cardenas had no problems. He swept on and never has the Cairo Opera sounded so exciting . The acoustic was relentlessly exact to the demands of the orchestra.
The Liebstod moved quicker. The immense broadening at the climax was like an Atlantic rogue-wave on the move.
This really was it -- Wagner. Richard had come in from his long banishment. The only thing lacking was the big curtain-opening scene with Isolde's words to her servant, "You there, Brangaene, where are we?" -- snap, the thread was tightened, the glimpse ended, but it was worth it. The music ended where it begins.
Wagner said the most rudely unrepeatable things to his wife Cosima, Liszt's daughter, about her father's music. After this performance of Liszt's Concerto No. 1 in E flat major for Piano and Orchestra had got going a bit, it sounded as if Wagner was right.
Conductor and pianist both seemed to go for the same theme in this extraordinary music -- speed, flash and fire -- and it never works with Liszt, it just turns him into a guilty party in the game of musical soliciting.
It is a bag full of tricks so trite and showbiz that it doesn't work at all. It is not street music. Liszt had a pure heart, even if the rest of his instincts were bordering on the carnival -- and he knew himself.
In the wonderful quartet played in the Small Hall on 20 January it was all very well for Brahms to go flying through the Csardas, hair flying, but for Liszt it did not work. His hair did not stream. He had none at all. He was bald and so was the performance of the concerto.
Yasser Mokhtar is a brilliant pianist, that is his problem. He belongs really to Bach and Beethoven, if he is in the right mood to Tchaikovsky, but his hands don't seem to obey the demands made upon them. His tone thins under pressure and Liszt is all pressure, formula one.
Great Liszt players forget the fire and flash and go for tone. Mokhtar, however, seems to lack the Liszt milk. Alfred Brendel and Arrau, in their wildest youth, had the milk of kindness and released floods of it. They loved this alluring, captivating master of the sexy overture. Mokhtar makes our mouths water with what he will one day do with Bach's 48 and the music of Couperin. For Liszt there are no plush, quiet corners.
The rest of this concert was Mexican history which musically, at this showing, started with Esperon and went on through the historic dates of Mexico's thrilling history. No need for any caution. We went straight into big tone, past memories, war, smoke and roses like a Dolores del Rio film. We lost everything, even the most beautiful woman in the movies.
