Mälkki and Kanneh-Mason at Severance

After last week’s disappointing concert at Severance, it was doubly enjoyable to hear relatively rare classics superbly realized by guest conductor Susanna Mälkki and, making her Cleveland Orchestra debut, pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason.

The concert began with Anton Webern’s orchestration of J. S. Bach’s Ricercare from his Musical Offering, BWV 1079.  The original work, a six voiced fugue based on a bleak theme by King Frederick II of Prussia, did not specify which instrument(s) should be used.  Webern’s orchestration begins starkly and steadily builds to a magnificent ending that could have only come from Bach’s pen.  Mälkki’s conducting provided the steady hand – or perhaps I should state the steady baton – the work required.  

This was followed by the Concerto in A minor by Schumann – Clara Schumann.  Her husband’s Concerto in the same key, written some ten years after the wife’s piece, has always seemed a bit trite and overplayed to me – as beautiful as some of the melodies are.  This work, premiered in 1835, displays both its own influences and provides a look into the future of the concerto genre.  The pianistic influences mainly come from Chopin’s concertos, which were hot off the press when Clara Schumann, still a teenager, was composing this work.  The opening movement, in particular, was resplendent with finger-twisting filigree which could easily be mistaken as coming from the Polish master.  But the work also looks forward, particularly in the duet between piano and cello in the slow movement, which presages a similar approach by Brahms in his Second Piano Concerto – composed over four decades later.  Also, the three movements are joined, as Liszt would do in his Second Piano Concerto, which premiered five years after Schumann’s work.  Kanneh-Mason brought everything that was needed to the work: formidable technique, flowing phrasing, an unerring sense of balance - the best kind of virtuosity.  Mälkki and the orchestra provided the ideal accompaniment – especially the lovely cello playing from principal cellist Mark Kosower.  A very enthusiastic and sustained ovation followed, and Kaneh-Mason responded with a nicely contrasting encore, Gershwin’s Prelude No. 1.

Kanneh-Mason following the concerto

Following intermission, Mälkki returned to conduct Hindemith’s Symphony: Mathis der Maler, composed from material the Hindemith was putting together for an opera of the same name which premiered in 1938 – four years after the Symphony.  The work was composed under trying circumstances, as the composer, living in Germany, was being harassed by the Nazis.  He emigrated to Switzerland in 1938 and to the United States two years later.  The music, inspired by the painter Matthias Grünewald’s struggle for artistic freedom in 16^th Century Germany, is in three movements, each in turn based on a painting by Grünewald: Angelic Concert, Entombment, and The Temptation of Saint Anthony.  What struck me about the music, which I’ve only heard infrequently, was that there was nothing in it to offend anyone in his right mind musically.  Mälkki brought to the performance everything that was missing from last week’s concert: broadness of conception, splendor of tone, a wide dynamic range, a sense of balance and pacing that were just so “right.”  There was spontaneous applause after the opening movement, and numerous curtain calls after the finale.  More important, the audience was the quietest I’ve witnessed since the return to concertizing after the COVID lockdown.    

The paintings by Grünewald

The thread that ran through this program was, simply, oppression.  Bach was virtually ordered to compose a six voice fugue by King Frederick II; Clara Schumann had to put her composing career aside to advocate for her husband’s works, to raise their eight children, and become her husband’s caregiver as he lost his grip on reality; and Hindemith had to flee Nazi persecution.   

Ever since music director Franz Welser-Möst announced he would not be renewing his contract in 2027, there has been much speculation as to his successor.  The orchestra could do much worse than to give Susanna Mälkki serious consideration.