Beethoven Festival: Swann, Dowling
The last word, and some along the way
February 21, 2012The news was decidedly mixed from the last two installments of the San Antonio International Piano Competition’s presentation of all 32 Beethoven piano sonatas.
Jeffrey Swann, who had opened the series last month, returned to Ruth Taylor Recital Hall on Feb. 18 to play the composer’s otherworldly valedictory, Op. 111, and the three sonatas of the early Op. 10. He was preceded on Feb. 14, in Christ Episcopal Church, by Richard Dowling, the competition’s 1991 gold medalist. He played four sonatas from the early and middle periods, including the popular “Moonlight.”
As before, Mr Swann spoke intelligently and at length about each of the works on his program. As before, his technical limitations were difficult to ignore, though this time the problems were both exacerbated and compensated by breathtakingly fast tempos in the presto and prestissimo movements of the three Op. 10 sonatas. If many of the details were blurred, the big picture -- the big Beethoven personality, and the distinct characters of the three sonatas -- came through clearly. His accounts of the slow movements of Op. 10 were transporting -- patiently paced, phrased with a fine sense of pathos and vulnerability, played with sumptuous tone.
In his remarks about Op. 111, Mr. Swann mentioned the most famous essay on the piece, in an early chapter of Thomas Mann’s novel “Doktor Faustus.” In a passionate but only semi-intelligible lecture-performance, the fictional music teacher Wendell Kretchmar attempted to explain why Beethoven’s final sonata had only two movements rather than the customary three. Mr. Swann’s answer was clearer: The two-movement structure was complete because the wild, ferocious struggle of the first movement was perfectly balanced by the serenity of the second. I would slightly amend that analysis only because “serenity” doesn’t seem quite the right word. The second movement begins in serenity, with the arietta theme, then passes through some increasingly nervous variations before entering a sublime state of ecstatic suspension.
There were some bizarre moments in Mr. Swann’s performance of Op. 111. In the third variation, the startling “boogie-woogie” rhythm in the descending arpeggios was entirely missing, and the rhythms were not quite right in other places as well. But there was also much to like -- the precise control and beautiful tone in the maestoso introduction to the first movement, the very fast but flexible tempo in the allegro continuation, the directness of the statement of the arietta theme, the icy quiet of the central variations. The ending was highly effective.
Mr. Dowling gave spirited, technically secure accounts of his allotment of sonatas, though he showed some distracting quirks.
His dynamic range skewed to the loud end, and his staccato notes tended to heaviness, sometimes stomping or being sustained too long. Granted, there is room for interpretation of some of Beethoven’s markings, and occasionally the pianist’s choices worked well: In the slow movement of Op. 2, No 2, his extension of the staccato sixteenth notes in the bass gave them the substance of organ pedal notes.
More troublesome was the sometimes excessive pushing and pulling of the tempo, with unauthorized ritardandi too frequent and too extreme, especially in the tornadic finale of Op. 27, No. 2 “Moonlight.” Commendably, he took the famous first movement of the “Moonlight” at the proper, not-too-slow tempo.
Mr. Dowling gave quite a strong account of Op. 14, No. 1. The tempo play was generous but well suited to the music. The first movement was especially winning -- spritzy, gutsy and stylish.
The zenith was Mr. Dowling’s zesty account of Op. 31, No. 1. The preening rhythms in the satirical slow movement were delicious, the stop-and-start closing sequence of the finale was wonderfully effective, and the performance was full of character.
After the piece won him an unusual mid-program standing ovation, he told the audience he’d just started studying it intensively a year ago. He added, “I’m keeping that piece in my repertoire till the end of my life.”
Mike Greenberg
