Who says life isn’t a dress rehearsal? Saturday night at the Proms was just that for New York-born Marin Alsop, for when she returns to the Royal Albert Hall in two weeks’ time she will make Proms history as the first female conductor to preside over the Last Night. It should be an astonishing fact that no woman has yet brandished the exalted baton, but in such a male-dominated profession, it is sadly par for the course. Alsop’s impressive stewardship of the Orchestra of Age the Enlightenment on Saturday evening makes her an outstanding choice to close the season.
That said, this night of brooding German Romanticism got off to an unexceptional start. Having been the subject of so many authoritative interpretations from Toscanini to Klemperer, and wont to unfavourable comparisons, Brahms’s Tragic Overture lacked depth: the upper strings were simply too reedy and there was an uncharacteristic dearth of energy to its dramatic motifs.
Schumann’s Symphony No. 4 in D minor, Op. 120 (played here in its revised 1851 version) was, however, excellent, with Alsop’s direction delivering a taut interpretation. The Romanze was particularly well interpreted, and the orchestra’s reading of the elegant melody scored for oboe and solo cello was delectable. Orchestra leader Kati Debretzeni deserves particular credit: her triplet figures towards the end of the movement were liquid gold.
Like Schumann’s Fourth Symphony, Brahms’s great choral work A German Requiem treads the brittle tightrope of hope and despair. Less accomplished performances of the Requiem can seem laboured and lethargic, but Alsop’s interpretation – its first period-instrument performance – was cathartic, as it should be, and oddly festive. Soloists Henk Neven and Rachel Harnisch both gave stellar performances, especially the latter. This was soprano Harnisch’s Proms debut, and I can’t be alone in hoping it will be the first of many appearances in the Royal Albert Hall. Her measured delivery of the words “wieder sehen” (“I will see you again”) was a mournful, resonant and deeply affecting moment.