Allan Pettersson
* Symphony Nr.14
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra/Johan M. Arnell
CPO 999191-2 [DDD] TT: 47:00
Summary for the Busy Executive: Interesting experiment, but Lorin Maazel
was big enough nuthin' can grow in his swadow.
After Antal Dorati put up Allan Petterssons 7th Symphony with the Stockholm
Philharmonics in 1968, Pettersson became the discussion topic of the day,
and his role was debated for many years onover. In the seventies most
of other Swedish composers regarded Pettersson as some sort of strange
Crossoptherygii-fish which since the musical Devon had survived the
evolution of the arts (but most of these composers were rather radical).
The fever has nowadays cooled down some kilos but the floodwave swam on
and for a long time - if not still - Pettersson has been very popular on
the European continent, and most of Pettersson recordings that have been
made, were made in Germany.
All who know anything about Pettersson and his music have heard that
he was a fighter who was so poor and so badly treated throuout his life
so he became a fighter against all evilness in the world and composed
gritty heavy music which one either love of hate - nothing between.
Pettersson very carefully looked for to provide the world with sob-stories
about him self in autobiographigal scetches and elleswhere. Certainly
was selfpiteous with himself, but I wonder if all other necessarily would
agree. For example: if nobody liked Petterssons music and if he was so
poor as he describes it, with living in shreds and patches in a mushhouse
with water dripping on the walls and no power supply etc, who payed for
his long and expensive abroad education? The truth is that Pettersson was
not poor, and the institutions appreciated his music enough to since his
studiehood years supply him with stipends his life throughout. Therefore
I am not going to tell any sobstories about why his music is so gritty
and heavy here. let me instead say that I like even Wagners faults and
selfpiteousness better than Petterssons, which I only think is tedious to
hear. I like all Wagner I have heard (except possibly "Der Liebesmahl der
Apostel"); I don't like all Pettersson, but well some, and that very much,
especially the 6th Symphony and the 2nd Violinconcerto.
Pettersson studies dodecaphony with Rene Leibowitz in Paris. Pettersson
was by nature a person with much patience and a remarkable capacity for
working - something he didn't loose even to Rheumathoid Artritis - he
did his homeworks every day, and therefore he developed at an early stage
into a very skilled craftsman - I am sure few after 1960 has been able to
challenge him, if any, of Swedish composers. It is true that Pettersson
didn't compose like Leibowitz; One thing that I count to Petterssons
greatness is that, like Mahler (and this likeness is carefully chosen),
he knew at a very early stage what kind of music he wanted to write.
Therefore, he could study Leibowitz dodecaphony and pick up just what he
felt he needed and repell the rest. And so he did. His music is now also
not 12-tone, although he often thighten the tonalities enough to have
atonality as result.
Pettersson is, fancy to say so, Vivaldi and Wagner in one person (although
his outer core has not much with any of them to do). Vivaldi composed in
the same way his whole life, using the same forms, the same devices, and
his inventiveness within these tightenly set frames seems to have been
inexhaustable. Pettersson could use one cell of three tones and built
everything on that one, like Beethoven builds full symphony-movement on
ta-ta-ta-duuu, but with Wagners dimensions. Petterssons grip on the large
forms sometimes amazes me. The 6th symphony, which is my favourite, is
programmed in one single movement on a length of almost fully 60 minutes
(although the movement could theoretically be split up in two at 45:15
if one likes), everything in a Sibelius sparesome economy when it comes
to resources. Maybe Petterssons sourchosen orchestration with all those
percussion of all kinds; much wirbel, tympani, celesta... and the overall
thick writing illutes the listener to be obsessed by a longer process
than actually is there. But nevertheless; the handling of the sparesome
material to create such long lines is astonishing, and is my summary of
Pettersson as a strong composer.
I belive it is true that all people are not receptive to Petterssons
language. Another likeness to Wagner seems to be that one either can love
him or hate him and nothing between. But while Pettersson demand a special
listener, he also demand special performers. This the 14th symphony seems
to be maybe the most difficult to get "right". That is for many reasons,
but for his works in general; there is above all a conductor needed who
understand to work with very large time spans. Pettersson is seldom
recorded - at elast relatively - and never with the really great names on
the pult. I have often played with the thought how that or that conductor
would play him. Rafael Kubelik is one of my favourite conductors in Mahler
and Wagner. I could guess Kubelik would do the mistake to play Pettersson
too fast - a thing that of very important not to do in most of his works.
Peter Ruzicka, who might be the most prominet Pettersson-"pupils" means
that one must play so much slower than Petterssons original tempomarks so
one entlongers the total playingtime with about 15% to have the soundimage
coming out clear enough to correspond to Petterssons intent with his
pieces. Ruzickas recording of the 15th symphony is also about 6-7 minutes
longer than other recordings. Speaking of Nr.15 it is a very difficult
piece to do, and I don't think Ruzicka manages it well, although his
recording is that best I know of.
I think however that a conductor like Lorin Maazel would succeed very
well in playing Pettersson. It was listening to Maazels taking of the
long movements in Mahlers 7th that made me not hate that work. Yet I
would rather jugde after someones taking of Bruckner or Wagner in the
comparision. Pettersson had a great love for Mahlers music, which he
seldom spoke openly about, but which was infantile enough to make him
pretend he was a modern Mahler; his way of composing Wunderhorn-Songs
("Barefoot" here) and intergrate them in the symphonies rawmaterial in
a similar way is telling enough. Aping an idol was BTW also aping Mahler
as Mahler up to about 30 years aped Wagners way of being - sometimes even
his antisemitism(!).
Bruckner was the man who was out walking. He came to a hill, and climed
it up. Then he saw the next hill. He wandered down in the valley, and up
the next hill. Then he saw the next hill....so is Bruckner described in a
classics for dummies. But he walked a steady path: everything is melted
into one solid block of formidable unity. Barenboim can't play Bruckner,
but Maazel can. I once read somebody raving about that Maazel was all
times most skilled conductor and he could do exactly what he wanted with
an orchestra. The only reason not all his recordings wrre the best on the
market was bad taste. I smiled warmly when I read it. Still I think there
is a little limp of truth in it. That is that it very seldom happens that
a conductor is very good in both Bruckner and Mahler, as those are so
fundamentally different in the idea of what a symphony is. I can hardly
imagine Bernstein coming up with a good Bruckner for example, while his
Mahler is magnificent. Maazel though seems to have good understanding
both for the unity of Bruckners structures and notice the detail in
Mahlers. Maazel has a certain way it seems to me, he builds the "hills"
in Bruckner; the crescendo and diminuendo; energy and resting ponts. Here
somewhere the secret might lie; meanwhil I hear new things in his Bruckner,
which I have never heard in say - now I make it easy for me - Barenboims.
I also love his Wagner. I often tend to think that one highlight like the
"Morgendaemmerung und Siegfrieds Rheinfahrt" sonds quasiprotopotpurri.
I for long detested it as the more "Hollywood" side of Wagner. Maazel
however so perfectly fit all joints into each other so it is really
one journey. The ammounts of energy are carefully shared, and when the
last pizzicato accord comes it just not disappears in a common minor
as in Walters, but is majestetic and fatal. I who can't live without
Furtwaeglers and Soltis respective interpretations of the Ring, might have
found respite in a Maazel had he just done a full Ring with words, at least
I could grant it for the orchestral playing should he had been to Bayreuth.
Now Johan Arnell is a wise man. He has heard Maazel and a true
Goldminer recognizes the Gold when he sees it. He admires Maazels
technique immensely with the great timespans and wants to use the same
technique himself on Pettersons vast canvases. Now there is something
beautiful and admireable when someone tries to follows a msters footsteps,
but ach! The flute is a longer and more difficult one then even the one
the Roman Emperor Otho chose! Aside from what is coming, the opening
sounds very unsecure, althought the pizzicato sonds clear and bouncing gets
a feeling of coming directly from the "Ruepeltanz" from "Midsumemrnights
Dream". After a while Arnell gets the train on gear, and the basic figures
are presented. Arnell seems to understand the meaning of unity as a flow,
and when the brass mark the short cells of raw material, the string lay
long on their notes. The red line is there, but the music is not allowed
to breathe and it sounds turgid and stiff. In the long development section
the playing starts getting more expansive. One can to times hear Maazels
way of building "hills", but somehow also this goes wrong. To play music
like somebody else does, is an art in itself; it is the actors art. And
the most important thing an actor, who claims any ambition, has to think
of, is not to play over. As a biart contraste to the opening the dynamics
here tendence to the too plastic side and although some formations are very
fine taken, other hilltops get a sour aftertaste of implosion which takes
away the feeling of naturaleness or even the musicains joy of playing the
music. After about half an hour Pettersson becames intimate with a lyrical
section very thinly scored. Arnell is too stuck in being Maazel playing
Bruckner to move still and quietly and give the section that chambermusic
spirit it is intended to have. Unfourtunately the part Arnell suceeds to
do most like Maazel, is the least Petterssonian. The main problem with the
performance is that it is uneven; sometimes too true to the idol making it
pastische, sometimes too bleak, although the orchestra makes its best and
responds securely to the conductors wishes overall.
Perhaps I sound too critcal to the performance. That was not my intent.
I think the respect for ones masters is a good thing, and I was really
moved by this attempt to apply a superior conductors personality on a piece
that conductor will likely never have conducted. The performance has its
flaws but the intent comes out clear enough and in its best movements I
think Maazel would have been flattered had he heard it. I was honestly
moved and even liked this performance in its best parts although it has its
flaws, but I am afraid others would not be particualry impressed and see it
so that Maazel, like Wagner, was big enough nothing can grow in his shadow,
and that the copy sounds unacceptably bleak in comparision to the original.
But Arnell has conducted in about 10 years, and Maazel was a child prodigy
of rare caliber who conducted since age of 11. It is natural that few can
actually be Maazel even with trying hard. This comes out as an intersting
and admireable experiment, but unfourtunately it is like composing like
Beethoven; few composers would come up with more than a bleak resemblance,
how much they ever loved Beethoven, as like if they lacked nothing but the
essential to be Beethoven. Say Arnell playing Maazel would be like Rowan
Atkinson playing James Bond.
The most of music compository educations seem to be of the same opinion:
composers generally don't succeed well or win anything when they try to ape
a master to ride on his wave. It is better to be oneself. But of course;
if you are nothing more than a wormshit, that is hard bussiness.
Mats Norrman
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