'24-'25: Performance #8
Of Metronomes and Matters of Interpretation
Performers:
Ensemble: New York Philharmonic
Conductor: Susanna Mälkki
Soloist: Leila Josefowicz. (violin)
Program:
Luca Francesconi - Duende: The Dark Notes (New York Premiere)
* * * intermission * * *
Strauss - Metamorphosen
Ravel - La Valse
Position: Way up in the rafters (stage left), in one of those weird forward-facing single seats.
Purpose/Intent/Questions: My main draw to the program was wanting to see Mälkki conduct. Simple!
How’d it go?
On the tail of a New Music program, this concert seems to prove all the unsavory points I raised. Admittedly, I missed entry for the first part of the program—they’re pretty tight in David Geffen Hall. I was there before the concertmaster called for tuning, and I absolutely could’ve made it to my seat! But part of me didn’t want to. I’d heard a recording of “Duende” beforehand, as seemed to have been the case for a number of folks cozily camped out at the bar, waiting for intermission to come. I didn’t consciously decide to show up late, but I did stack up a bunch of errands right beforehand… like finally getting my ear piercing redone1 a decade after it closed up, and dropping in on a friend on the Lower East Side.
Francesconi’s idea of duende is not my idea of duende. And I do have a fairly significant idea of duende.2 Lorca asserted, among other things, that duende cannot be summoned. After a substantial amount of time in different religious, spiritual, and creative communities, I think that it can be summoned. But it doesn’t always come when called. It’s probably not Josefowicz’s playing that’s at fault. Watching her on the Hauser Digital Wall, she seemed to be at least as competent of a player as most who stroll through Lincoln Center. It’s the spell.
The cante was not jondo, to put it lightly.
When those of us dwelling in the lobby were permitted to ascend to our seats for the Strauss and Ravel that titled the evening, I was quite struck by Mälkki’s conducting. Less for any particular aspect of interpretation and more for the almost unbelievable control she has over each of her hands. A lot of people underestimate the difficulty of training your hands to function independently. Many folks who take the podium do so with the awful habit of muddy double-fisted conducting, using both hands to gesture towards the same thing, whatever that thing might be. If there’s one clear factor common to the majority of Finnish conductors, they at least take it as a minimum that you have to keep your tempi hand clean, if not sacred.
But Mälkki is on another level, almost mechanical, a self-adjusting human metronome. In the 3D chart that exists in my brain (and only there… for now) where I plot out conductors on various axes, she is holding the far corner of precision, accuracy (this is different from precision—one can be very precise about her mistakes, but Mälkki clearly knows the score and how it billows over the orchestra in time), and consistency. That hand just does not stop. As an audience member, it might start to feel a bit annoying. But even the best musician can appreciate it, like a clock and compass on constant display. And her left hand was free to move around for entries and exits, for emotion and dynamic emphasis.
Both pieces were beautifully played. Flawless, but not groundbreaking. It left me curious to see Mälkki conduct something larger, more complex, unwieldy by nature.
Shoutout to Rocky at Cherry Bomb!
Beyond lived and artistic experiences, much of my post-secondary music education and training and my graduate literature program focused on Latin American traditions. Duende: it’s in the curriculum!