Blomstedt/ Lucerne Festival Orchestra
KKL Concert Hall, Lucerne, 14th August 2020
“Life is Live” is the defiant banner under which this year’s revised Lucerne Festival was launched on Friday evening. A reduced audience in face masks, yes, and distanced orchestral seating, but with an all-Beethoven programme for the first two concerts headlined by two elder statespersons of the classical world. With a combined age of 172, Martha Argerich and Herbert Blomstedt certainly brought a wealth of experience to the platform, but there was never any danger that these were going to be stately or safe accounts.
Herbert Blomstedt and Martha Argerich
© Peter Fischli | Lucerne Festival
Blomstedt, shaking the leader’s hand before suddenly realising his naughty indiscretion, brought an energetic punch to proceedings from the orchestral tutti which opened Beethoven’s First Piano Concerto. Argerich’s response to Blomstedt’s boisterous initial thrust was a playful parry. Sporting a plaster on her left thumb, her tempi were generally a little gentler than Blomstedt’s – she set a broad speed for the second movement Largo that he tried to chivvy along once the orchestra joined in – but her playing was always fluent, occasionally wilful. The first movement cadenza was full of impish wit and, even if one got the sense that Argerich was in the driving seat and Blomstedt was steering his charges to accommodate her, their musical partnership was most satisfying. They tumbled along like kittens in the perky Rondo finale, defying the years. Both Blomstedt and LFO leader Gregory Ahss tried to cajole Argerich into giving an encore, but she declined with good grace. (She relented the next day, after playing the same concerto.)
Martha Argerich, Lucerne Festival Orchestra and Herbert Blomstedt
© Peter Fischli | Lucerne Festival
The Lucerne Festival Orchestra boasts some luxury players, as it has done since its reincarnation under Claudio Abbado. The Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Orchestra Mozart – both Abbado creations – still provides the bulk of the players. Starry principal desks including Wolfram Christ (viola), Clemens Hagen (cello), Jacques Zoon (flute) and Stefan Dohr (horn). Reduced ranks gave much of a period feel to proceedings, although Blomstedt has long favoured leaner strings and faster tempi in the symphonies.
Herbert Blomstedt conducts the Lucerne Festival Orchestra
© Peter Fischli | Lucerne Festival
And so it proved in an invigorating performance of the Second. I wish the director had just left us following conductor cam, for the shots of Blomstedt demonstrated his sheer love for this music, his animated expressions a delight to follow. After the Adagio molto introduction, the first movement drove along agreeably; the Larghetto felt unhurried, but just right; and the Minuet was cleanly accented without being too hard pressed. The woodwinds were neatly turned out, even if the clarinets sometimes felt under-nourished, and the brass punctuated the finale with gleeful humour. Blomstedt’s Beethoven is always a tonic and this Second certainly raised the spirits.
Watch the concert on Arte (unavailable in some regions)
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