Springtime in Toronto: touring programme needs some rethinking

For a programme supposedly inspired by the outset of spring, the weather could scarcely have been less cooperative. After a balmy day or two, Toronto served up biting winds and freezing temperatures. Yet, the unfailing pulling power of Mahler was evident in the near-capacity hall.

The evening opened with the investiture of Gustavo Gimeno as Commander of Civil Merit, one of Spain’s highest honours, bestowed by King Philippe III. Leading the ceremony, the Spanish ambassador got a particularly rousing cheer when he asserted Canada’s independence and sovereignty. Patriotic emotions overflowed with the Spanish national anthem followed by O Canada. Expectations were already high for what was to follow, given that this programme is tipped for inclusion in the TSO’s eight-city European tour next year.

The first half consisted of vocal works, featuring Austrian-British soprano, Anna Prohaska, encasing a short orchestral interlude, in the shape of Maria Theresia von Paradis’s Overture to her Singspiel Der Schulkandidat – a jovial if anonymous affair. If there is case to be made for this modestly talented, blind contemporary of Mozart and Haydn, the TSO and Gimeno certainly did their very best.

Even less substantial was Rufus Wainwright’s A Woman’s Face, from his Five Shakespeare Sonnets, a four-minute song with a nicely scored accompaniment that develops from celesta solo to orchestra tutti. The setting itself scores high for unmemorability, as though it had been rummaged out from a discarded pile of failed attempts by Andrew Lloyd Webber. A miked-up Prohaska, singing from the choir seats, was at least audible, but diction came a poor second to bel canto.

Extending the Viennese concept came two concert arias: Fiordiligi’s “Come scoglio” from Così fan tutte and Haydn’s Scena di Berenice. Unfortunately, Prohaska’s under-powered voice, pleasant though it is and well suited to lighter Baroque repertoire, was not up to the athleticism and drama demanded by either piece. Such suspicions were confirmed in the finale of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony where, despite transparent orchestral textures, her voice lacked the requisite power, not to mention lightness, insouciance and childlike wonder. 

Elsewhere in the symphony, Gimeno was in total control, with an eye firmly on continuity. While this resulted in a highly disciplined performance, not least thanks to an on-form TSO and some superlative solos especially from the woodwinds, it made for a Mahler Fourth with a diminished profile: neither a sunlit, childlike world occasionally disturbed by bitter-sweet sadness, nor the sinister “figures moving behind a veil”, in the words of Mahler scholar Deryck Cooke. In other words, neither Hans Christian Andersen nor the Brothers Grimm.

In the first movement Gimeno seemed to be tidying up rather than relishing the music’s playful tantrums and excitable outbursts, and the nightmarish climax was surprisingly tame. Likewise, the second movement was almost lovingly rustic, lacking the macabre evocation of Mahler’s ‘death friend’. Perhaps most convincing was the slow third movement, which captured the extremes of fragile serenity and solemn sadness (special mention for the strings’ featherlight hush and sumptuous glissandi). The climactic opening of the gates of heaven was not as revelatory as it can be (but had it been so, the finale itself would probably have been even more of a letdown).

Gimeno and the TSO have many more claims to excellence than were shown here. To showcase this programme in Europe would seem unwise.