Virile Flor Beethoven opening concert

10 September 2011 was the MPO's opening concert of the 2011-2012 season. A programme of Beethoven's Fifth and Seventh symphonies under MD Claus Peter Flor brought an almost full house to the DFP. The musicians were generally well-chosen with superb principal flautist and oboist Hristo Dobrinov and Simon Emes respectively. A disappointment for me was that Paul Philbert was not on the timpani and he would have been a better player to co-ordinate rhythmic elements of the 2 Beethovenian scores.
The trumpet playing was generally poor too.

Previously MD Kees Bakels led some good performances of the Beethoven symphonies but the level of the prior performances was not a match for these two new interpretations by Flor - a superior conductor to Bakels. His tempi are fast, with no-nonsense playing - an "a tempo" Germanic feel (a la Karajan) and without much or any slowing down (unlike Furtwangler's Beethoven). Rhythms were very clear most of the time and dynamics and phrasing were generally very well-terraced.

The famous opening movement of the Fifth was fast and furious but perhaps lacked some Karajan "fire". The next movement was flowing and nicely played. The third movement was well handled and the transition into the fourth movement was exciting. An unusual interpretative gesture was that the first three held notes of the fourth movement were at the third movement's tempo and then Flor took off at a much swifter speed for the remainder of the movement. Texturally, Beethoven wrote similar speeds for both these movements and the dotted minim speed (for the third movement) should equal the minim speed (for the fourth movement).

After the interval, we were treated to a lively and rhythmic performance of the Seventh symphony. Tonal depth was much better than MPO Beethoven performances under Kees Bakels. The sharp rhythms in the first and third movements were a delight to listen to. The second movement was played swiftly and the gravitas (in the fugato section) seemed slightly lost here. The horns are a very important part of this Beethoven symphony and the new hornists that are now in the MPO are much better than those that used to play in the orchestra. Though they are now better, the playing is still not beyond reproach (note a fluffed section at the end of the first movement).
The last movement was slower than I would expect Flor to take it at (Karajan and Carlos Kleiber are very swift here). A disappointing feature was that the first and second violinists were unable to capture the mounting excitement of the oscillating phrases at the end of the symphony.

Nevetheless, this is one of the more distinguished Beethoven performances that the MPO has given in the DFP hall. May Claus Peter Flor be our MPO MD for a long time and may he lead them to further glory and higher standards in time to come.