MEDTNER: Drei Gedichte von Nietzsche, Op.19. Zwei Gedichte von Nietzsche, Op.19a. Sonate-Vocalise mit einem Motto “Geweihter Platz” von Goethe, Sieben Gedichte Op.46. Acht Lieder, Op.61 / Ekaterina Levental, mezzo; Frank Peters, pno / Brilliant Classics 96072
For the past four years, Uzbekistan-born mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Levental and her accompanist, pianist Frank Peters, have been on a mission to record and release the complete songs of composer Nikolai Medtner, the last of the Russian Romantic composers and, unfortunately for him, one of the longest-lived. The good news regarding his longevity was that, in the late 1940s, a group of wealthy admirers raised enough money for him to record a good portion of his music himself, including some of the songs in addition to piano pieces and his piano concerti; the bad news is that none of these recordings revived interest in a musical style that was considered old-fashioned, thus he died a pauper. But Medtner’s music was, sadly, not fully accessible enough to the average listener for easy assimilation, even in the early years of the 20th century. As I said in my review of Vol. 1 of this series:
There is nothing trivial about [his music]. His goal was never to entertain his listeners. He was a very serious and, according to the few who knew him, an almost humorless person. Of course, this is nothing new to those who know and understand the “Russian soul.” A great many artists from Chaliapin onward took their art very seriously, no matter how high or low-born they were. Medtner was merely someone operating on a higher plane than some of his colleagues.
In the liner notes for this album, Levental adds to this picture of the composer:
Medtner himself said that eternity is the most important theme of art. “You cannot invent eternity, eternity is bigger than us. You can only discover it for yourself”. He believed that music is the language that can connect us across centuries and language barriers. Only through this language do the unspeakable and unspoken feelings and thoughts become clear and distinct. This is the key to communication, in which wholeness, uniqueness, and naturalness emerge. He believed that we humans long for this. Similarities in diversity can thus be achieved, people can thus learn to hear and understand each other again. It is us, humans, who can put the spirit in the words and sounds, not the other way around. All delight comes from within. Medtner himself was a deeply spiritual man. And he had a wish: “every musician”, he said, “must be able to feel the necessity of his destiny on this Earth and create from it. And I want to help them to find this destiny.”
The first five songs on this disc are set to texts by Friedrich Nietzsche. Then there is a “Sonata-Vocalise” based on a “motto” by Goethe. This is not good-time music; this is very serious art. And both singer and pianist take their mission seriously as well. But serious does not mean dreary or heavy-handed; on the contrary, the first of the Nietzsche songs, memories of his childhood, is handled in a fairly light-hearted mood, almost sound like a Schubert song—except that it is set in the minor and uses downward-moving chromatics in the piano part. Medtner’s piano music, even in his songs, was usually technically difficult, which makes the relative simplicity of the second song here, “Little Old Mother,” an outlier in his oeuvre.
Over the years in which Levental has been recording these songs, her voice has improved in steadiness, so that the last few releases are clearly the best. It is not a large voice, but it has a bright, penetrating quality, and she is artist enough to know how to modulate it expressively. I did, however, notice on this new release that her vibrato has become somewhat over-ripe, but that may simply be a natural condition of singing for her. Her vocal control, oddly, improves as one continues to listen to this recital. For me, anyhow, as long as the voice is steady, and it is so here, musicianship and expression are more important. The fourth Nietzsche song, “Returning Home,” sounds more like a cross between Rachmaninov and Scriabin than Schubert, perhaps even with a touch of Richard Strauss in the rolling arpeggios of the accompaniment—yet as usual, Medtner keeps his own identity in everything he wrote.
One of the things I like most about Medtner’s music, aside from its seriousness, is the fact that there never seems to be a wasted note or phrase in anything he put down on paper. I wonder if he was the kind of composer who crossed out and re-wrote his music during the creative process, or one of those to whom the inspiration came whole to his mind, but either way, once he was sure of his footing he produced nothing but perfect pieces. There is little or no waste in Medtner’s output as there is in the music of Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninov.
And not only was everything he wrote interesting, he seldom repeated patterns. He had one of those musical minds that could always re-cast his ideas in fresh and interesting ways, and in terms of style he always had a basic Russian sound yet could cross over to or include elements of Schubert, Rachmaninov or Strauss. Because of this richness and complexity of his piano writing, the accompanist in any Medtner song is of paramount importance, and Frank Peters is as much if not more responsible for the success of this music as is Levental. As good as she is, I can’t really imagine what these songs would sound like were she working with an inferior pianist. Her singing is the heart of this project; his playing is the head and soul; and the Sonata Vocalise is proof of this. Her voice is important here, but the success of the performance clearly rides on Peters’ shoulders.
Perhaps another reason for Medtner’s neglect in his lifetime was the fact that, as a piano virtuoso, everything he wrote included his instrument. There were no symphonies, tone poems, string quartets, choral works or masses; even his colleague and good friend Rachmaninov wrote some orchestral and choral music, even a couple of operas. Yet by all accounts, despite his musical seriousness, Medtner was a very kind, warm person who liked people and really did want most of them to like his music. They just never did.
Nowadays, however, we live in a different world. Compared to the drippy, sad-sounding noew tonal music being written by modern composers, Medtner’s world sounds almost incomparably rich and substantive. Perhaps this will be enough to lure some listeners into his world, perhaps not, but at least the tonal qualities of his music are accessible to all despite their complexities.
One final note of interest: the Nietzsche songs are among the rarest of Medtner’s scores, even though they were composed way back in 1910 and 1912 respectively. And why? Because when Medtner’s widow Anna returned to the Soviet Union to get his collected works published, they were excluded. Nietzsche had been banned in the Soviet Union, probably because he was a free-thinker, and free thought is not what the Soviets were about. An excellent album, like all of its predecessors, and well worth adding to your collection.
—© 2024 Lynn René Bayley
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