INVENTION MEETS PERFECTION
For its first concert under a new name, the Royal Bangkok Symphony Orchestra presents works from Vivaldi and Beethoven
The rare, the popular, the ancient, the modern.
For its first classical concert under its new name, the Royal Bangkok Symphony Orchestra (RBSO) this Wednesday will present a programme of four pieces that would make any international orchestra envious.
Yes, in “Vivaldi’s Invention, Beethoven’s Perfection”, RBSO has planned a work that should be popular indeed. Meanwhile the name Andriessen is well-known in cities around the globe, and his son is a composer-in-residence for the New York Philharmonic this year. But his father, Hendrik, was no slouch in the composing business, and his work — virtually never played outside of his native Holland — will also be highlighted at the concert on Wednesday. Beethoven’s Third, Fifth and Ninth Sym
phonies are always performed, but what about the First? That symphony rates as one of the most jovial in the repertoire, easily belying the saturnine, sullen face of the composer. And what about a work called Sinfonia Al Santo
Sepolcro? Here Vivaldi offers another surprise. Hendrink Andriessen, the composer of Variations And Fugue On A Theme By Johann Kuhnau, seems a natural choice to the esteemed conductor of the evening, Wim Steinmann. Wim Steinmann is a piccolo and flute player with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. But more important for Bangkok, he is the artistic director and conductor of the Domestica Rotterdam, consisting of players from the Rotterdam Orchestra.
As a student of some of the most esteemed conductors in the world — including Valery Gergiev, Ilya Moesin and Anton Kerjes — he has become famous for his staging of works by Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky. He also directs numerous festivals throughout Europe.
And as a progenitor of rarely heard music, he is not shy about introducing unknown pieces to Bangkok audiences. The Variations And Fugue On A Theme By Johann Kuhnau is typical. Andriessen’s son Louis is famous for his political stands and revolutionary avant garde music. Father Hendrink is a bit more conservative. He was a virtuoso organist known throughout Europe. This composition, though, for string orchestra, shows a different mood, one as tragic as Beethoven’s could be, yet with shimmering string passages.
The piece is beautiful in itself, but don’t expect jolly Dutch dancing. The variations are expressive, grave and serious — though all are introductions to the final fugue, which should get everybody dancing.
On the other hand, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons offers two fascinating elements. Primary is soloist Elizabeth Basoff-Darskaia, one of the few who holds citizenship for both America and Russia.
Born in Los Angeles, she started playing violin at the age of six. And at the age of 10, she flew from La La Land to Nyet Nyet Land, where she enrolled in Moscow’s Central Music School. Two years later, she flew back to Philadelphia, where she enrolled in the Curtis Institute of Music, studying with Aaron Rosand, Ruggiero Ricci and Victor Danchenko.
Another flight and she was in Austria, where she presently lives as artist and student.
As a soloist, she has performed with the Israel Chamber Orchestra, Pacific Symphony Orchestra, Moscow Virtuoso Orchestra and many other ensembles. Nor is she a stranger to Asia, having given recitals in Singapore and Taiwan, as well as Europe, Russia and America.
And no matter how many times you’ve heard the great Venetian composer Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, you probably never knew that every single phrase and measure of the four concerti refers to lines in four different poems. Nobody knows whether Vivaldi himself wrote the poetry. But hopefully, these gentle bucolic verses will be printed in the programme — for this, as much as Liszt and Richard Strauss, is a pictorial tone-poem, about 100 years before its time.
It used to be said that he composed one piece played over and over again. That was nonsense. And the first work on the programme will be an eight-minute sinfonia, one of his last pieces. He had been exiled to Europe for fooling around with his female students. But when he returned, he composed a piece as profound and poignant as any work by his contemporary Johann Sebastian Bach.
The final piece is Beethoven’s very first symphony. Unlike the jovial Mozart, who was writing symphonies and operas by the time he was 10-years-old, Beethoven — saddled with a drunken father and a stubborn constitution — never tackled this kind of music in his 20s. He was known as an excellent pianist, and had written much chamber music for the elites of Vienna, but he was hardly the most likeable person in the town.
When he was 30-years-old, he wrote his first symphony.
And while it sounds deliciously youthful, gracious and delightful, the critics of Vienna hated it. Even the first chord came to them as something barbaric.
Not to us, though. It is much like Haydn or Mozart (all three of whom had to deal with inferior orchestras), though the First Sym
phony has changes of mood and practical jokes throughout.
The result is that the Royal Bangkok Symphony Orchestra has endless challenges for the evening, which is fitting, since the sound of surprise is precisely the objective of any musical ensemble.
“Vivaldi’s Invention — Beethoven’s Perfection” is on Wednesday at 7.30pm at Thailand Cultural Centre, Small Hall. Ticket prices are 500, 800 and 1,000 baht, and are available at Event Pop. Call 062-5932224 or visit www.evenpop.me or email pop@eventpop.me. Or you can call the RBSO office at 02-255-6617-18 or visit www.bangkoksymphony.org.