March 17, 2009: Prokofiev 2, Beethoven 0

Sergei Prokofiev is far from the easiest composer for a listener to approach, but it often seems that a Russian guide can be very valuable in facilitating that approach.  When the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, under conductor Yuri Temirkanov, visited San Francisco in November of 2007, I used my blog to reflect on my own Prokofiev listening experiences, writing that "I have called him a 'burned-out firebrand' and celebrated his raucous qualities."  On that occasion Temirkanov served as an excellent guide to Prokofiev's fifth symphony;  but, if one wishes to take in the full scope of Prokofiev's repertoire, one probably could not hope for a better guide than Valery Gergiev, who spent the last two evenings at Davies Symphony Hall conducting the London Symphony Orchestra in four of Prokofiev's symphonies and one piano concerto.  I attended last night's concert, where the symphonies were his second (Opus 40 in D minor, completed in 1925) and his seventh (Opus 131 in C-sharp minor, composed over the year preceding his death on March 5, 1953).  This evening also provided the only break from Prokofiev in the form of Ludwig van Beethoven's fifth ("Emperor") piano concerto in E-flat major, Opus 73, with Alexei Volodin as soloist.

Prokofiev composed his second symphony when he was living in Paris.  The work was both encouraged and supported by Serge Koussevitzky, a champion of the modernism of that time.  Koussevitzky's performance was not very well received, quite possibly because, as a conductor, he was not really up to the task.  Michael Steinberg's program notes quoted Prokofiev writing (in his diary?) that "neither the audience nor I understood anything in it," which reminded me of one of Arnold Schoenberg's more notorious observations:

My music is not modern;  it's just badly played.

Nevertheless, Steinberg hit on the key to approaching this symphony properly:

Writing for a public exceedingly interested in the latest thing, Prokofiev set out to write a symphony "of iron and steel."  Fascination with art about machines as represented by Marinetti's Futurism and the Constructivism of Tatlin, Gabo, and the Pevsner brothers was very much in the air.

However, I would suggest that Prokofiev was responding to more than what was just "in the air."  In this digital age in which so much mechanical activity has been reduced to the interplay of energy fields at the subatomic level, it is easy to forget what made those large and complex machines so fascinating.  I would not be surprised if Prokofiev's fascination came from the extent to which the machine was a physical embodiment of the concepts of counterpoint and harmony that provided the foundations for his creative efforts.  For those who did not understand mechanical engineering (presumably such as Prokofiev), there was something mystical about assembling such a large ensemble of moving parts, each with its own "voice" but all linked together in intricately coordinated (and harmonious) movement.

1924, the year when Prokofiev began work on this symphony, was also the year when Koussevitzky first performed Arthur Honegger's "Pacific 231," which is very much a reflection on the counterpoint and harmony of a steam locomotive.  Prokofiev's own reflection commands far more gut-wrenching dissonances than those of Honegger;  so one can appreciate why Koussevitzky could never muster the chops for it.  These days, however, those sounds are not as shocking.  Gergiev could clearly hear the music in them with no difficulty;  and he conducted the London Symphony in which a way that we could hear that music, too.  What may have been gut-wrenching for Koussevitzky and his audience has become exhilarating;  and through Gergiev we could all share that exhilaration.

One final comment from Steinberg is worth noting:

One of the odder impressions made by the 1925 reviews is the double complaint of formlessness and unoriginality.  The design is both clear and, for a symphony, new.  Prokofiev pointed out that he had chose Beethoven's last piano sonata, Opus 111, as his formal model;  that is, he cast the work in two movements, the first muscular and turbulent, the second a set of variations on a slow theme.

In such a context I find myself wondering whether, knowing that his seventh symphony would be his Opus 131, Prokofiev deliberately chose C-sharp minor, the key of Beethoven's Opus 131 string quartet, composed in, as Thayer put it, the "year which witnessed the last of Beethoven's completed labors."  In many ways Prokofiev's symphony shares the valedictory feel of the Beethoven quartet;  but Prokofiev's valediction is more inclined to look back on his past accomplishments, not so much from his "firebrand" years in Paris as from the lyricism he ultimately found in his ballet music for Romeo and Juliet and Cinderella.  Listening to this symphony is a bit like sitting on a couch with Prokofiev as he leafs through an album of photographs of these ballets.

The reflection on Cinderella is particularly poignant.  In that ballet the clock strikes midnight with the same dissonant force that inspired so many nineteenth-century depictions of Judgment Day.  In the symphony this is transformed into a quiet ticking motif, introduced in the first movement and pretty much the last word of the final movement.  Prokofiev is more aware than Cinderella was of how time is running out on him;  but he is accepting it with a resignation that can review his past accomplishments "without blushing" (as Roger Sessions put it when he gave his Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard).  Gergiev knew how to capture this spirit of acceptance, just as he had captured the machine-worship of the second symphony, giving us the full pleasure of Prokofiev sharing this final thoughts with us.

Given the strong connection of Beethoven to both of these symphonies, placing his own final piano concerto between them seemed like a logical choice.  For reasons that may have had more to do with jet lag than technical capability, Volodin's performance as soloist was not a particularly secure one.  His tempi were erratic, and there were too many stumbles in his rapid passages.  More importantly, there seemed to be a serious "communications disconnect" between Volodin and Gergiev (a topic currently receiving some interesting attention on Stephen Hough's Cadenza blog).  The London Symphony Orchestra has probably played this concerto for just about every major pianist and just as probably under most of the major conductors.  There was no faulting their support under Gergiev's baton;  but they never came together with Volodin in that spirit of conversation that makes a concerto "click" in just the right way.  Considering the high opinion that Prokofiev had of Beethoven, it was more than a little disappointing that this "old master" did not receive the same support as his twentieth-century admirer.