Review: Andriessen Los Angeles Philharmonic premiere

Friday night, Esa-Pekka Salonen conducted the world premiere of Louis Andriessen’s “The Hague Hacking” at Walt Disney Concert Hall.  It is a glitzy 16-minute two-piano concerto written for the flamboyant French duo of Katia and Marielle Labèque.  That makes it a relatively small and relatively flashy piece compared to Arvo Pärt’s soul-searching, expansive “Los Angeles” Symphony and Kaija Saariaho’s ravishing, soul-sapping oratorio, “La Passion de Simone,” also premiered by Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic in recent days.  Still, “Hague Hacking” proved hard work, very hard work.

Apparently getting the 69-year-old Dutch master, an uncompromising anti-establishment figure, to write a concerto for traditional orchestra was, in itself, like pulling teeth.  Salonen has said Andriessen needed considerable convincing to accept a commission to write for traditional symphony orchestra.  In 1970, after penning his nose-thumbing “The Nine Symphonies of Beethoven” for ice cream bell and orchestra, the Dutch composer moved on to smaller ensembles, or larger ones comprising raucous winds, brass and percussion. 

The San Francisco Symphony commissioned “Die Snelheid” (“Velocity”) in 1983 for three ensembles, replete with blaring saxophones and Hammond organ, and that aggressive work drove audiences out of the hall in fury and fright.  At a rare American revival of “Snelheid” a decade later as part of the Tanglewood Festival in Massachusetts, one well-known American composer ostentatiously kept his fingers in his ears throughout the performance. 

But Andriessen, who has been mentor to many younger American composers and who has created a major stylistic school in Holland, has lately clicked with the L.A. Philharmonic.  His work was a hit during the Minimalist Jukebox festival three years ago, and it looks as though a fruitful relationship with the orchestra has emerged.  Moreover, Andriessen’s latest work has taken on a depth of expression that demands more attention in the U.S.

Still, he remains feisty.  To increase his comfort level working with a symphony orchestra, he added electric and bass guitar, along with synthesizer and a healthy percussion section to the Philharmonic for “Hague Hacking.”  At a preconcert talk, he told the audience that during a rehearsal he found the lush sound of a large string sections simply not to his taste and he asked Salonen to half the number of players.

“The Hague Hacking” begins with percussive attacks by the pianists, who play throughout the score as if a single pianist with four hands.  They riff on the opening notes of Liszt’s “Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2,” a potboiler the contrarian composer claimed not to know.  But he did admit to adoring a “Tom and Jerry cartoon that parodies the Liszt.  He also threw into the mix a drawn-out version of a popular song about the Dutch city The Hague.

Andriessen describes the concerto as essentially a toccata.  Its edges are sharp and everyone on stage Friday seemed on edge as well.  But the Labèques, fabulously dressed, were fabulous soloists, reading each other’s minds as they became a single super pianist.  Stravinsky’s prickly sound was an evident influence on the piano writing, but there were also sweetening hints of Messiaen’s harmonies in the orchestral accompaniment.  Liszt remained deconstructed throughout in this study of pinpoint pianism.
The ending was surprising.  Andriessen reaches an unusually triumphant climax -- unusual, that is, for him.  The score then ends with a hint of sentiment -– also unusual for him -- in soft string chords.

“Hague Hacking” was the center of a splashy program that began with Janácek's Sinfonietta and ended with Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring.”  The brass, with many added trumpets, blared brightly in the Sinfonietta.  Meanwhile, Stravinsky’s “Rite” was, as it has become in Disney, a rite of Salonen.

Friday’s performance nonetheless differed considerably from the celebratory one that opened the hall in 2003.  Though full of drama and given its quotient of frenzy, this “Rite” had a curiously somber cast.  For all its explosive drama, Salonen brought a new moodiness to the score.  Instrumental details were richer and dwelt upon.  An unbroken sense of line was sustained from beginning to end that I felt was moving but unsettling.  Alternating the “Rite” with Saariaho’s wrenching Passion has undoubtedly taken a psychic toll on the performers.

Salonen dedicated the program to Betty Freeman, the Los Angeles patron who died earlier this month.  He called her one of the most important patrons in the history of music.  He did not exaggerate.

But I would like to add another aspect of Freeman’s legacy to the discussion.  Besides the many composers she supported and more than 400 works she commissioned, she also inspired new heroes of new music.  Lenore and Bernard Greenberg underwrote the Philharmonic commissions for both Saariaho’s Passion and Andriessen’s concerto.    

--Mark Swed

Caption: Marielle Labeque, left, and Katia Labeque at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Credit: Christine Cotter / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Steven Swartz]

"The contrarian composer:" Louis in a nutshell. Would love to have heard this!

[MFRML]

I had the privilege of seeing both Friday's and Sunday's performance. Both days were glorious. It's especially impressive that the orchestra was able to so much new and complex music in such a short time.

It's been fun and fascinating to watch how Salonen tweaks his interpretation of Sacre over the years. Little changes: different trumpet mutes in the opening section of Part 2, longer pauses here, shorter ones there. The very few rough edges of Sacre that appeared on Friday were gone on Sunday; as typically good as Friday was, Sundays was stunning in its ferocity AND beauty. Shawn Mouser's bassoon solo on Sunday was especially good. I really am going to be sad that we won't have Salonen conducting the piece here regularly anymore.

I really disliked the Andriessen on first hearing on Friday, and the reaction of both audience and orchestra was relatively luke warm. Sunday was a little better on all accounts: crowd most more into it, orchestra less stoic. I even enjoyed it more; not sure if part of my reaction was due to differences in seat location (Fri in Orch West looking over one pianist's shoulder, Sun dead center in orchestra where both keyboards were visible); perhaps I could appreciate the interchange between the pianists better when I could see them both, or perhaps I just knew what to expect. Either way, I don't really feel the need to pay money to see that performed again.

Sinfonietta was great, too. My 7-yr old asked for a toy trumpet after the performance, and after sitting fascinated by the Andriessen and rockin' & rollin' his way through Sacre (his favorite piece of classical music), he deserved it.

[markiejoe]

I was at Sunday's performance which was quite moving, but not necessarily because of the music. The fact that Salonen's era with the LA Phil is coming to an end is now permeating the hall with every concert he conducts. And Sunday that feeling in the hall was tangible. And almost visible in the orchestra. It's something eerie that I've never felt before in a concert hall.

Although to my taste I've heard the Phil play a better Rite, and although I don't think Salonen brings out much of the inner beauty of the Sinfonietta (one of my all-time favorites), I actually enjoyed the Andriessen premiere, and I am forever grateful to maestro Salonen for bringing me kicking and screaming as a season subscriber over the last dozen years or so into the often abrasive sound arena of contemporary music to the point where I now can sit and actually enjoy it. I certainly didn't understand the Andriessen from a composer's point of view (even after listening to the composer expound on it in the pre-concert talk), but I find that after being "forced" to listen to the many contemporary pieces -- including his own -- that Salonen has brought to my ears during his term here, I now don't resist and I find myself able to grab onto at least something in every performance which affects my heart or soul or brain or skin -- something.

So it's been a great journey that Salonen has taken me on, and I will be forever grateful to him. And every time I sit in Disney Hall in the future listening to our wonderful band, I will think of all of Salonen's efforts to make the Hall happen, and smile.