Nathalie Stutzmann and the Orchester Métropolitain | Beginnings that do not fly

The great contralto Nathalie Stutzmann converted to conducting about fifteen years ago. She made her debut with the Orchester Métropolitain on Saturday night. Unfortunately, the result did not meet our expectations.

We were starting off with strongly positive biases, however, given the musician’s accomplishments as a singer, who was recently named head of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, making her the second woman – after Marin Alsop in Baltimore – to hold the reins of an ensemble of such importance in the land of Uncle Sam.

Watching Nathalie Stutzmann in action, however, unfortunately gives the impression of seeing a good conservatory student in action, nothing more. She knows her score well, gives entries at the right time looking in the right place. But it goes little further.

Visual impressions are obviously not proof of everything. We know splendid musicians who give shivers without breaking a sweat. And others who fidget a bit in vain too.

But as a general rule, when the music is truly embodied in the body, as with Yannick Nézet-Séguin or Rafael Payare (who moreover came to listen to his colleague), both the sound and the discourse take on a whole new dimension.

Forget the music

The French chef had chosen the Symphony n^oh 6 in B minor, “Pathétique”, by Tchaikovsky. It is difficult to make a more moving score: the Pathetic undoubtedly contains some of the most beautiful themes in the history of music.

But Nathalie Stutzmann is so preoccupied with the set-up that she forgets about the music. I thought of a certain rather colorful piano teacher who told her overly reserved students that they should play as if they had just thrown their clothes across the street. This abandonment was absent on Saturday.

When Tchaikovsky puts such dissonance, such poignant harmony, the interpreter must taste it himself for the public to savor it. It is not something which is calculated like a theorem. The singer however does it magnificently when she sings Bach, for example. But that remains to be found as a chef.

In the slow movements, the problem is the lyrical themes, which are conducted with unpardonable indifference. In rapid movements, it is the urgency that is lacking. The musician does not provide enough energy to lead the phrases to their destination.

What about the dancing side of the second movement, a sort of five-beat waltz whose deliciously capricious side we hardly feel? Ditto with the third movement, much too static. But the public applauds at the end because it ends strong…

A great musician once said in a master class that you had to play a fast movement as if you were surrounded by flies that you hoped to sweep away once the piece was finished. A way of saying that you have to press the accelerator, which of course does not prohibit a sudden brake here and there to let a passing beauty pass. Nathalie Stutzmann, however, lives very well with mosquitoes.

Timid management

And there is sound. Tchaikovsky is the beauty of the strings at its zenith. We may work on the sound of an orchestra for years and have the best musicians in the world, but it is the conductor’s commitment that gives life to the sound.

Despite the relative stability of the whole (in terms of set-up), the departures were also often uncertain, due to the timidity of the management. At the beginning of the third movement, the beat in the void given before the real start confused some musicians, since we did not feel any difference between the two gestures.

We got a taste of it all in the Violin Concerto n^oh 2 in G minor of Prokofiev at the beginning of the concert, in particular in the last movement, marked “ben marcato”, indication left in plan.

The soloist was the young Swedish violinist Daniel Lozakovich, with whom M^me Stutzmann has already collaborated elsewhere. He is known to have signed with Deutsche Grammophon at age 15. He is now 21.

The technique is impressive, and the playing is far from devoid of musicality, but we do not yet perceive a truly original personality. The projection of the sound is also still to be perfected. And Prokofiev’s sardonic wit was hardly there. A talent to follow.