In recent times, due in part to the cosmic boredom aroused by the Auditori's programming and the qualitative inconstancy of the Liceu's operatic productions, the Palau de la Música has consolidated itself as Barcelona's most reliable musical venue. This was certified by the season opening this Thursday of Palau 100; one might think ---and would be right--- that the Palauera programming is not very risky and relies exclusively on re-consecrated names of classical music, but it can also be argued that this select group of ensembles, conductors, and performers have not reached the pinnacle of fame by chance. This is relevant for concerts like this season opening which had the guarantee of featuring the Vienna Philharmonic and a top maestro like Daniele Gatti but which, despite the guarantees, gave us an excellent evening, ideal for philosophizing about the repertoire.
The professors from Vienna and Gatti chose a sound menu that could not be more contrasting: on the one hand, the neoclassical-spirited music of Stravinsky's Apollon Musagète and a piece of great dramatic-psychological tension like Shostakovich's Tenth, two works that diverge in their sonic spirit and highlight the progressive decadence of Europe and the world between 1927 and 1953. The first score fits the acorn-like strings of the Viennese professors like a glove, and Gatti offered a reading that was perhaps a little too Apollonian, surely to contrast the agonizing drone of the totem that awaited us in the second part, but with maximum attention to instrumental articulation. In this sense, the work of the Milanese maestro (with a left hand copied from Solti's gestural clicks) seems more like that of a surgeon of detail than that of an intellectual with an overall vision.
This perhaps weighed a little in a highly tragic symphony like Shostakovich's Tenth, a sonic monument written just after Stalin's death that compiles all the repression and misfortune the composer suffered during the communist dictatorship. The distressing vision of the piece led us to an interpretation that was sometimes somewhat uniform in the moments of greatest volumetric intensity, but all of this is minor compared to the rectitude of the Viennese soloists, who pulled off the devilish pirouettes and syncopated rhythms of the Allegro (in reality, a Scherzo) with bulletproof strength. When a practically bicentennial orchestra, which could achieve the same level of applause without much training, shows such involvement, the audience can only applaud until their hands are red. In turn, the listener is also compelled to reflect on our time, which will regurgitate the contrasts of the past.
For the moment, the first steps of this musical season have been magnificent, with a notable Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk at the Liceu (where we have finally seen maestro Josep Pons tackle a repertoire ideal for his baton... just during the last season in which we will see him in the coliseum of La Rambla) and now with this kickoff of a Palau 100 season that, with old acquaintances like Herreweghe or Hengelbrock, looks important. I am writing this Punyalada hours before the opening of the OBC season at the Auditori begins, the third to be led by principal conductor Ludovic Morlot, with a very interesting program featuring works by Mompou, Gershwin, and Ravel. Nothing would make me happier than to swallow my intuition and for the OBC to succeed in musically enlightening us with something more than mere correctness and for the Auditori to thus leave a greater mark on the sonic imagination of our city.
For now (and I regret writing it, because I would like to praise public institutions much more) the Palau is winning by a landslide. We will continue to report.