1991

The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra

Celebrating Mozart

Two centuries on Mozart’s compositions continue to be music to our ears. Conductor Nicholas Braithwaite and Concertmaster Ladislav Jasek talk with Murray Bramwell about what Mozart means to them.

Unless you’ve been living in a cupboard for the past year you will know that 1991 marks the bicentenary of the death of Mozart. Throughout Europe and North America commemorative programs of his music will be performed to audiences whose love for his work only increases with time. In Austria extensive celebrations are in prospect and large numbers of visitors will be making the pilgrimage to Vienna, Salzburg and other Austrian cities associated with the peripitetic Wolfgang.

When we consider the singularly unhappy circumstances of Mozart’s final years and his premature death in pitiful circumstances, the magnitude of public admiration for his music nowadays has an unavoidable irony about it. In his own lifetime his work was undervalued by envious rivals and a fatuous court and despite his tenacity and optimism his career was buffeted by ill-health, fickle patronage and financial uncertainty.

We can take no comfort in the romantic myth that suffering is a catalyst to creation. Even a passing glance at the facts suggests that Mozart died of neglect. Michael Levey in his biography, The Life and Death of Mozart, describes countless times when well-to-do audiences were happy to applaud but less willing to subscribe. One instance, in Leipzig, caused Levey to fume – “Two of Mozart’s finest arias -Bella mia fiamma, probably, and Ch’io mi scordi di te- two mature piano concertos and portions of two unidentified symphonies were included in a programme which may make posterity weep for envy of those who heard it, and for shame that humanity would not pay for such a privilege.”

The focus on Mozart in 1991 is valuable and timely. Singling him out gives the chance to acknowledge fully the scale of his achievement. Even though he died at thirty-six he had a prodigious writing life of thirty-one years in which he produced , according to Kochel’s diligent catalogue, 626 works -an output which in itself represents the pinnacle of achievement in the classical period.

The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra is not only presenting a series of four Mozart-only concerts during April and May, it has initiated a cluster of other events relating to the Mozart celebrations. The ASO will appear with the State Opera in its production of Don Giovanni in May and the Adelaide Chamber Orchestra and the Australian String Quartet will also be performing during this period. The Adelaide Festival Centre Trust will be coming to the party with a series of Mozart film screenings and there are plans to present a season of chamber music with players from the University of Adelaide’s Elder Conservatorium performing in the Festival Centre foyers.

ASO General Manager, Michael Elwood is enthusiastic about the Mozart program which is unique to the Adelaide concert season. “The idea came from the excitement when Walter Klien came in 1988. We virtually booked him on the spot. He is carrying several other Mozart concertos for other cities but only Adelaide has made it a specialty.”

Austrian born, Walter Klien has distinguished himself in both the classical and 20th century repertoire, touring regularly throughout Europe and North America. He has also recorded extensively – amongst some 65 recordings he has performed all of the Schubert sonatas and the complete Brahms and Mozart solo works.

Principal Conductor Nicholas Braithwaite will present all four of the Mozart concerts. “I first worked with Walter Klien in my very first job with the Bournemouth Symphony,” he recalls, “it was in the late 1960’s and we did a Mozart concerto then too. He’s a Viennese musician and the thing about them is that they really know about music. You have a soloist come who specialises in Mozart but you talk about a Puccini opera and he can play it to you from memory.”

“He was stunning then and I never worked with him again until the performance in Adelaide about two years ago. it went so well that at that time we suggested he come back to do the Mozart anniversary season with us. The concerto selections are his choice and then we had to decide what else to do for the four programs.”

“We went through all sorts of permutations like Mozart and Vienna, Mozart and his Contemporaries and so on,and we found that they were either too restrictive or dangerous in other ways. We looked at various programs other people had done recently and they do tend to show a great composer with a lot of other not-very-great composers. You can end up with a ragbag collection really.”

“In my opinion Mozart is the one composer above all others where you can do lots of different programs purely from his music without becoming saturated. After Walter Klien had selected the piano works, the question was then how to structure the rest of the program. We decided to do something really simple which was Symphonies 39, 40, 41 and the Requiem. They are the peak of Mozart’s creativity -it is a logical sequence of the three major achievements in the symphonic world in the 18th century plus the major choral work of the 18th century. It is a simple idea but we thought `Why not ?’ We then matched the concertos with the different character of the symphonies and built the program up from there.”

Nicholas believes that the success of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus has contributed to a revival of interest in Mozart. An admirer of the play he saw the Peter Hall production five times. “The play, and the film, have done a magical service for music,” he explains, “because although we are all aware that many of the details are factually incorrect, Amadeus captures absolutely what it was like for Mozart to be Mozart at that time and what it was like for the people around him to be confronted by him. It showed his frustration at finding himself being judged for appointments to jobs by people whom he knew to be infinitely inferior to him and their fears to find themselves in the company of someone they knew to be so much better than they were.”

“I’ve come to Mozart’s work over a very long time. I started my musical life as a trombone player, interested in the music of Wagner and Tchaikovsky and Verdi. Over many years working with chamber orchestras Mozart has become a larger and larger part of my life and I expect that to go on growing.

“I think one of the reasons is that there is about Mozart a sense of balance and perfection which you don’t find anywhere else. Now, I don’t really believe in perfection- I believe in the search, but not in its realisation. But Mozart confounds me because in his music- and I would say I knew about a quarter of it well- there seem to me to be no imperfections.I find that difficult to come to terms with !”

“Mozart’s work is a perfect blend – when you get to the people who transcend their period and their time such as Mozart or Wagner, I think they blend the qualities of Classicism, Romaticism and Impressionism together. All of these elements occur in their music which is why they are so good. When it comes to externals it is easy to find labels but when it comes to internals, like the balance of a piece which may be the reason it is ultimately more successful than another composer of comparable melodic gifts, these labels dissolve. Then you find that Mozart is just as Romantic as Beethoven and Beethoven as Classical as Mozart.”

All the orchestral works in the program have personal associations for Braithwaite. “The Requiem interests me because as a trombone player it has a super part for trombone ! Also, I find the sheer sense of creative excitement in the Requiem very moving. Mozart was dying and it was left unfinished. Mozart did not dictate it from his deathbed, and certainly not to Salieri ,as suggested in Amadeus. He left sketches for others to complete. The excitement of that process,though, of getting the vision in someone’s mind on to a piece of paper, that stays with me when I do the Requiem. ”

“I have conducted it twice before and the symphonies all have life-long associations with my early days with amateur orchestras. I’ve been doing them on and off ever since and I’m gradually learning to come to grips with them in the way I want to do them. The piano concerto in B Flat K 595 is also a return to a familiar task because we performed it in 1988 with Walter Klien on his last visit. ”

For Nicholas Braithwaite, a conductor whose warmth and enthusiasm has made him popular with Adelaide audiences in his time with the ASO, the Mozart season, particularly with Walter Klien, is one he looks forward to -” There is so much space in his playing, ” he notes admiringly, “that’s the element of classical perfection that Mozart gives you, the complete sense of timelessness and space in his music.”

Violinist Ladislav Jasek has been Concertmaster of the ASO for eight years. He came to Australia in 1959 to teach at the Elder Conservatorium in Adelaide and soon distinguished himself as a soloist with a number of Australian orchestras as well as with the widely regarded Elder Trio. He returned to Prague as Resident Soloist with the Czech Philharmonic and travelled throughout Europe. Australia became a base again in 1966 and he also worked a stint teaching at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. He has been guest Concertmaster with the Royal Philharmonic and the London Mozart Players. He was Concertmaster with the Elizabethan Theatre Trust Orchestra before taking the front chair with the ASO.

In conversation Ladislav Jasek’s affection for Mozart is immediately apparent. “My enthusiasm began when I was a child,” he recalls with a quiet smile, “I used to be a child prodigy myself. I started playing when I was five years old and I played my very first Mozart concerto when I was six. I studied it and performed it in my local village in Czechoslovakia. Later I played it professionally and performed all seven of the violin concertos. Also, not many years ago I recorded one of the Mozart concertos with our Adelaide orchestra.”

“I am an avid collector of records which began when I was very young. I started with 78’s and then LP’s and now compact discs. I have three full sets of Mozart piano concertos and also the symphonies. For me personally Mozart is a great joy and the Mozart season will give us a wonderful opportunity to play his work.”

“Mozart’s genius is his simplicity and yet he makes definite statements. The structure of his themes is simple yet precise. It is not possible to make any changes. You can find composers, even Beethoven, where some things, not necessarily could be added, but re-orchestrated or slightly changed. In Mozart that would be sacrilege. It is a statement -right there, that’s how it is. It is there like a law – a kindly law, not abrupt or strict, something you play with an equal loving care, which is what the music conveys.”

“There is a tremendous sense of humour in Mozart as well as something very profound, especially in the later work. I am refering to the symphonies and operas like The Magic Flute. There is a story of a Czech composer who was asked what he would do if Beethoven came into the room. He said he would bow very low in honour of Beethoven. And if Mozart came into the room ? He said he would get under the table and never come out !”

“Mozart was there, is here and will always be here. The only thing that we may change is our conception of how to perform him. I think, thank God, that we now go to the simplicity and play precisely what is there without adding any unwanted Romaticism and -talking as a string player – without any unwanted portamenti or glissandi. We keep to what is written without -again from the string point of view- any excessive vibrato. Then the beauty of the music is fully revealed as the composer intended. Mozart wrote with such ease that he could even write two or three things at the same time and never would one thing interfere with the others- such was his genius of mind and spirit.”

Jasek is also looking forward to working again with Walter Klien and is especially fond of the later piano concertos. his favourite is the Concerto in C, K467 -now sometimes called the Elvira Madigan after it was popularised by Bo Widerberg’s film in 1967. “You know that so-called relaxation music that people use ? When I really want relax I play the slow movement from 467. Sometimes when I go to sleep I simply switch off the light and play the tape I have of Vladimir Ashkenazy conducting the London Philharmonia. I have often thought to tell my children that when I have my funeral that they should play that particular tape for me because it is one of the most sublime pieces of music, by any standard, written by any composer.”

Commenting on his animated approach to music, Ladislav readily concedes -“It is part of the Slav race you could say. Ever since I showed my particular talent as a child I always believed that music is the deepest expression of the human soul and spirit- combined together through physical means- and that has to be obvious, not in an ostentatious manner, but expressed nevertheless.”

“This Mozart program is a happy event for the orchestra. We all love to play Mozart. I could not possibly imagine anyone in the orchestra not enjoying the series. In fact, we may have a problem because we have to reduce the orchestra size and already we are wondering who on earth will be left out. So we may do some rostering so everyone will have an equal chance to participate.”

“I remember the 200 year commemoration of the birth of Beethoven. I was in New Zealand and I performed all ten sonatas.” Then the violinist adds- “I wish I could perform all 35 or so of the sonatas and we could do all the concerti and symphonies.” With a wry smile, Ladislav Jasek interrupts his enthusiastic reverie. “But we have to be modest,” he concedes with a reluctant shrug, ” and look forward to these four concerts instead.”

Symphony Australia, 1991.