VoxCarnyx

City Halls, Glasgow

At least the errant mobile phone momentarily delaying the opening of Bruckner’s Symphony No 9 in D minor was in the right key. If audible to those listening at home to the live Radio 3 broadcast, be assured this belligerent and persistent D was not part of the some newly discovered revision of the symphony by a composer prone to such second thoughts. That, of course, could never be in this case here, as he died before completing this final symphony.

As it happened, Thursday’s conductor Alpesh Chauhan was quick-thinking. He not only waited for the ring tone to cease, but had the presence of mind to segue perfectly into the trenchant solemnity of Bruckner’s opening movement, effectively creating art out of an accident. (The last time I witnessed something like this was with the same orchestra in a Mahler Symphony, where the lonesome final note on double basses was matched uncannily by a passing plane, the inevitable Doppler effect unfortunately turning fortuitousness into farce.)

That aside, this was a Bruckner bicentenary performance by the BBC SSO that made its own luck. Chauhan weighed in with bullish bravado, which ensured the symphony’s mountainous peaks towered magnificently over the expansive landscape. At the other end of the spectrum he stood back from the fray, tempting the strings in particular to voice their own verdant response to the lower-lying pastures. But the middle ground was messy, imperfections of tempo change, attack and intonation (especially the woodwind), that emphasised the potential pitfalls of Bruckner interpretation, and the need for an unstoppable sense of trajectory to counter the composer’s block-like mentality.

To his credit, Chauhan’s Scherzo was a particular delight, its puckish Trio sounding like Prokofiev before his time. Either side, the extant outer movements acted as solid bookends, as cathartic as they were despairing. The hushed conclusion had question mark written all over it. Had he lived, where would Bruckner have taken us next?

Chauhan had already taken us to Italy and Russia, opening with two Puccini Intermezzi from his operas Madama Butterfly and Manon Lescaut before charting unfamiliar Tchaikovsky territory in his symphonic fantasy Fatum (Fate), a work the composer chose to destroy after its second performance, but which was reconstructed after his death. Thankfully so, for it is particular interesting, its heraldic power-driven unisons and punctuating ballistic chords not unlike a Puccini opera opening. We heard a volatile work, heated and febrile, if swithering ambivalently between operatic and symphonic ambitions. 

No such question with the Puccini, though aspects of Chauhan’s performances seemed emotionally constrained in this concert hall context. The Madama Butterfly Intermezzo opened magnificently, its heaving expectant anacrusis giving way to swooning lyrical enchantment and exotic colours, the players adding whistling to emulate the twittering birds. Principal cellist Rudi de Groote’s molten solo, in particular, set in motion a moody Manon Lescaut extract, even if later tutti moments seemed tempered by ragged entries. Nor, to be honest, did this performance absolutely capture the all-pervading resonance and glow Puccini’s music ought to inspire.

Ken Walton

This concert was broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, and is available for a further 30 days on BBC Sounds. The SSO performs Bruckner 9 again at The Glasshouse (formerly The Sage), Gateshead, on Sunday 3 March