Klaus Tennstedt's LPO Mahler cycle

My collection of Mahler recordings has stretched into the dozens, with multiple versions of each of his symphonies.  I found myself increasingly drawn to the work of Klaus Tennstedt, mainly based on the incendiary live versions that can be easily found on youtube and elsewhere.  Tennstedt was known as a master of the standard German repetoire, but there was a certain magic to be found when he conducted Mahler with the London Philharmonic.  The LPO was considered the third or maybe fourth best orchestra just in London, whereas Tennstedt, while great, had a lot of competition when it came to the German masterpieces he specialized in.  But the whole was better than the sum of the parts.  The synchronicity between orchestra and conductor was often something to behold, on any given night, this highly motivated group of performers could elevate themselves to being the greatest orchestra in the world playing the finest music ever composed.  

I have gradually been making my way through the entire set, some sixteen CD's worth.  Audiophile note: I bought this set through iTunes, so I listened on 320 kbps mp3's, with the exception of the 8th Symphony, which I have on CD.  

Symphony #1

A disappointing start.  The first movement is slow and tense, but comes across as too passive and underplayed for my taste.   The second movement is light and playful but fairly forgettable, and the third movement gets bogged down by its leisurely tempos and lack of momentum.  This reveals a problem that will recur multiple times during this cycle.  During the inner movements, which often don't build to huge, world-resolving climaxes, Tennstedt can get a bit lost in the plot.  But in his defense, this is a studio phenomenon that didn't happen during his live performances.  In front of an audience, Tennstedt would go all out and the music never lost its sense of purpose.  The fourth movement again drags, and although the final minutes are well played, the payoff can't redeem the symphony as a whole. 

 

Symphony #2 

The first movement snarls and growls, this is a truly heavy funeral march, and its brutally maudlin character is a quality that is lacking in many conductor's performances.  The tension is sustained wonderfully throughout the movement.  The second movement is delightful and again sticks closely to the script intended by Mahler, conjuring up youthful memories from long ago.  The third movement is playful but fairly nondescript, but serves as a setup for the glorious final two movements.  The finale runs nearly 35 minutes, one of the longer recorded finales in the Mahler catalog, but never drags or grows stagnant.  Tennstedt keeps the music flowing wonderfully -- extraordinarily difficult at such a slow tempo -- but builds unbearable tension even during the quieter moments.  In the hands of lesser conductors these quieter moments induce boredom and grind the symphony to a halt well before the finish.  Despite the long runtime, nothing is overwrought or exaggerated.  Tennstedt knows how to extract maximum emotion from nearly every moment.  In live performance, Tennstedt could be even more incendiary, but its easy to see why this was one of his signature pieces even from the studio recording.   

Symphony #3

The first movement is dark, schizophrenic, and masterfully intense.  This is followed by its near opposite, the light and lyrical minuetto of the second movement.  The third movement, the scherzando, is another triumph, a dreamlike gothic folk  number unfurling in slow motion.  The vocal movements then provide an oasis of calm leading up to the finale, particularly the hymn-like fifth movement.  The finale is almost unbearably tense, not as explosive as the live version from Minnesota that inspired me to finally buy this set, but riveting all the same.  Again, Tennstedt was more in his element performing this live, where he could have a complete emotional commitment to the music, staying constantly in the moment on account of the audience. He was a conductor who undoubtedly lost some of that focus while hammering things out for days in recorded setting.   

Symphony #4 

The first movement walks a careful and difficult balance between smooth and sentimental (in its first half), while flipping the switch to become rocky and unsettling in the second part.  The whole symphony kind of wavers between these extremes, which is strange for Tennstedt who usually carries a more consistent vision of Mahler's work.  It's as if he was undecided between two different takes on the music, or perhaps the consistency was broken between different recording sessions.   The third movement (Adagio) is beautifully played with a heart stopping final climax.  In all this symphony is a fine effort, although its two-faced nature did leave me feeling somewhat empty and confused.  

Symphony #5

Often cited as one of the great performances in this cycle, this is a dramatic, gripping account of the fifth.  I have a problematic relationship with this symphony, it's Mahler's busiest and longest (in terms of bars), and unfortunately I find myself exhausted by the end of the third movement unless it's a more flowing, lyrical reading such as Barbirolli's.  The first and last movements are explosive, but I found the third movement (scherzo) to be a bit meandering, and not as punchy or forceful as Tennstedt seems to be going for.  The fourth movement, the famous Adagietto is beautifully played, but too slow for my tastes, although many would disagree.  Overall this is a memorable account of the fifth, albeit a long and draining one, but again, that's my typical reaction to most versions of this symphony.

Symphony # 6 

Once again, Tennstedt nails the outer movements.  The first movement is everything you'd want -- bludgeoning, terrifying, the foreteller of impending doom.  The second movement (the Scherzo in Tennstedt's treatment) makes less of an impression, it's an extended bridge to the third movement but not much more.  The third movement (Andante) is simply gorgeous, among the very best I've heard.  In other versions, this is often the flat movement of the symphony for me, serving as a pause before the epic final movement.  With Tennstedt, it's the love theme for the doomed hero, like something out of a Hollywood tragedy.  

As for the final movement, the challenge for the conductor, in my view, is to maintain the momentum after the hammer blows.  He or she needs to smoothly, inexorably transition to the fateful conclusion, while avoiding the whiff of a huge anti-climax following the second hammer blow.  Tennstedt inverts this typical situation.  I found the passages leading to the hammer blows to be underplayed, leading to a searing final fifteen minutes that does not disappoint.    

Symphony #7 

Through the first two movements, this symphony was a big miss for me.  The first movement is too forced, too grandiose, like an extenstion of the 6th merely plugged into the Tennstedt formula.  It loses much of the offbeat kookiness that characterizes far better versions of this symphony.  The third movement, the scherzo, brings back some of the humour and nearly saves the symphony, and the fourth movement (Andante) is sympathetic, touching.  But the final movement, the Rondo Finale, once again plays it too straight, opting for more formulaic drama rather than madcap chaos. 

Symphony # 8 

I have never really connected with Mahler 8, which is less of a standard symphony than a drama set to music.  It's notoriously difficult to perform, with a million different things going on and the conductor trying to reign in the mayhem rather than truly shape the interpretation.  But undoubtedly, Tennstedt's version is the most effortless that I have heard.  This symphony trips up even the greatest Mahler conductors, and getting to the end can feel like a huge struggle, where the conductor forgets that they're dealing with a work of art and merely tries to maintain the orchestra's focus and will them to the finish.  Tennstedt makes it all sound easy.  This is hardly my favourite symphony but the quality of this performance can't be denied.

Symphony #9 

This performance is very understated throughout, and the shifts in mood seem to frequently confound Tennstedt.  The first movement starts out fiery, but then Tennstedt gets lost for about ten minutes in the middle.  This is a rare case in this cycle where the very slow tempo (run time of the first movement = 33 minutes) is a serious detriment.  The same can be said for the second movement, which begins energetically, only for the intensity to gradually trail off.  Tennstedt's slow, dramatic style doesn't fit the first three movements' schizophrenic struggle between the calm and the storm, which is most noticeable in the third movement.  The build to its climax should be frenetic, anxious, with the conductor instilling panic in the performance while not losing control of the orchestra.  Tennstedt solves this by simply taking things slow, the jaunty feel of the music doesn't pack the right emotional punch.  In the final movement (Adagio), the string sonority is too loose and sloppy.  The final minutes are meant to sound like the last gasps of life, but here the music simply trails off and vanishes with a benign whimper.  Soft climaxes were clearly not Tennstedt's strong suit.  

Symphony #10 (unfinished)

Tennstedt plays only the Adagio, but as was the case with the ninth, the sense of purpose is muddled without a towering climax as his destination.  

In all, this is clearly a set with its flaws, the biggest of which may be the fundamental notion that just about everyone's favourite Tennstedt will be from a live version rather than one of these studio versions.  Nevertheless, this cycle is well worth owning, the passion and inspiration that Tennstedt felt for the music is evident even during the weaker parts.       

Jeopardy Music Expert

Last year I paid almost no attention to new releases.  The only album I listened to multiple times was Low's "Hey What".  

This year I haven't heard a single new album.  Only two have caught my radar: Tears For Fears' "The Tipping Point" (a remarkable comeback story) and Beach House's "Once Twice Melody" (new double album by my favourite band of the past decade).  

Between two small kids at home who tend to wake up early, catching up on work in the evenings, and general exhaustion, I haven't made a new mix in over a year.  The mixes and podcasts will eventually return, because this thing called life is a long haul process, and this is the so-called diary that documents it.  I am hopelessly out of touch with all things techno, having long since given up my BPM Supreme membership and not finding the time to search new tracks and EP's from sites like Beatport.  

However, I'm more than happy to continue buying classical music on iTunes and scrolling through dusty CD bins.  Classical music is still where I find 90% of my musical inspiration these days.  Classical blogs and forums make up the bulk of my exposure to music crit. There is a parallel universe of great albums that I'm decades late in discovering -- who has time for new releases (even classical ones)?  I have no idea how fans find the time to hear 70 CD boxes of material (everything is boxed up relatively cheap it seems), although right now I am finding the time to sort through about 20 hours of live Stereolab recordings (stay tuned!) so perhaps the answer is staring me in the face.  

Music categories on Jeopardy usually center on 80's and 90's material, roughly coinciding with the age and knowledge expertise of most contestants, and I typically ace them.  Contemporary music clues pose a greater challenge.  I didn't know the Grammys had been postponed because of Omicron until I had to look it up while writing this post.  So this is my role these days.  Expert on easy music trivia on an otherwise very challenging trivia show.  In that world, I can still get away with looking like a music savant.  

I wish I had more to write about this days (and/or mixes to post) but freeing myself from any and all trends and buzz-worthy topics means I'm even more unencumbered and can deep dive into thirty years of Stereolab recordings (coming soon!) or Mahler cycles (yep!) without being concerned about its immediate (or long-term) relevance.  As always, I do it for me.    

Netta Barzilai/Nunu at Hangar 11

I was prepared to write a review of Netta's first full concert in Israel but it turns out that Michaela Hazani summarized my thoughts almost perfectly for Ynetnews.

I disagree somewhat about the lack of a unifying theme.  From the matching outfits and audacious brass section I was getting a 21st century electro funk JB's vibe from the whole thing.  The problem was the inconsistent execution.  If she wants to revamp her sound and go full on JB's, then go for it.  But you can't do that while also giving the looper a starring role and showcasing wacky sets and backup dancers like in her iconic Eurovision performance (the style that Hazani wants her to return to).  

Netta clearly wants to blaze a new path, beyond "Toy", beyond her other famous collaborators like Static and Ben-El.  That's fine, but "Zero Effort" was one of the biggest hits of the year and should have been a show-stopping performance, but it wasn't.  I felt the crowd was excited for the concert, but the overall mood was one of curiosity.  People wanted to see what a Netta concert was all about but didn't plan on losing their minds while dancing.  

"Straight Outta Compton", dir. F. Gary Gray; "Rolling Thunder Revue, A Bob Dylan Story", dir. Martin Scorsese

I watched these movies back to back, which made for an interesting contrast.  Both are set against the backdrop of political and social turmoil in the country, both stories are centred upon cults of personality for their chosen subjects.  However, the Dylan film uses the politics of the day merely to set the time and place, the music is presented as a literal travelling circus meant as a distraction from important real life problems.  Of course, NWA's music was a intended as an encapsulation of the real world, and was entirely reflective of their environment.   Dylan is a fascinating and befuddling character.  Each evening he dresses up as a half-zombie, half troubadour clown, constantly looking worn down by living a rock star lifestyle.  But when he hits the stage  he breathes fire, projecting an intensity and purpose every bit as lucid and intimidating as what NWA were doing. 

Between the two Martin Scorcese directed Dylan docs, I preferred "No Direction Home" by a wide margin.  Many rock fans knew next to nothing about the folk scene of the 50's and 60's, other than the fact that Dylan was a part of it.  That doc turned the scene into a living object filled with colourful characters and impassioned live performances.  The interviews in  "Rolling Thunder" are a mix of real and made up characters, and the faux-documentary aspect left me confused rather than amused.  It's interesting to see the likes of Joni Mitchell and Roger McGuinn caught in Rolling Thunder's orbit, tagging along with the tour and jamming with Dylan in their downtime.  And as I already mentioned, the main strength of the doc is its many outstanding stage performances.   Even Dylan admits at the end of the doc that the tour meant nothing and accomplished nothing, it was a fun thing to do at the time, but didn't have a broader cultural impact and was a money loser to boot.  

"Straight Outta Compton" goes the extra mile in its quest for realism.  The camera frequently catches its subjects at close range, it's almost like you're watching a live Go Pro feed from a person who was standing in the room at the time of the action.  Indoor scenes are dimly (and grimly) lit, scenes of violence are appropriately chaotic.  I think the story arc leaned too far into "Behind the Music" territory, searching for a fall and redemption that wasn't really there.   Dre and Cube were far more successful and relevant after leaving NWA, Eazy E floundered but still made a bundle of money off of Ruthless.  I don't know all the details, but was Jerry Heller any more corrupt than the average music exec?  The artists are always the last ones to get paid, I'm not excusing it, but Heller is clearly cast as a uniquely evil villain of the project whereas the moral failings of the NWA members are largely glossed over or ignored (Cube's anti-Semitism, Dre's domestic issues, E's promiscuity).     For the most part I enjoyed the movie for the same reasons I enjoyed, say, Anton Corbijn's "Control", in that it brilliantly reconstructs a bygone era and makes you a fly on the wall for moments that fans have longed to see.  

Superbowl LVI halftime show

People my age are now in the centre of the Superbowl halftime show demographic, i.e. people who don't follow contemporary music too much and wax maximum nostalgia for music from thirty years earlier. It's true that the boomer-era stars had a good run for most of the first decade of the 2000's, and haven't headlined since The Who in 2010.   The last ten plus of headliners have skewed much younger, certainly nobody can claim that The Weeknd (last year's headliner) isn't a huge star at the top of his game.  But don't fool yourself, do the math.  When Paul McCartney headlined in 2005, it had been twenty years since his last US top ten hit ("Spies Like Us", a song I remember nothing about).  In 2022, it has been eleven years (not including appearances as a featured artist) since Dre's last US top ten hit ("I Need a Doctor"), and twenty seven years since his last top ten before that ("Keep Their Heads Ringin"). Bruce Springsteen's last top ten was fifteen years before his SB headlining appearance, Prince's last was thirteen years previous.  Justin Timberlake, Shakira, Jennifer Lopez, and Coldplay were all twenty year veterans of the music business when they headlined.  These are criticisms only if you want them to be. Prince was a commercial force more recently than Dre (at the time of his SB headlining gig) and many people consider his set to be the best ever.  

This year's show felt fresh and different.  The staging was unique and highly original. Dre and Snoop looked like they were having the times of their lives out there.  Kendrick Lamar and Eminem were great for the most part, Mary J. Blige and 50 Cent not so much.  Obviously Eminem's kneeling gesture was approved by the NFL, this is a non-controversy that's been overblown.  If he had gone off script the director would have cut away or reframed the shot, in fact the opposite occurred and the camera lingered on him for about twenty seconds.  MJB's vocals sounded weak and nondescript, although that might have been due to the poor stadium acoustics and double tracked vocals for all the performers.  50 Cent appeared lazy and unmotivated, but no different than in the prime of his career in that sense.  Dre and Snoop came off like kings of the MF'ing block, STILL, after all these years.  All in all, it wasn't a perfect show by any means, but it was certainly one of the most memorable.

Cat Stevens

 More and more examples have cropped up where my steadfast opinions have slowly eroded over decades.  Songs I disliked in the 1980's (Phil Collins' "Against All Odds", Bruce Springsteen's "Dancing In the Dark") are now beloved classics, for instance.  Sometimes this applied to artists as well as songs.  Take Cat Stevens.  Even though he had left the music industry years before I had ever heard of him, in the mid to late 80's he was a hugely popular name and remained popular with classic rock fans under the age of 20.  I couldn't stand him.  To me he seemed like a poor man's Don McLean at best, taking himself far too seriously, bland post-hippie peace theorizing for the people who couldn't get enough of the "sensitive bearded guy with acoustic guitar"-type in their life.  

It took me a while to come around.  I became more acclimated to early 70's singer songwriter megastars in general (Carole King, Paul Simon, Gordon Lightfoot).  "The Wind" was used to devastating effect in the 7th season finale of "How I Met Your Mother".  I had kids, and songs like "Father and Son" took on new,  sentimental meanings.  I still don't like some of the big hits (e.g. "Wild World") but overall the man just gets it, displaying wisdom far beyond his years at the time.  He could capture a distinct feeling -- a brief moment -- with a simple lyric better than just about any of his then contemporaries this side of Lightfoot.  

Band Aid, "Do They Know It's Christmas?"

I listened to a lot of holiday music over Christmas weekend.  Binging on Spotify playlists, I found myself surprisingly moved by the Bing Crosby-style pre-RnR era songs, and pleasantly surprised by some of the modern songs by artists like Kelly Clarkson and Sia.  I still don't get the big deal about Mariah Carey's ubiquitous song, but after hitting the Christmas #1 spot on the Billboard chart for three straight years, you can't deny its place as one of the biggest and most enduring songs of its type in music history.  I can't help but notice that religious themed tracks are being phased out (I never hear the "Mary and the baby"-style caroling that I grew up with) and it's all about vaguely holiday themed love and togetherness.  Add some sleigh bells to the mix to make it crystal clear that you've recorded a holiday song and hope for regular airplay each December. 

I am not a push-button cancel culture type of person, but "Do They Know Its Christmas?" gets more disturbing to me each year.  The controversy surrounding this track (and the remakes) are not new.  The genesis of the track (well meaning pop stars record a charity song on very short notice) still makes for a wonderful story, and the repeated "feed the world" chorus can still get me choked up on occasion.  But it's gotten to the point where the smug, condescending tone of the lyrics is rapidly eroding my enjoyment of the song.  

The first verse starts innocently enough. Throw your arms around the world, spread the joy this time of year, and so on.  Then it all transforms into grim death -- literally -- and post-colonialist condescension.  The idea that Christmas should be the aspiration to save poor people from misery is absolutely soaked through with the stench of white man's burden.  As if the fact that Christmas isn't on the radar of people in a completely different part of the world -- regardless of their socio-economic condition -- is the saddest, most tragic fact imaginable and must be corrected without delay.  If the famine had been in, say, Saudi Arabia then perhaps more people would hear these lyrics for what they really are?

I have always liked the song and the Christmas season wouldn't be the same without hearing it a few times.  But I couldn't, in good conscience, oppose phasing it out of holiday playlists if a serious movement to do so arose.   

Future Sound of London, "Dead Cities"

This would be the eighth in a series of albums that I haven't heard in over twenty years, since the start of this blog in January 2020.  Except that's not exactly true in this case, because I don't think I ever heard "Dead Cities" in its entirely.  I was a fan of FSOL from "Papua New Guinea" onward, had "Lifeforms" and the Amorphous Androgynous albums in heavy rotation, but by 1996 I felt that they were following trends rather than leading them, and the trends they were following weren't the trends I was the least bit interested in.  Since I'd rather not repeat artists in this series, and seeing as I never heard the album to begin with, I'm reluctant to count this one.  On the other hand, it is a fairly notable album by a legendary act, and I just bought the beautiful limited edition that comes with a book and some amazing artwork ...

A few thoughts on this album:

"Herd Killing" utilizes the same sonic palate as "Lifeforms", clearly it's the same band that recorded that dreamy ambient/modern classical (two of the adjectives applied to "Lifeforms" at the time) album, except that the dreaded 1996 big beat sounds are seeping in.

"Her Fact Forms in Summertime".  This is more like it, a proto-Burial epic in miniature, featuring rainy nights stepping through flooded gutters in an urban hellscape crossed with chopped up b-boy street music.

"We Have Explosives".  The single owes an obvious debt to what the Chemical Brothers were doing at the time, but also shows glimpses of the rhythmic noise that would become popular in completely different circles in a few years time.  

"Everyone in the World Is Doing Something Without Me" radiates a starry eyed ambience with ethereal layered voices, but also carries the overwhelmingly horrifying feeling that everything is falling apart.  That's a combination of sounds and emotions that you almost never hear, but somehow they pulled it off.    

"Quagmire" is true to its name, a chaotic, messy soup of skittering beats, jazz samples, and futuristic noises, jazz samples.  That track bleeds into "In a State of Permanent Abyss" (the best title on the album IMO), which is an early 70's Kraftwerk-ian throwback of twinkling, bubbling synths.  This kicks off the more abstract second half of the album.    

"Yage" shines through as a centerpiece track, with a long ambient intro and outro bookending a kitchen sink collage of quaking bass, warped sitar-like drone, wall of sound dub effects, and face-smashing beats.   

Overall, "Dead Cities" sounds a lot better now than it probably did when it was first released.  Far removed from the fleeting trends that firmly date this album to the late 90's, there's an adventurous mixture of sounds to sink one's teeth into.  There are also a few forward thinking moments, showing that FSOL still had innovative trump cards up their sleeves.  

The Buchmann-Mehta School of Music Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Maestro Lahav Shani

This was the first post-COVID major performance for this orchestra, and everyone involved was thrilled and relieved to return to some semblance of normal performance practice.  This season opening performance presented a varied program featuring strong soloists, full of hits and very few misses.

The first piece, Tchaikovsky's "Rococo Variations" featuring cellist Jan Bogdan, featured some tentative playing by the orchestra, although this soloist's playing couldn't be faulted.  The next piece, Ibert's Flute Concerto featuring Avishai Srugo, demanded more playing from the orchestra, and they were up to the task.  Sometimes a dull accompanying part during a concerto makes for a complacent orchestra.  I loved this flute concerto, it is a modern piece (composed in 1934) full of vibrant, unconventional melodies and strained notes that stretch the range of the instrument in eye-opening ways.

After the break, soprano Yaara Atias performed two arias, the first (Mozart's "Se il padre perdei") was simply fine, but the second (Donizetti's "Il faut partir") was superlative and elicited strong reactions from the audience.  Finally, the full orchestra took the stage for Debussy's "La Mer", which was excellent and superbly conducted by Lahav Shani.  His somewhat underplayed Mahler 1 actually built my anticipation for this performance even more.  The things I didn't like about his Mahler (deliberate tempo and pacing, milking the slower, atmospheric parts) are perfect for "La Mer", and it didn't dissappoint.   

Opening of the Israel Philharmonic's 85th Anniversary Festivities

The IPO came up with a genius marketing plot to offer a first rate concert for the bargain price of 85 NIS as part of their 85th anniversary celebrations.  The absurdly low price guaranteed a packed house and an eclectic crowd.  On this night, the Bronfman Auditorium may have been the hippest spot to be seen in the city.    

I took immediately to "Prayer For String Orchestra", feeling the music's drawn out, solemn passages in my bones.  The composer of the work, Tzvi Avni, walked on stage for a bow at the conclusion of the piece in a very touching moment.  The next piece, Alphons Diepenbrock's "Im grossen Schweigen" (with Matthias Goerne performing the baritone solo), didn't connect with me in the same way, the lyrics cry out against to the loneliness of nature, but the music leaves me with little of that intended desperation or passion.     

Gustav Mahler's "Symphony No. 1" was beautifully played and elegantly conducted by Lahav Shani, but I found it underplayed in many key moments.  The third movement should alternate between a funereal lullaby and a folksy, slightly absurdist dance, but Shani played it as a rather straightforward slow movement.  I felt the symphony nearly ground to a halt around this point, although he did manage to pull things back together nicely for the second half of the fourth movement, leading to a suitably spectacular finale.