 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: JKL
Date: 2016-01-16 17:30
A concert I attended yesterday, Jörg Widmann with KV 622.
http://concert.arte.tv/de/hr-sinfonieorchester-mozart-sibelius-messiaen
What do you think about it? (Mozart starts at min. 38)
JKL
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2016-01-16 19:12
I liked Widmann's playing overall here; he did some beautiful things. Nice sound, pretty good control (vs. high standards that is - I'm talking as an "omniscient listener", not as anything like a superior clarinetist myself.)
Interpretatively, some nuances were fresh and good, some gave me pause. A normal listening experience for this piece. Tempos were good.
I've heard so many recordings of this now. Somehow it feels like almost all of them miss something, as though nobody starts from the highest view of the whole piece and builds an interpretation down from there. That is, they often sound like a string of pretty phrases and delectable nuances, and at the end it's almost like nothing really happened.
Could I do better? - ha, no. Just trying to express my vague feelings about a great work I almost always enjoy hearing. This music may be deeper than some performances reach. I've heard numerous performances of Mozart's piano concertos that really moved me, and conceptually the clarinet concerto seems as though it should be on that level.
I had to stop watching the video and just listen, because I don't care for people turning this way and that like Widmann does here; at one point he plays a long section facing the conductor. During an orchestral passage, he turns to the orchestra, his back to the audience (before the camera cuts away.) Is this the fad or something? Frost does it too. Some movement is ok, but to not face the audience seems unnecessary, distracting, and a bit rude.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2016-01-16 20:42
Actually Widmann turns to the balcony section which is situated behind the orchestra. I think it's kinda cool that a performer acknowledges these 'less than ideal' seats.
The things I like are more "clarinety," but here they are: As a player of German system clarinets, he not only uses the traditional barrel (the other guys in the concert use those "turn and tune" things), but he also uses string to tie on the reed. The use of string is going the way of the dodo and I don't like seeing it go.
I'm also glad that he is doing mostly a straight up soprano clarinet rendition (pre-basset clarinet rage). It is somewhat of a hybrid, but more on the subtle side. It seems to take some guts these days to play the Mozart WITHOUT a basset clarinet or basset extension (and I prefer by leaps and bounds the standard clarinet version).
Hugh Wolff imposes some really dramatic interpretive elements on the orchestral accompaniment and that is very worth while.
Now, I don't have any problem with physically demonstrative performances. In fact I think Europe is much better at encouraging young music students to feel music on a visceral level. If this takes on more movement AND more musical nuance.........go for it.
That said, I too am not too crazy about the interpretation either. As you state, it is a little choppy, not really a continuous whole.
.....................Paul Aviles
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