BBCSSO: Wagner's 'Twilight Of The Gods'
City Halls, Glasgow - 17/11/22
“Majestic, Cinematic, Powerful Wagner” – the poetic tagline for the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s latest programmed offering, given a first outing in the City Halls, Glasgow on Thursday 17th November and due to be reprised on the afternoon of Sunday 20th in the Usher Hall, conducted by Ryan Wigglesworth. It refers to Götterdämmerung – A Symphonic Journey, Wigglesworth’s reworking of highlights from the final opera of Wagner’s epic Ring cycle of four, which formed the second half of the programme. The first half was devoted to a recently composed work by the Danish composer Hans Abrahamsen, ‘Vers le silence’, for large orchestra.
Many composers – Bruckner, Bartók and Messiaen to name but three – have pursued a mystic fascination with numbers and numerical patterns to guide the structure of their composition. In ‘Vers le silence’, Abrahamsen has done this with the first nine prime numbers, the four ‘elements’ of earth, air, fire and water and an undefined fifth non-material element. This much I gleaned from the programme notes. Though a mathematician (or perhaps because), this reviewer cannot and will not feign engagement with such sophistry. The music, on the other hand, is a force to be reckoned with and, though complex and demanding of the listener, is refreshingly untainted by any influences of the Darmstadt School. The huge orchestral forces (quadruple wind, for example) are used to full effect in two fast, powerful movements, one cataclysmic assault on the senses and one final slow movement where the life force has retreated to an undercurrent that does not so much stop as pass beyond our hearing. Best experienced live.
As I type, I have to hand my copy of Lorin Maazel’s 1988 CD, Der Ring Ohne Worte, The Ring Without Words, and it is a great favourite. Maazel cherry-picked the orchestral goodies from across the cycle (with over half of the CD devoted to Götterdämmerung), knitted them into a one-movement symphonic epic and recorded it with the Berlin Phil – what’s not to like? It is of course superb. Comparisons are inevitable. I am delighted to say they are entirely positive. Wigglesworth’s selection from Götterdämmerung is almost identical to Maazel’s (Daybreak, Siegfried/Brünnhilde love scene, Siegfried’s Rhine Journey, Death and Funeral March of Siegfried, Immolation scene), with one important difference. In his programme notes, Wigglesworth decries the “ohne worte" policy as impoverishing the immolation scene. I still treasure my Maazel CD, but I have to agree. So we got the whole scene with Brünnhilde sung by Katherine Broderick. This was my first time hearing her live and it will not be the last – what a voice! And a believably passionate Brünnhilde. Brilliant!
I can’t leave it unsaid that the orchestra were on top form too. Special mention is due to the four-plus-one horns and the four Wagner ‘tubas’, who all played their hearts out; Siegfried’s offstage horn call gloriously played by guest principal horn Annemarie Federle.
Another memorable BBCSSO concert and, I am pleased to report, reasonably well attended.