We’re never really done with Beethoven. Uncovering and understanding his music is an endless pursuit. Most symphony orchestras wouldn’t consider a season complete without performing at least one of his nine symphonies. But the Philadelphia Orchestra can now say it’s done with the Beethoven 2.0 project.
Conceived as a tribute to the 250th anniversary of the composer’s birth, it was supposed to have taken place in March 2020 but you know what happened instead, the pandemic and all. Maestro Yannick Nezet-Seguin’s traversal of the complete symphonies plus the debut of some companion pieces was finally completed during the course of this season at the Kimmel Center as well as at Carnegie Hall. The finale to all of it was the rarely performed Missa Solemnis, Op. 123, a huge undertaking for chorus, four vocal soloists and orchestra that runs about 90 minutes in length.
On Saturday evening April 9, SPAC corralled about 30 patrons (plus one critic) for Saratoga night at the Kimmel Center. The performance of the Missa Solemnis was stunning and sometimes breathtaking. With so much firepower on hand, it has the potential to come off as long and explosive. But Nezet-Seguin has a remarkable ability to deliver dramatic music in a refined and radiant manner while not robbing it of force. Under his guidance, the orchestra also allowed the layers of ideas and voices to show through with inviting clarity. The fine acoustics of the Kimmel surely contributed.
Adding to the sensory experience was a ginormous vertical screen, some 40 feet high, that hovered behind the players and presented an endless unfolding of colorful textures with hints of famous houses of worship and religious art. This commissioned visual element was created by media artist Refik Anadol, who fed a database of thousands of images of churches, temples and mosques, plus sculpture and iconography into a computer. An artificial intelligence system then created the moving collage in real-time as triggered by the live music. Orchestra staff report that it was an entirely different show every night.
From the start the abstract and morphing imagery suggested grand and cosmic forces moving in dialogue with the ancient liturgical texts and the mysteries of Christian faith. There were undulating surfaces and tendrils of light, sometimes wispy like fur, other times a vast constellation of dots, and sometimes whooshing and flowing as if from a painter’s brush. Glimpses of stained glass and rose windows shined through the fog. In the later movements there were faces, serene and saintly, briefly formed and then washing away. Toward the end, Michelangelo’s David filled the screen in alabaster glory.
So there was plenty to look at and initially you couldn’t help but watch closely. There was never much of a strict rhythmic synchronicity between music and imagery but the maestro definitely set the pace for both. Ultimately, the dominant creative voice remained that of Beethoven. At key junctures and passages, there was no competition and the music drew full attention.
The opening Kyrie felt less like a plea for mercy and more like an opening invocation. The chorus sang with a pillowy soft sound. Tenor Rodrick Dixon led the way as the soloists upped the ante and the music rose in majesty, evoking a feeling of divine incarnation. The Gloria was at a whole new level, regal and exalted, and the movement just keeps going because Beethoven is hardly done just because he got to the word “Amen.” From there, a massive and intense coda is launched with a fugue in the male voices. Nezet-Seguin had everything well in hand, keeping the forces aligned. The music was loud and clear, yet somehow still supple and warm. When the freight train of sound suddenly ceased, the overhead screen went blank and you just wanted to collapse from the intensity of it all.
Beethoven thankfully makes quick work of the Credo’s many long businesslike verses. Yet he slows the pace and uses a light scoring for the passage ending “et homo factus est” ("and was made man"). Here soprano Jennifer Rowley sang with stark beauty backed by the hushed chorus and set off by principal flute Jeffrey Khaner. Soon the fragile sound shifts in color and sentiment as the glow of the nativity becomes the sorrow of the crucifixion. The tenor again leads the way to the resurrection.
After an accelerando midway through the Credo, the players to the right of the conductor fell a hair behind the beat and this lasted for maybe a couple dozen bars. The women’s voices also sounded understandably fatigued in the Hosannas that end the Sanctus. So if it wasn’t a flawless performance, it was still a very human and more than admirable one.
In the Benedictus, concertmaster David Kim played a lengthy violin solo with a disarmingly clear and unaffected tone. The final movement, Agnus Dei, had an appropriate beseeching character yet the energy or momentum did seem to flag. The piece ends in an understated way, almost a fade to black. Beethoven opens the last phrase “Dona nobis pacem” ("grant us peace") with a brief but exposed battle cry from the brass. It’s a curious choice and likely a commentary on the impermanent nature of peace. That’s something we know about these days. Maybe Beethoven isn’t done with us, either.
The enveloping and rewarding experience of the Missa Solemnis makes one anticipate even more than usual the Philadelphia Orchestra’s annual performances at SPAC because Nezet-Seguin will be there with a batch of Beethoven. During the third and final week of the residency, he will lead performances of three Beethoven symphonies, the Fifth on Wednesday, Aug. 10; the Third (“Eroica”) on Thursday, Aug. 11; and the Ninth (“Choral”) on Saturday, Aug. 19.
Joseph Dalton is a freelance writer based in Troy.
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Classical Notes: Philly Orchestra ends Beethoven cycle with powerful Missa Solemnis - Times Union
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