Pasadena's all-Beethoven program may not be for all tastes

By Truman C. Wang
October 15, 2003

JORGE MESTER conducting

ILYA KALER, violinist
Pasadena Symphony

Saturday, October 11, 2003  at Pasadena Civic Auditorium

PASADENA, CA – As far as opening nights go, this was a pretty serious, highfalutin affair.  Upon entering the foyer, one saw an audiologist’s booth with a sign “Beethoven was deaf at 28!”  On the program was the Grand Fugue, Op.133, Beethoven’s highly cerebral and enigmatic work that only a music critic would love.  Clearly, the emphasis of the evening was on education, not entertainment (the latter was the theme of the posh dinner party across the street afterwards). 

Throughout the evening, we learned from Executive Director Karine Beesley the importance of community support for the arts.  And from Maestro Jorge Mester, we learned, if only vaguely, how to unravel the puzzle that is the Grand Fugue.  In the end, however, there was an aspect of music that can neither be taught nor analyzed; namely, the music’s spiritual content.  This last element, I felt, was largely missing from the concert.

The Leonora No. 3 was the best work on the program, lovingly and fervently conducted by Maestro Mester, that also featured Jason Garner’s superb offstage trumpet.

The dreaded (and to many, dreadful) Grand Fugue in B-flat major is, for me, Beethoven’s dramatic experiment with the classic sonata form by superimposing the strict rules of the fugue over not one, but all three of its sections (exposition, development and recapitulation).  In so doing, Beethoven effectively stretched both genres to their exhaustive, breaking limits.  The effect for the listener (myself at least) is disquieting at first, but ultimately exhilarating and cathartic.

I am speaking, of course, the string quartet that Beethoven wrote, not the later orchestral version by conductor/composer Felix Weingartner (1863-1942).  It has to be said that Weingartner lived in a time when conductors had no qualms about ‘improving’ old works in order to make them more palatable for modern consumption. (Another example is Mahler’s re-orchestration of Beethoven’s symphonies.)   The high spirituality of the fugue’s motto theme, in all its glorious transformations, is easily lost in the sea of strings in the orchestral version.  On the other hand, the violent, jarring clash between this motto theme and the rhythmic, wide-leaping counter-subject is softened and diluted by the addition of strings.  The Pasadena strings played with great precision and verve, but left a spiritual void in this work that great playing alone could not remedy.

The D-major Violin Concerto was downright disappointing.  Maestro Mester’s somnambulant reading and dragged-out tempos made no distinction of the main theme’s myriad moods.  The many rallentando’s (sudden slowing down) at the end of phrases sounded mannered and inelegant. Russian violinist Ilya Kaler played with a lovely singing tone throughout, and seemed equally disinterested in any show of passion.

On his own, however, Mr. Kaler gave a heartfelt encore of the Gavotte, from J.S. Bach’s E-major Partita (BWV 1006).  Its enchanting beauty provided a much needed spiritual lift at the end of the evening.

This concert will be broadcast on K-Mozart 105.1FM, November 2, 2003 at 8pm.  For tickets to other concerts of the Pasadena Symphony 2003-2004 season, call (626) 793-7172 or visit www.pasadenasymphony.org

 

Truman C. Wang is editor of Classical Voice.

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