T hese sonatas are] a representation of one of Beethoven’s deepest yearnings: to fashion order and harmony from the chaos of life.”Colin Carr (cello) and Thomas Sauer (piano) take on super-human powers when they make music together. Their recital last night—a two-and-a-half-hour program consisting of all five Beethoven cello-piano sonatas (Op. 5 [Nos. 1 & 2], Op. 69, Op. 102 [Nos. 1 & 2]; in chronological order)—one of the events in this week’s Beethoven Institute at Mannes College of Music The New School in New York—was a tour de force.
— Thomas Sauer, Program Notes, Mannes Beethoven Institute, New York, 02-JUN-2008.
These sonatas hail from each of the three major ‘periods’ in Beethoven’s career: Op. 5 (1796), Op. 69 (1807), Op. 102 (1815). Their textures and compositional styles are dramatically different from each other, reflecting Beethoven’s stages of development and changing motivations: early demos and self-promotion, to Friedrich Wilhelm II, and others; mid-career self-reinvention and discovery; late-career envelope-pushing iconoclasm. As Thomas Sauer says in the program notes, these cello-piano sonatas offer a quicker tour of Beethoven’s compositional styles and major creative periods than do works of his in any other genre: “An evening suffices.”
And what an evening it was!
The two-movement Op. 5 sonatas have 18-min first movements, followed by 7- to 9-min second movements. The long first movements are expansive—emblematic of symphonic writing; unusual for chamber works. The second movements are discursive—the No. 1 carrying on in a light-hearted rondo-like manner, in F major; the No. 2 evoking 18th-Century literary notions of tragedy, in G minor.
The Op. 69 admixes minor-key motifs in predominantly major-key settings. The recurrent uncertainty and eventual triumph of major over minor are routinely regarded as characteristic of Beethoven. Anxiety and sorrow displaced by fortissimo joy and affirmation: yes, that’s there. But Carr and Sauer find far more depth and complexity in Op. 69 than that. The plot-line, according Carr and Sauer, to has more to do with temporality as a feature of the human condition: an essay on how patience and the interplay between personal ‘will’ and opportunity and cooperation [between the characters represented by the cello and the piano] can lead to the affirmative result.
The Op. 102 sonatas, especially the No. 2: these are my favorites. The sheer energy that propels them; the emotional range that they cover, from deep despair, to euphoria, and back again; the improvisatory quality of the dissonances and transitions; the drama of the fugal finale—there is so much to love in here. And Carr and Sauer do animate these sonatas as a labor of love. Breathtaking exuberance! From warm-and-tender, to fierce and defiant. The expressive range is quite a ride.
One of the remarkable things about the collaboration between Carr and Sauer, each of whom is a superb soloist, is an extraordinary ‘filial’, ‘fraternal’, brotherly quality that they impart to their playing together. These cello-piano sonatas present ample temptations for each voice—to display soloist-style ‘ego’, rubescent embellishments, flamboyant figurations, fioritura. But Carr and Sauer do not indulge in any such thing.
It is not as though either of them renounces his ego totally; far from it. The acoustic image they each project is simply a strong, genuine ‘brotherliness’. The allegiance between the two is evidenced by the extraordinary balance and responsiveness, one to the other, in a thorough-going, egalitarian way. (Much as with rock climbing/mountaineering, each one, Carr or Sauer, when it is his turn to take the lead, places an ‘anchor’ or ‘protection’ as he goes—to protect the other, enabling him to ascend/descend with expressive assurance, agility, and safety. The trading of ‘call-and-answer’ figures between the cello and piano parts throughout these sonatas is like a ‘running-belay’, to use the moutaineering term. No heroics; just continual looking-out-for-the-other-guy. The pleasures in doing this in climbing are a similar species of pleasure as we see in the beaming faces of Sauer and Carr: these are the pleasures, not of mere collegiality, but of true brotherhood.)
In other words, their conceptions of ‘self’ and of ‘other’ and of ‘family’ are not formal or rule-based; the realizations of the concepts are extemporized, improvisational. Both voices—cello and piano—are continually active, never passive or subordinate; the piano is never ‘accompaniment’. The net effect of this is to impress us listeners with a vision of collaboration and solidarity and mindfulness to which each of us can and should aspire. If they can do it, we should too!
We thank Colin and Thomas for the wonderful evening—for their gift of vitality and warmth. Nominally a faculty recital with a musicological rationale and didactic, pedagogical program notes, the performance showed its true colors as a compelling concept of aesthetic and filial unity: a shining Beethovenian example for all of us, a noble thing to emulate, not just in music but in everything we do.
Colin Carr is the winner of many international awards, including First Prize in the Naumburg Competition, the Gregor Piatigorsky Memorial Award, and Second Prize in the Rostropovich International Cello Competition. Carr was on the faculty of the New England Conservatory in Boston for 16 years. He became professor at the Royal Academy of Music in 1998. Also in 1998 St. John’s College, Oxford, created the post of ‘Musician in Residence’ for him. Since 2002 he has been professor at Stony Brook University in New York. Mr. Carr plays on a Matteo Gofriller cello made in Venice in 1730.
Pianist Thomas Sauer, founder and director of the Beethoven Institute at Mannes College, received his Bachelors of Music from The Curtis Institute, his Masters of Music from Mannes College of Music, and his DMA from the City University of New York. Among others, he studied with Jorge Bolet, Edward Aldwell, and Carl Schachter. He has performed regularly at Carnegie Hall and with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society. His CD of five Haydn piano sonatas is available on MSR Classics. His recording of music of Britten and Schnittke with cellist Wilhelmina Smith is available on Arabesque.
- Mannes College, The New School for Music
- Colin Carr page at Lincoln Center Chamber Music Society
- Janof T. Interview with Colin Carr. Cello.org
- Thomas Sauer page at Mannes College The New School for Music
- Cheal D. Sociology of Family Life. Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
- Luebben C. Rock Climbing Anchors: A Comprehensive Guide. Mountaineers, 2006.
- Newman D, Grauerholz E. Sociology of Families. 2e. Pine Forge, 2002.
- Paun M. A Constant Burden: The Reconstitution of Family Life. 2e. Ashgate, 2006.
- Pesterfield H. Traditional Lead Climbing: A Rock Climber's Guide to Taking the Sharp End of the Rope. Wilderness, 2007.
No comments:
Post a Comment