Between clear frenzy and the battle for fraternity: Impressions of John Eliot Gardiner's Beethoven cycle at the still young festival "Barcelona Obertura"
Barcelona - "All people become brothers": Whoever believes it. Obviously, this man is less so - otherwise he would not overstate and overheat the finale of the ninth, drive it insane and mad, so that chorists, instrumentalists, listeners and, last but not least, almost fail deodorant. Brotherhood takes a lot of work, which is what John Eliot Gardiner means with this performance. And: Beethoven's music is an art of uncompromising, the ninth is not a self-contained monument, but an expression of the sheer superhuman struggle for a (too) distant state.
The most important Beethoven conductor of our time will announce this several times in this Beethoven year. With his Orchester Révolutionnaire et Romantique, founded 30 years ago to record the Bonn Master's symphonies, he performs the symphonies cyclically four times. In Chicago, New York and Athens, the premiere round was just in Barcelona. The architectural explosion of the Palau de la Música with the blend of Art Nouveau, Neo-Baroque and Catalan Modernism fits perfectly with Gardiner's interpretation.
Three music institutions work together
In the tightly seated 2100-seat hall and thanks to the living room acoustics, the message from Gardiner and Beethoven not only hits the brain, but also the stomach. At the same time, this is the early start for “Barcelona Obertura”. The spring festival was held for the first time three years ago. The Catalans want to catch up: In a city where the masses are pushing the La Rambla promenade and the card buyers are meandering in front of the Sagrada Familia, classical music providers also want to benefit from the tourist boom.
Three major institutions have joined forces: the opera house of the Gran Teatre del Liceu, the music center L'Auditori, which opened in 1999 with its modern halls, and the Palau de la Musica. “Barcelona is perceived internationally from the perspective of football, architecture and good cuisine, but hardly from the perspective of classical music,” says Joan Olle, General Manager of the Palau. "I know that we cannot immediately achieve the importance of Vienna or London, it is just a long-term project."
The Catalans are not just targeting T-shirt and sneaker tourists. Those customers who like to combine the enjoyment of their music stars with a city trip should also be addressed. So far, reports the Palau boss, around 25 percent of concert goers are tourists, the vast majority come from Catalonia. Interesting: The riots and strikes of the past few months, when the Catalans fought for their independence, had little impact on the tourism boom, not even the terrorist attack on La Rambla three years ago. "Maybe a lot of travelers think that this can happen to them in Rome or London," says Joan Olle. "The financial crisis 20 years ago was much worse for us."
No other ensemble plays that exciting
The “Obertura” festival has some attractants on offer. In addition to John Eliot Gardiner, Victor Medem, the well-connected managing director and founder, was able to win for example Lang Lang with Bach's Goldberg Variations, Valery Gergiev and his Mariinsky Ensembles with Verdi's Requiem or Philippe Herreweghe with the two Bach Passions. The Liceu becomes the Bayreuth spring branch: Katharina Wagner stages the "Lohengrin" of her great-grandfather with Klaus Florian Vogt in the title role. As an extra there is the free festival "Obertura City plus". The program includes, for example, the cyclical performance of all Beethoven piano sonatas at various locations in the city.
However, they will all struggle to beat the start. Gardiner did not deviate from Deut by recording his Beethoven symphonies three decades ago, on the contrary. The tempos are still based on the metronome information of the master, hardly any other ensemble can play it so exciting. The descriptions of nature by the sixth sound like Nordic Walking through magical landscapes, the rhythms of the seventh increase in delirium, the grossly motorized, folk music joke of the eighth acts like a shirt-sleeved Haydn parody for Gardiner.
The ninth as an overwhelming border crossing
With the Orchester Révolutionnaire et Romantique, he discovers the utopian where one would hardly have expected it - not in the loud proclamation, but in the gently pulsing "scene on the stream" of the sixth, permeated with pure beauty and harmony. Or in the orchestral song of the Adagios der Ninth spun like an endless melody.
You can tell the orchestra how exhausting this Beethoven week is. And at the same time you can feel how much the musicians are playing into a clear intoxication. When the Ninth Gardiners Monteverdi Choir and the Chamber Choir of the Palau join forces in the finale, it pushes you into the seat. "Delightful spark of gods", but above all "Be entwined, millions", that becomes the border crossing, gruff, loud, overwhelming , a polyphonic, glistening beam.
That work that the world is only too happy to use as a festive garnish is traced back here to its actual meaning: “About stars”, Schiller finally texted, “a creator has to live”. Certainty: none. Hardly anyone has hammered this into the audience as intensely as Gardiner. Maybe it was just imagination, but the grim bust of Beethoven next to the stage nodded briefly.