Organization

Conductor

Christian Karlsen

Singer

Lawrence Power

Soloist

Odense Symfoniorkester

Brahm's 2nd symphony

Odense

Denmark

Odense Koncerthus

Brahm's 2nd symphony: Concert

Public

Concert

Approved

Lili Boulangers alt for korte liv gav slet ikke tid og plads til al den skønne musik, den unge, franske kvinde indeholdt; de værker, hun nåede at få på papir inden sin død som 24-årig, gav løfte om så meget mere. Hendes farvel til verden blev den med rystende håndskrift nedfældede D’un soir triste, der har symfonisk mæle og en dybt imponerende modenhed for en helt ung komponist. Boulangers dystre romantik får følgeskab af et helt nyt værk, nemlig Steingrimur Rohloff s dobbeltkoncert for to bratscher, skrevet specifikt til vores solobratschist, Rafaell Altino, og hans musikalske legekammerat, verdensstjernen Lawrence Powers. Rohloff er stålsat på altid at samarbejde i dybden med musikerne, og når han kender kunstnerne, graver han de små juveler i musikerskabet frem i lyset. Under titlen “Doppelgängerkonzert” leger han med de muligheder, der ligger i at have to ensklingende, vildt virtuose solister: ekkoer, skygger og resonans udforskes i en instrumentalkoncert, der også indeholder teatralske elementer, samt udforskning af koncertrummets akustik.
Koncerten sluttes af med Brahms’ idylliske og varme 2. symfoni, der kan smelte ethvert vinterfrossent hjerte, og som byder på nogle af Brahms’ allerfineste melodier.

 

Du kan læse, hvad Katrine Nordland skrev om Brahms’ 2. symfoni, sidst vi spillede værket, her:

Med sin selvkritiske natur og tendens til at føle sig misforstået fandt Brahms aldrig fred med, at hans 2. symfoni hurtigt fik tilnavnet ”Brahms’ Pastoralesymfoni” med slet skjult reference til Beethovens 6. symfoni, som den udtryksmæssigt ligger tæt op ad. Brahms kæmpede hele sit liv med et ganske ufrivilligt prædikat som ”traditionalist” og arvtager efter den wiener- klassiske stil og i særdeleshed Ludwig van Beethoven. Som en noget modvillig frontfigur for den ”klassicistiske” stil, som Brahms kom til at repræsentere i selskab med bl.a. hans gode ven, den ungarske violinist Joseph Joachim, og musikkritikeren Eduard Hanslick, stod Brahms i den årelange ”musikstrid”, der rasede i de fremherskende musiktidsskrifter, over for den såkaldt ”nytyske skole”, personificeret i komponister som Franz Liszt og Richard Wagner. Striden handlede primært om, hvorvidt musikken skulle og kunne handle om og betyde andet og mere end sig selv (som det hævdedes i den nytyske programmusik, eksemplificeret f.eks. i Liszts symfoniske digte) eller befries for udenomsmusikalske associationer og have værdi og betydning nok i sig selv – som klassicisterne hævdede. Og begge parter i striden fremførte netop Beethovens 6. symfoni, ”Pastoralesymfonien”, som en sublim eksponent for netop deres synspunkt. Det hele var altså et spørgsmål om forholdet mellem musikkens form og indhold.

Men at være mere eller mindre frivillig fortaler for traditionalisternes absolutte musik indebar en risiko for at blive anset for en smule reaktionær, og det var denne fælde, som Brahms hverken ønskede eller fortjente at falde i. Og derfor kunne et værk med et så sødmefuldt og på sin vis stilistisk tilbageskuende udtryk som den optimistiske 2. symfoni være risikable vande at betræde. Brahms var dog heller ikke uden lune og selvironi, og efter uropførelsen af symfonien skrev han til en veninde: ”Musikerne spiller min nye symfoni med sørgebind om armene, fordi den klinger så sørgmodigt. Den vil også blive trykt med sørgerand!”. Han var godt klar over, at landidyllen strømmede fra symfoniens partitur som honning fra en æblegren i et bistade. Og de konventionelle kompositoriske virkemidler for at illustrere naturen – f.eks. en markant og fremtrædende brug af træblæsere med særlig vægt på horn og oboer – er da også til stede i den 2. symfoni. Når det er sagt, så er symfonien i langt mindre grad end hos Beethoven lydmalende og direkte landskabsbeskrivende. Her er ingen dramatiske tremoloer til at imitere tordenvejr eller nedadgående tertser i klarinetterne til at efterligne en kukkende gøg. I stedet er der musikalske idéer, masser af leg med harmoni, rytme og metrik og et ustoppeligt væld af melodiske motiver, der glider sømløst og uden anstrengelse over i hinanden og minder os om, at musikken i sig selv er et af naturens undere

dansk

You can read what Katrine Nordland wrote about Brahms's 2nd symphony, the last time we played the work, here:

With his self-critical nature and tendency to feel misunderstood, Brahms never made peace with the fact that his 2nd symphony was quickly nicknamed "Brahms' Pastoral Symphony" with barely concealed reference to Beethoven's 6th symphony, to which it is close in terms of expression. Brahms struggled all his life with a quite involuntary predicate as a "traditionalist" and heir to the Viennese classical style and in particular Ludwig van Beethoven. As a somewhat reluctant figurehead for the "classical" style that Brahms came to represent in the company of, among others, his good friend, the Hungarian violinist Joseph Joachim, and the music critic Eduard Hanslick, Brahms faced the so-called "new German school", personified in composers such as Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner, in the year-long "music dispute" that raged in the prevailing music journals. The dispute was primarily about whether the music should and could be about and mean something else and more than itself (as was claimed in modern German program music, exemplified, for example, in Liszt's symphonic poems) or be freed from extraneous musical associations and have enough value and significance in itself – as the classicists argued. And both parties in the dispute performed precisely Beethoven's 6th symphony, the "Pastoral Symphony", as a sublime exponent of precisely their point of view. It was all a question of the relationship between the form and content of the music. And both parties in the dispute performed precisely Beethoven's 6th symphony, the "Pastoral Symphony", as a sublime exponent of precisely their point of view. It was all a question of the relationship between the form and content of the music. And both parties in the dispute performed precisely Beethoven's 6th symphony, the "Pastoral Symphony", as a sublime exponent of precisely their point of view. It was all a question of the relationship between the form and content of the music.

But to be a more or less voluntary advocate of the absolute music of the traditionalists ran the risk of being considered a bit reactionary, and it was this trap that Brahms neither wanted nor deserved to fall into. And so a work with such a sweet and in its own way, stylistically retrospective expressions such as the optimistic 2nd symphony can be risky waters to tread. However, Brahms was also not without whims and self-irony, and after the first performance of the symphony he wrote to a friend: "The musicians are playing my new symphony with mourning bands on their arms, because it sounds so mournful. It will also be printed with a mourning duck!”. He was well aware that the country idyll flowed from the symphony's score like honey from an apple branch into a beehive. And the conventional compositional tools to illustrate nature – e.g. a marked and prominent use of woodwinds with particular emphasis on horns and oboes – is also present in the 2nd symphony. Having said that, the symphony is, to a far lesser extent, sound-painting and directly descriptive of the landscape than Beethoven's. There are no dramatic tremolos here to imitate thunder or descending thirds in the clarinets to imitate a cuckoo cuckoo. Instead, there are musical ideas, lots of play with harmony, rhythm and metric and an unstoppable wealth of melodic motifs that flow seamlessly and effortlessly into each other and remind us that music itself is one of nature's wonders There are no dramatic tremolos here to imitate thunder or descending thirds in the clarinets to imitate a cuckoo cuckoo. Instead, there are musical ideas, lots of play with harmony, rhythm and metric and an unstoppable wealth of melodic motifs that flow seamlessly and effortlessly into each other and remind us that music itself is one of nature's wonders There are no dramatic tremolos here to imitate thunder or descending thirds in the clarinets to imitate a cuckoo cuckoo. Instead, there are musical ideas, lots of play with harmony, rhythm and metric and an unstoppable wealth of melodic motifs that flow seamlessly and effortlessly into each other and remind us that music itself is one of nature's wonders

English

Brahm's 2nd symphony by Various, No (2023/2023), Diriģents Christian Karlsen, Odense Koncerthus, Odense, Denmark

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