Admittedly, it has been quite some time since I heard a St Matthew Passion in a concert hall as opposed to a church. The Concert Hall of the Danish Radio in Copenhagen is an impressive building both inside and out; it was well-filled and buzzing with excitement for a Passion featuring the radio orchestra, choir as well as young and attractive international soloists. Led by Andrea Marcon, most known for his very successful ensemble, the Venice Baroque Orchestra, this Passion performance was disappointingly messy from start to finish. “Murphy’s Law” prevailed and too many things went very wrong which was sad, as soloists, choir and orchestra were clearly committed and handled their Bach with organic musicality. Frankly, the problem was the conductor.
Nowadays we are quite used to strange looking conducting, ever since the historically informed performance practice movement inspired many keyboard players to take up batons: traditional conducting technique is not often seen, neither is two armed independence nor the clear triangles and squares of the symphonic tradition, where the upbeat is clearly up and the downbeat is the most important accent. The crucial work Harnoncourt, Koopman, Brüggen and Herreweghe do is, of course, during rehearsal when the structures of Baroque music is discussed with orchestral musicians: lines are recognized, bowings corrected and accents are set. The influence of the recording industry being what it now is, many symphonic players have heard their fair share of Baroque long before the specialists come to town.
Marcon uses a constant circular motion augmented with pointed fingers to lead. He hits both down and upbeats somewhere in these circles. This entire Passion was nerve-wracking as a result. The next major misunderstanding between soloists, solo instrumentalists and continuo players was always just a few bars away. Well-playing instrumental soloists dropped out, soloists dropped notes, even this experienced choir was on occasion insecure about commencing the next line of some of the chorales due to the vague nature of Marcon’s circles. Neither of the two continuo organists took any lead whatsoever so throughout both recitatives and arias, all had to fend for themselves.