The Pentaèdre wind quintet joined forces on Saturday, at Bourgie Hall, with the Penderecki string quartet and a few fellow musicians to offer the 4th Symphony of Mahler in the reduced version by Klaus Simon. This short but delicious concert, enhanced by a creation by Julien Bilodeau, brilliantly showcased Simon’s genius as a transcriber.
Reductions of Mahler symphonies by Klaus Simon, a 55-year-old German pianist, conductor and composer who specializes in arrangements for chamber ensembles, attracted sudden attention during the pandemic, when it became impossible to accommodate an orchestra whole on stage.
However, it is much more than a simple reduction in size and resources. Simon’s culture allows him to refer to the genre of Hausmusik (domestic music) in vogue in the 19th centurye century and salon reductions as they were practiced at the beginning of the 20the century, therefore in the time of Mahler. We can think here of the famous arrangements of Viennese waltzes by Berg, Webern and Schoenberg.
Earth roots
It is therefore not necessarily a question of “reducing a symphony orchestra”, but also of cleverly using non-orchestral instruments, here the piano and the accordion. The latter takes the place of the harmonium used in the last century. He can perform the pedals (held notes), for example at the beginning of the 3e movement with viola, cello and double bass. As for the piano, it is crucial in the cutting of repeated notes or the rhythmic structure, for example at the beginning of the symphony.
Obviously, what changes are the scales, since winds are found behind a simple quartet. There is also the fact that what can be the subject of sonic crossfades in the orchestra is not possible here. Certain transitions in the development of 1er movement appeared a little convoluted. Moreover, individual responsibility is increased, as we saw with the violist for a fraction of a second at the end of the slow movement.
As if to redouble the effect, far from playing a reduction of a Mahler symphony, Pentaèdre, the Penderecki and their colleagues played an often fascinating stripping which returned Mahler to the rugged harshness of his native Moravia. With these edges and this frankness of sounds, we also visualized the meadows, lakes and mountains of Toblach, where Mahler composed.
Unlike most interpretations of this reduction, which are rather light and lively, Quebec musicians have highlighted colors and timbres: the horn, the oboe, the flute-violin combinations. It was Mahler eaten to the fullest, in his juices, to the point that the “real” 4th Symphony sometimes seemed, when we thought about it, to an enlargement of this sap.
Magali Simard-Galdès has an excellent solo voice. It has, as in the work of Julien Bilodeau, particularly succeeded in a subtle and moving ending. She should, in our opinion, more firmly materialize the beginning of her phrases rather than starting them in a somewhat anecdotal way and amplifying them, especially when, as here, the musicians make little effort to comply with her nuances.
In the first part, All the fertile amplitude, by Julien Bilodeau, set to music for the same group (limited only to the string quartet and wind quintet) the second verse of the untitled poem, known under the name of “There are nevertheless apples and oranges”, by Marie Uguay, published in the collection The afterlife, in 1979. To prepare for these words, Bilodeau designed a work in two parts. The first is purely instrumental with the idea that “music without words is a nature without a name”. In the second, “the voice appears on a vowel, before the word becomes “the full stop in the moment, all the continuous dispersion of time” (Sign and rumor1976) and that “from that time, [se] reconstitutes your look” (Prose poem, posthumous). »
A very thoughtful work, therefore, which will need to be heard again, ideally with an explanatory preamble from the composer, to grasp its dimensions and in particular the relationship between the text and the timbres, which does not appear at the first hearing.