Friday, January 24, 2025
Concert Hall, Helsinki Music Centre, Mannerheimintie 13 A, 00100 Helsinki, Finland
The two ballet scores included here, both seminal in their very different ways, were premiered in Paris within weeks of each other during 1913. In Helsinki Jeux was refined, elusive and mercurial, with finely graded timbres and considered dynamics to aid a flexible, breathing, and poignant performance. The Rite was not quite as successful – on the quick side (rhythms less than stabbing) and percussion could be too polite (a marvellous bass drum aside) although all came together in a thrilling ‘Sacrificial Dance’, metrically meticulous, ending with an unanimous and – signalling the demise of another deliriously-dancing maiden as she bites the dust – violently-addressed chord. The mysterious introduction of Part II will also stay in the memory.
In between, Ravel’s Concerto in G (for both hands), a dashing and vivid rendition of the outer movements – Alexandre Tharaud a master of legerdemain – with no lack of expression in the first, that quality to the fore in the Adagio, space and sensitivity entwined, graced by wonderful woodwinds, a highpoint of this engagingly collaborative reading. For an extra, Tharaud added Erik Satie’s Gnossienne No.1, played tenderly, musically wistful.