Steuerman, RTÉ NSO/Klajner, NCH, Dublin, Haydn Symphony No 95. Rachmaninov – Paganini Rhapsody Mussorgsky/Ravel – Pictures at an Exhibition
PAGANINI WAS a larger than life figure, a fiddler beyond compare, whose every move, were he alive today, would probably be splashed all over the tabloids. He was also a composer, a minor one, who left a string of fiendishly difficult works for his violinistic successors to struggle with. And in the process he wrote a set of variations, in the 24th of his Caprices, that were built on a theme so protean that it has provided inspiration for generations of composers, from the 19th century up to the present day. Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini, written in 1934, is a set of variations presenting pianists with opportunities for dazzling technical display, an array of awkward hoops to jump through, and – in the 18th variation – one of the most prized sentimental melodies of the 20th century.
Brazilian pianist Jean Louis Steuerman, the soloist in Friday’s performance with the RTÉ NSO, had an able partner in Swiss conductor Daniel Klajner. He presented the piece with full tone and clean lines, and always gave the impression of having energy in reserve.
All that was missing was a sharpness of perspective that could have made more of the wit which lies behind so much of Rachmaninov’s writing in this particular piece. Klajner presented the arguments of Haydn’s Symphony No 95 with a clear cut and thrust. The playing was not always refined in detail, and the balances too often tended to favour the first violins. But the overall effect was of fresh and engaging music-making. Ravel’s orchestration of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, a piano tribute to his artist friend Victor Hartmann, helped to secure the popularity of the piece in both the orchestral and piano repertoires. Klajner delivered the piece in an upfront manner, the colouring gaudy, the heavy brass rather too prone to blare. But the combination of Mussorgsky’s singular inventiveness and Ravel’s imaginative resourcefulness can weather this kind of treatment.
Indeed, this may well be why Ravel’s orchestration has proved so durable in the face of the many others who have sought to compete with it.
