Not particularly showy, but gorgeously lyrical, Beethoven's Violin Concerto shines in the hands of Clara-Jumi Kang who confesses that she loves Beethoven "too much". The Auckland Philharmonia under Giordano Bellincampi also give us works by Leonie Holmes and Igor Stravinsky.
Clara-Jumi Kang Photo: supplied
HOLMES: For just a little moment...
This performance of For Just a Little Moment... is something of a Covid redo – its premiere in November 2020 was put together under very different circumstances. Cast your minds back to that strange time when things were opening up but we couldn’t actually attend concerts. The Auckland Philharmonia was in the Auckland Town Hall with Giordano Bellincampi at the helm for a live broadcast, but there was no audience in the hall.
Leonie Holmes gets a repeat performance with a full Town Hall audience to enjoy her musical response to a few lines in Tessa Stephens’ poem Cycles:
'And life is tasted on the tongue
For just a little moment
Then, time’s toll must be paid
Matter melts, dries to dust
Shimmers into nothing
Yet something.
Hint of a new dawn.'
BEETHOVEN: Violin Concerto
This work sits at the centre of canonical repertoire for the violin, but unusually for a piece by Beethoven, it was not well-known in his lifetime. Written in 1806 and influenced by the French school of violin playing with such figures as Rodolphe Kreutzer, the premiere performance by Franz Clement was lacklustre to say the least. Beethoven had written his only Violin Concerto in something of a rush, and Clement is said to have sightread much of that first performance. Hardly the stuff of a successful premiere, and Beethoven struggled to build any public interest in it. It wasn’t until 1844 – sixteen years after Beethoven’s death – that Mendelssohn revived the work in London with 13-year-old virtuoso Joseph Joachim on violin. Joachim later declared it the greatest German violin concerto. Even still, a full score wasn’t readily available until 1894.
Beethoven’s Concerto was a piece slightly out of step with its own time – never quite right for the early Romantic performer or audience. It was too long, too lyrical, maybe a bit too French, and too technically challenging – yet it had none of the showmanship of other violin showstoppers of the day.
This combination of technical skill and lyricism is safe in the hands of a violinist like Clara-Jumi Kang. Recent reviews have praised her immaculate technical delivery while also praising the way she balances grandeur with gentleness and warmth. Beethoven is one of her specialities, and back in 2010 she said: “I love Beethoven too much - If this concerto didn't exist, maybe I wouldn't love the violin as much.” In 2021, Kang recorded the full cycle of Beethoven Violin Sonatas with Sunwook Kim on piano.
BACH: Violin Sonata No 2 in A minor BWV1003, III Andante
An encore from Clara-Jumi Kang.
STRAVISNKY: Petrushka
Petrushka is the second of Stravinsky's trio of career-defining works written for Sergei Diaghilev and the Ballet Russe along with The Firebird and The Rite of Spring. All premiered in Paris.
The ballets are based on Russian folklore with Petrushka telling the tale of three sideshow puppets brought to life at the 1830 Shrovetide Fair. This is carnival season with all its last dash hedonism before the piety of Lent sets in. And Petrushka is that same irascible puppet known in various guises across Europe: in England, he is Punch and the Russian Petrushka is just as much of a trickster and rogue.
This performance is of Stravinsky’s 1947 concert adaption, but while he always conceived of the music in purely concert terms, the theatrical image of the puppet was quickly part of the composition process: Stravinsky later wrote: “I had in my mind a distinct picture of a puppet, suddenly endowed with life, exasperating the patience of the orchestra with diabolical cascades of arpeggios. The orchestra in turn retaliates with menacing trumpet blasts.”
Stravinsky’s signature Petrushka Chord – C major and F# major played together represents the dual characters of Petrushka. Puppet and human.
Recorded by RNZ Concert, Auckland Town Hall, 24 November 2024
Producer: Tim Dodd
Sound enginieer: Adrian Hollay
