Deerhunter @ Neumos
The Seattle Symphony’s Coming to America festival, a season long look at composers who brought their talents to the United States, came to an end this week with performances of Kurt Weill’s The Little Mahagonny and Bela Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra.
Over the last few years, the SSO’s festivals have showcased composers and music outside of the mainstream of Beethoven, Brahms, and Mahler. This year was no different. In addition to capstone concerts featuring Martinu, Korngold, Weill, Bartok and the curious Genesis Suite, a chamber concert and a performance by University of Washington Wind Ensemble explored the even less known music of Stefan Wolpe, Henry Brant, Samuel Adler, and Karel Husa.
Even though for each of these concerts the audience was smaller than usual, those who braved the new names and new sounds were rewarded with an exhilarating series of evenings, solid playing and a welcome break from the standard repertoire patrons demand.
For the final series of concerts, Schwarz juxtaposed two pieces and two composers who have posthumously swapped positions. When Weill wrote Mahagonny he was at the top of his game, and his other collaborations with Bertolt Brecht, like The Threepenny Opera, brought Weill fame and fortune. When he came to the United States, Kurt Weill immediately threw himself into composing for Broadway.
By comparison, Bela Bartok’s career plummeted during his time in the United States. First his unique folk idiom fell out of favor and second, Leukemia constrained his health and limited the energy he had for composing. Bartok might have never composed another major piece of orchestral music had it not been for his friend Fritz Reiner and Sergei Koussevitzky. Because of Reiner’s advocacy of Bartok’s music and Koussevitzky’s desire for a new commission for the Boston Symphony, the world now has the Concerto for Orchestra.
In the time that has passed since Weill and Bartok composed their pieces, each composers’ fortunes has changed. Bartok may have died with few friends and on the verge of poverty, but today he is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of the Twentieth Century. Weill, on the other hand, has drifted into near obscurity.
It’s easy to see why Bartok’s music has worn well. The Concerto is of standard symphonic proportions and scored for large orchestra. But, the work also resembles a concerto as well. Ample solo and duo parts highlight instruments in ways only a concerto can. Throw in folk melodies and the piece’s appeal is clear.
Schwarz and the orchestra delivered a solid but not electrifying performance. Schwarz generously shaped each movement and he kept Bartok’s textures clean; not mushy. Even the rhythmic pulse of the work was managed and kept from becoming too feverish. The end result was enjoyable even it lacked energy.
Before Bartok’s masterpiece was performed, Schwarz, a smaller instrumental ensemble, and six singers gave the Northwest premier of Kurt Weill’s The Little Mahagonny. The quest for alcohol, sex and money drive the songs in Mahagonny. Or, at least that’s what the program notes lead us to believe. The challenge presented to anyone in the audience was following the story’s narrative. This could have been helped by printing the libretto in the program guide or projecting the titles overhead like what was done with last year’s performance of Bluebeard’s Castle. The arrangement of the instrumental ensemble and the singers contributed to this difficulty as well. Positioned on the left edge of the stage, Schwarz and his instrumentalists were easy to hear, often at the expense of the singers. This was great for those of us who like Weill’s colorful instrumental music but not ideal if you were trying to understand what was being sung.
Basically, a sextet of people set out to find Mahagonny, a town where vice runs free and fast. The group arrives in Mahagonny, but they soon tire of a life of vice and decadence and set out for a new city, Benares. Back in Mahagonny, God comes to judge the sextet and sends them to Hell. A revolt against God’s decision ensues and the city of Mahagonny is destroyed.
Kurt Weill’s success in Germany surely is due in part to his keen ability to satirize and study the popular and political culture around him. This reality probably has contributed to The Little Mahagonny’s slide into insignificance. Satire depends on context and the present isn’t the same as Germany between World War I and World War II.
The crowds were smaller than usual for the Seattle Symphony’s Coming to America festival. But, the success of any festival depends on more than just large crowds. For two weeks, audiences were presented with seldom heard music in commendable performances. Both the Genesis Suite and The Little Mahagonny were revived for the occasion. A slew of other pieces and composers were given their due too. Festivals like the one that just concluded, let the music director, orchestra, and audience stretch their legs and in the process find new favorites. For two weeks the Seattle Symphony explored the little known and the seldom heard; a refreshing diversion from the tried and true heard so often these days in the concert hall.