L Boulanger D’un matin de printemps
L Boulanger Faust et Hélène
Stravinsky The Rite of Spring
Karina Canellakis conductor
Véronique Gens soprano
Andrew Staples tenor
Jean-Sébastien Bou baritone
Lili Boulanger’s D’un matin de printemps is a taut evocative excursion. Her writing works hard, pedalling furiously from scene to scene, transitions marked by Canellakis with elegant hesitations realised by a responsive woodwind section. The cellos seemed underpowered at the start; an early oboe solo cutting through the morning mist with delicious clarity. There a whiff of Dukas in the orchestration when the brass join for a momentary climax. When the tuba final joins there’s a sense the work has found completion, as though Boulanger has spent the previous five minutes casting around for the instruments she wants. A flourish brings this sophisticated light music to a resolute end with an unapologetic splash of a chord that shouldn’t work harmonically but absolutely does.
Where the programme notes confused, Boulanger’s score provided clarity in Faust et Hélèn. I’m still not entirely clear exactly what was going on — a straightforward synopsis of the text printed text would been a whole lot more effective than the copy and paste from the sleeve notes of a recording. The performances, particularly replacement tenor Jean-Sébastien Bou whose voice doesn’t screech but caresses has a lot to sing and even more to convey in a very short space of time. A captivating voice.
The Rite was the draw. The near capacity audience remained for the main attraction. A tidy, attentive if sometimes polite rendition, turbo charged by insistent percussion. Some of the mystique and the grit that makes Stravinsky’s seminal work was missing in this performance, though conductor Karina Canellakis was solid and committed — it seems remarkable to think there was a time when a woman on the podium was a point of difference. On balance maybe the dismissive programme notes were right after all: this is music written for ballet. What the author witheringly downplayed is the brilliance of the score that resulted in it this work being a well-loved sought after live experience.
