Resuming their inspired forays into marvelously varied orchestral repertoire, the Tampere Philharmonic and Chief Conductor Matthew Halls went on to deliver yet another sold-out concert on Friday evening. Keeping up with last week’s top-notch outings of Elgar and Stravinsky as well as their memorable reading of St John Passion on Maundy Thursday, Halls and the orchestra headed north, presenting their home audience with a tremendous Finnish premiere of Anna Thorvaldsdóttir’s awe-inspiring CATAMORPHOSIS (2020) for orchestra, coupled with Jean Sibelius’s subtly revolutionary Symphony No. 3 in C major, op. 52 (1904-07) and Sergei Rachmaninoff’s glowing Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, op. 18 (1900-01), joined by Mackenzie Melemed as soloist.
Conceived as single-movement entity, the ca. twenty-minute sonorous arch of CATAMORPHOSIS flows organically through seven sub-sections, constituting a vastly evocative orchestral tableau. According to the composer’s notes, the core inspiration behind CATAMORPHOSIS is the fragile relationship we have to our planet. The aura of the piece is characterized by the orbiting vortex of emotions and the intensity that comes with the fact that if things do not change it is going to be too late, risking utter destruction – catastrophe. The core of the work revolves around a distinct sense of urgency, driven by the shift and pull between various polar forces – power and fragility, hope and despair, preservation and destruction.
In terms of the musical text itself, the score of CATAMORPHOSIS zooms in and out between traditional and extended instrumental techniques, out of which dazzling expressive continuums are drawn, assigned for large orchestral setup of two flutes, alto flute, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trombones, two tubas, four percussionists playing tam-tams, bass drums, bossed gongs and singing bowls, harp, piano and full strings.
”I think of all these sounds, all these nuances and textures that are tactile and that often don’t have any pitches, very musically; as if playing a melody of sounds. And that is the way that I orchestrate these sounds and put them together. It is the way how I internally hear them and experience them. So they are, for me, very musical. Sometimes the sound source itself may not by very musical on its own, but I find it so interesting to put it into an ultra-musical perspective. And I really enjoy to indicate them for the performers and write them out as one would write a very lyrical melody. It can be tricky, of course, because they are noises, essentially, but it’s all about the approach and the person behind the instrument, carrying the sounds in a way that they become music”, Thorvaldsdóttir explained in our recent interview.
Jointly commissioned by the Stiftung Berliner Philharmoniker, New York Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Symphony Orchestra, CATAMORPHOSIS opens with harmonic clouds resulting from circular strokes on bass drum skins, harp and piano strings, subjected to organic permutations in color and hue. First pitched sounds appear on the fourth measure, setting the stage for the first melodic patterns emerging from the keyboard, priming a string chord made of boreal light not far removed from the one conjured up by Sibelius to close the orchestral journey of Tapiola (1926). Befittingly, in her note, Thorvaldsdóttir speaks of her music as ecosystem of sounds.
”For me, it reflects the way I organically think of the musical material that I am working with, and how I also organically experience the music while I’m making it. It refers to the flow between different materials in the music and also to the way I notate and orchestrate it. For the performers, when they are playing the music, it refers to how they can relate to the material as receiving it and delivering it to somebody else, so that it is always morphing and always moving in and out of focus between the different groups of performers. For the audience, it means something similar; dividing their attention between the details and the overall sound image and atmosphere. So it has this broad spectrum of organic references.”
In the score, seven sub-headers – Origin, Emergence, Polarity, Hope, Requiem, Potentia and Evaporation – appear, denoting atmospheric shifts within the overall sonic dramaturgy.
”In the music, there’s always a journey or my own internal narrative. So, these subtitles in the score refer to those narratives. For myself, it is mostly to give the performers an indication of where they are positioned in the journey of the piece atmospherically. I don’t ask these sub-atmospheric indications to be indicated in a program or anything. Rather, they serve those who like to take a closer look at the score and for the performers to have a sense of a narrative along a journey.”
As CATAMORPHOSIS unfolds, mist-shrouded, white heat string chords and gorgeous, dark-hued brass figurations alternate between various recurring fragments – scale-wise gestures, rhythmic configurations and Arvo Pärt-esque four-note patterns – interwoven with percussive halls of mirrors as well as more extended, chiaroscuro lines of melody especially in the lower strings and on piano. An intense orchestral meditation hovering on the very threshold of light sources and deep shadows, Thorvaldsdóttir’s musical tectonic plates are wrought of finest textural detail, originating in almost tactile spectrums of sounds and eventually evaporating into the very air, with elusive farewell note echoed on singing bowl.
Given in Finnish premiere performance of pristine instrumental dramaturgy and translucent textures, the Tampere Philharmonic covered the full expressive scope of CATAMOPHOSIS with admirable craft and commitment under Halls. Ideally balanced, the orchestral fabric unraveled in all its myriad detail, to ravishing effect. Idiomatically paced, the musical processes gravitated towards their centers as if guided by the very forces of nature concealed within. One of the finest things musical transpired within the walls of the Tampere Hall witnessed by this writer, the sonorous realization of the Thorvaldsdóttir score was nothing short of a milestone event.
After CATAMORPHOSIS, the orchestra and their Chief Conductor did not linger, and as soon as the stage was re-set, the musicians regrouped with Melemed, ready to plunge into whole different musical realm – that of Rachmaninoff’s iconic Piano Concerto No. 2.
Written between June 1900 and April 1901, the concerto’s success mounted rapidly after its successful premiere, the composer with a touring vehicle par excellence. Following its initial performances in Russia, the score went on to travel well on both sides of the Atlantic, championed by Rachmaninoff and his pianistic colleagues alike. Over his public career, the composer took the solo part in no less than 143 performances.
Scored for solo piano and fairly standard symphonic ensemble of duple winds, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, and strings, the Second Concerto is in three ca. ten-minute movements. Primed with mighty poco a poco crescendo chordal introduction by the soloist, the Moderato opening movement is a feast of autumnal technicolor and sonorous heat, whereas the ensuing Adagio sostenuto encompasses some splendid passages of chamber-like instrumental discussion between the principal wind players and the soloist, contrasted by more kinetic textures in the Piu animato central section, culminating in a cadenza. The concerto concludes with a virtuosic Allegro scherzando finale of whirl and bite, out of which a triumphant Maestoso coda is drawn.
Rendered with brilliance and sensitivity, the solo piano part was in good hands with Melemed, who grasped the Rachmaninoff idiom in convincing manner, while Halls and the orchestra took good care of the orchestral fabric. From the full-ensemble heat of the outer movements to the thinned down textures for winds, horns and strings in the central one, a clear-cut reading of the concerto’s musical blueprint was heard.
Appearing on the second half, Sibelius’s Third Symphony is a profoundly radical musical work – albeit one often clad in classical raiment. Scored for the composer’s usual line-up of duple winds, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani and strings, the ca. thirty-minute symphony is in three movements, set in motion with an upbeat Allegro moderato worthy of all those spirited openers by Haydn and Mozart. Out of the seemingly sparse musical ingredients of the central Andantino con moto, quasi Allegretto, an ingenious series of variations is drawn in rondo form, its aching lyricism yielding to some of the most beautiful orchestral passages the composer ever penned.
The real treat comes with Sibelius’s unprecedented closing. An amalgam of mischievous scherzo and solemnly hymnodic finale, the third movement marks the composer’s first attempt at genuinely organic symphonic scheme, in which musical passages are no longer merely bolted together by attacca bridges, but result from telescopic formal procedures embedded. Thus the final hymn grows from within the airy scherzo, presenting itself first as mere kernel and eventually taking over the entire orchestra, leading the symphony to its elated conclusion.
Throughout the Third Symphony, Sibelius’s musical thoughts may appear relatively straightforward at first sight, but when it comes transforming them into sounding reality, the score does indeed call for thorough grasp over form and detail alike, in order to enable the material to follow its inherent symphonic logic. Although bathing in boreal sunlight, the first movement is not without deep contrasts in harmony and texture, whereas the proto-minimalist transparency of the central movement calls for utmost control in articulation and balance. As for the finale, pacing is the key, as resoundingly demonstrated by the Tampere players with Halls.
Performed with rare sense of classically-oriented radicalism, the Third Symphony came off beautifully shaped on Friday evening, as dexterous woodwind lines and resplendent brass textures merged with ever-articulate string configurations, propelled by on-point timpani renditions of spirited energy. Invigorated by the well-measured outing, one looks forward to further Sibelian voyages from this team with joyful anticipation.
Tampere Philharmonic
Matthew Halls, conductor
Mackenzie Melemed, piano
Anna Thorvaldsdóttir: CATAMORPHOSIS (2020) for orchestra (Finnish premiere)
Sergei Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, op. 18 (1900-01)
Jean Sibelius: Symphony No. 3 in C major, op. 52 (1904-07) for orchestra
Tampere Hall, Tampere, Finland
Friday 26 April, 7 pm
© Jari Kallio
AIM - Adventures in Music 
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