The London Philharmonic Orchestra and its conductor for the night Anja Bihlmaier missed a trick. On the 268th anniversary of the birth of Mozart, one of the greatest composers the world has ever seen, it seemed curmudgeonly to be offered just one of his 27 piano concertos by way of a nod to the occasion rather than something more appropriate and substantial. But better something than nothing at all. Musical anniversaries are always worth celebrating.
Stepping forward to honour Mozart was Martin James Bartlett, victor ludorum of the BBC Young Musician competition exactly a decade ago. He played the first of only two piano concertos in the minor key which Mozart wrote, held in high esteem by Romantics throughout the 19th century and admired by Beethoven and Brahms, who both wrote cadenzas for it. The D minor signature of K466 represents Mozart in his demonic mode, summed up in the three words used by Alfred Einstein to define it: passion, pathos and drama.
Two of those elements were largely missing in this performance. Bartlett’s first entry revealed a velvety touch and a serene evenness of line which emphasised an Apollonian approach. Aided by a string complement half the normal size, in which intimacy was writ large, not least in the hushed playing of the first movement cadenza and the half-veiled tones of its counterpart in the third movement, this was chamber music at its best, underlined in all the dialogues with the woodwind players. In the central Romanze, Bartlett voiced the first iteration of the theme simply, softly and sensitively, imbuing all its returns with liquid tone.
Though there was pathos, there was not much in terms of passion and drama. It was left to Bihlmaier to inject energy and rhythmic drive to the accompaniment, beginning the orchestral introduction with a purposeful shudder and highlighting the operatic qualities of the G minor episode in the Romanze, where Bartlett maintained a self-effacing view of the work. Disdaining any heroic gestures, or indeed much playfulness in the concluding Rondo, this turned out to be rather a muted celebration. Bartlett’s encore, however, played to his strengths. This was the first of Schumann’s Scenes from Childhood, capturing its dreamy, withdrawn and otherworldly qualities in simplicity without sentiment.
Bihlmaier cuts a dashing figure on the podium. Attired in mint-green with matching jabot and silver boots, she often signalled energy with scooping arm movements. Pocket dynamos are fine, but constant whirring motion can ultimately rob a piece of its multi-dimensionality. In this performance of Beethoven’s Symphony no. 7 in A major three things stood out for me. She deployed antiphonal violins in a slightly reduced string complement, which ensured transparency of texture and attention to contrapuntal detail. For each of the movements she set a basic tempo with no deviations or indulgences. Overall coherence was underlined by playing all four without a break with generous repeats in the first and third. All of this accentuated the terpsichorean character of the work.
Unrelenting forward movement does, however, require moments of contrast if it is not to sound ultimately mechanical and self-defeating. Bihlmaier followed many other present-day conductors by ignoring the Allegro con brio marking of the Finale and treating it as an extension of the preceding Presto movement. At the end of the first movement Beethoven comes as close to a musical representation of an orgasm as is imaginable, with surging groans in the bass line and accumulating tension ending in an explosion. This went for nothing here. Those horns, too, needed to blaze much more triumphantly rather than merely peeping over the edge.
