At the festive final concert, Janine Jansen shares the stage one more time with the team of befriended top international musicians who were guests at this year’s International Chamber Music Festival Utrecht. Eight friends divided into two ensembles will play masterpieces by Taneyev and Brahms together with Janine.
The Russian Brahms
That Janine Jansen has invited Russian violinist Boris Brovtsyn to play the first violin part in Sergei Taneyev’s adventurous Piano Quintet is no coincidence. Boris recently recorded the work for the Naxos label, with South African viola player Gareth Lubbe, among others, who is also on tonight’s bill. Together with the other three musicians, they will show how unjust it is that this work is not performed much more often in the Netherlands. The striking and dominant piano part, which at times suggests that we are listening to a piano concerto, betrays the fact that the Russian Taneyev was not only a great composer, but also a piano virtuoso. He made his debut as a concert pianist in Moscow with a performance of Brahms’ First Piano Concerto. He received composition lessons from none other than Pyotr Tchaikovsky, with whom he became great friends and whom he would later succeed as professor at the Moscow Conservatory.
In turn, Taneyev was a teacher of Alexander Scriabin, Serge Rachmaninoff and Nikolay Medtner, among others; students who would all become at least as famous as Taneyev himself. He probably owed his nickname ‘the Russian Brahms’ to his impressive chamber music works, which, as with Brahms, sometimes have a symphonic aura. This is true, for instance, of his overwhelming Piano Quintet in g minor. The piece opens with a mysterious, sombre introduction and a contrasting Allegro. This is followed by a playful and cheerful Scherzo, a tragic Largo with a constantly repeating short accompaniment motif in the cello part and a compelling Finale.
Fresh zest for life
Johannes Brahms plays a prominent role in this year's evening concerts of the festival. Previously, his First Piano Trio, First Piano Quartet and Second String Quintet have sounded. Today, Janine Jansen closes the festival with the imaginative Second Piano Quartet in A major, a kind of twin brother of the First Piano Quartet in g minor, although they differ greatly in character. The first ideas for these two compositions originated in the 1850s in Detmold, northwest of Kassel, where Brahms was temporarily employed by the local prince. The young composer rented a room in Hamm from the widow Elisabeth Rösing, to whom he dedicated the Second piano quartet. After both his friend and pianist Clara Schumann and his friend and violin virtuoso Joseph Joachim gave their assent, Brahms published both piano quartets as opus 25 and opus 26 in 1861. A year later, he himself played the virtuoso piano part of these pieces at his Vienna debut.
The first quartet is predominantly passionate and impetuous, while the second is much more lyrical and relaxed. After close examination, Joachim described the Second piano quartet as follows: ‘Innermost gentleness alternates with fresh zest for life.’ And: ‘Whoever writes such a thing is noble and good.’ After an inventive first movement full of contrasting emotions, a lyrical and wistful Adagio and a proud and energetic Scherzo, the work closes with a spirited dance. Although that dance is regularly disturbed by melancholic melodies, the lust for life eventually triumphs. The exuberant finale is a delightful conclusion to the festival.