Symphony No. 8 (1968-1969)
Allan Pettersson’s previous two symphonies, though structured as single movements, both featured what amounts to two distinct sections. Symphony No. 8 is the same, though here Pettersson explicitly divides the work into two movements. This is an interesting decision, as it can easily be argued that, as before, they work as twin parts of a single symphonic argument. In some respects, it’s like a continuation, and a reversal, of Symphony No. 7. The introduction is once again dramatic, quickly becoming fast-flowing, though with a lyrical impulse that struggles to be heard, and appears to be limited in scope. As such, it’s essentially a small-scale version of what the larger symphony will turn out to become.
Pettersson’s obsessive streak comes to the fore, this time focusing attention on not a melody, barely even a motif, but just two notes, a rising semitone. Faintly folk-like (due to its harmonic implications and the way it’s often accompanied) it’s effectively like the beginning of something that can’t really get going and expand, continuing the combination of obsession and immobility explored in the preceding symphonies. This is one of the ways it’s easy to regard the piece as a continuation of No. 7: it’s as if the music is tired from the outset, barely able to put one foot in front of the other, still less deal with anything untoward that might crop up. But of course, that’s precisely what does occur, and the symphony’s first part is a familiar progression through climactic swells – once again, sometimes maintained as plateaux – that shake up everything, causing material to rupture, tumble and fragment, and periods where everything seems nebulous and lost. Somehow that ridiculous, microscopic notion of an idea keeps going, though by the close of the first part you wonder whether on earth it’s got anywhere or achieved anything. Perhaps that’s the point.
The second part turns away from being primarily lyrically-minded to an equally familiar world of volatility. In some ways it harks back to the extreme contrasts of earlier symphonies, where no one idea is able to dominate but is swept aside as quickly as it takes centre stage. A real sense of momentum makes this part sound all the more unstable, like a runaway train, driven along – as ever – by the militaristic precision of snare and tenor drums, with added muscle from the brass. That rising idea is abandoned in favour of other, equally tiny possibilities of an idée fixe, including a descending four-note phrase that appears around eight minutes in, and, some time later, a rising phrase in the bass. But they’re attempts to get a handle on things that are as ineffectual as the work’s longer-term stability. Indeed, another flailing attempt (again echoing previous symphonies) is the work’s insistence on prominent tonic-dominant progressions and cadences to give the illusion of something secure and stable, employing them like a comfort blanket. In this respect, no-one in their right mind would call this symphony (or any of the others, for that matter) “tonal”, though this cadential emphasis, coupled to a soundworld where neither progress nor expansion (let alone development) are likely possibilities, results in a kind of quasi-stasis that could be crudely interpreted as tonally-inclined.
The obsessive streak is equally matched by the disruptive force of the work’s volcanic attitude, continually building up only to be broken up, smashed apart, distorted or contorted into another grotesque screaming processional. So when the rising idea forces its way to the front again, around 10 minutes before the end, one could read it as a kind of giving up, returning to an earlier point when things were (barely) more manageable. As with Symphony No. 7, the piece concludes with a massively drawn-out coda that’s just as obsessive as everything else, unable to let go, unable to stop, despite the fact, on this occasion, there’s not so much musically compelling about the material being prolonged and lingered over. It suggests the impression conveyed by Concerto No. 3 for String Orchestra, that it’s better to keep going than fall silent altogether. The rising idea doesn’t even survive to the end; a new, weirdly plainsong-like chattering idea starts up, seeing the symphony to its end.
Of the four recordings of Symphony No. 8, Sergiu Comissiona’s, made in 1977 with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, remains unavailable, its vinyl release never issued in digital format (which is surprising, considering the recording was reissued on vinyl in 1980 by none other than Deutsche Grammophon). Though a strong performance, it suffers from being a somewhat boomy recording with limited dynamic range (a deadly problem in Pettersson’s music), and is arguably the least effective at making a compelling case that the symphony should carry on and not just give up. All the same, though, Comissiona knows what he’s doing in Pettersson, and it would be good to see the recording remastered and reissued some day. The Radio-Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Thomas Sanderling’s recording is comparable in many ways, again suffering from insufficiently captured lower registers (which seems to be a real CPO label problem), though the clarity is generally much better. The processional sequences have a chaotic atmosphere to them, and the brass in particular sound like so many trapped animals. The music’s in-built restrictive language comes across in the more dramatic passages, those animals writhing while pinned or confined, and when they’re unleashed, Sanderling elicits magnificent power as the orchestra rushes and flexes its freedom. Many inner details are clarified, having the effect of making the symphony’s long-term non-trajectory feel even more abject and stunted.
Both of the other two recordings are unequivocally outstanding, in terms of both performance and sound quality. Gerd Albrecht and the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Hamburg really lean into the drama of the piece, managing to make even the introduction have its share of quiet grandeur and directionlessness. The ensuing swells are portentous, overflowing with stormy chaos, reinforcing just how disorienting it is when we plunge into the troughs between these vertiginous peaks. The second part is particularly breathless, not merely propelling but plunging forward, though Albrecht makes beautiful sense of the symphony’s eventual return to lyricism, teasing out tonal elements otherwise lost in the surrounding ferocity, and causing the oblique harmonic collisions and sagging glissandi to give the music a sickly patina, even sounding nauseated. The work doesn’t so much end as stagger on as if in a stupor, knackered, yet the orchestra keeps it compelling to its last breath.
While their interpretation of Symphony No. 7 was the longest on record (and the best), Leif Segerstam and the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra take the opposite approach here, with their recording of Symphony No. 8 – included in the Complete Edition – being the shortest of them all (and again, the best). Theirs is the only truly clear introduction, where Pettersson’s undulating lines don’t blur into apparent dissonance but are kept clear and distinct. There’s also an immediate foreshadowing of the oom-pah-like processionals and lyrical minutiae to come, forging a stronger connection to the rest of the work than the other recordings. Part One is pure exhilaration, displaying enormous contrasts, ominous and foreboding, while ensuring the lyrical sensibility continues through while other elements threaten to crowd it out or simply crush it. That’s taken even further in Part Two, with such volatile pushing and pulling it’s as if the very fabric of the music is poised to tear itself apart. Everything is ramped up a notch in this performance, not just dramatically but also orchestrally. The brass are abundantly rich, the percussion rain down thunder, wind accents are wincingly pointed, while the strings are rendered a meekly poignant underclass to these forbiddingly ferocious hostile elements. As with their performance of No. 7, there’s a barely-contained madness that comes across later on, a numbness, a weirdness, that begs questions about where on earth we are, where we’re going, and what’s the point of it all. More than any other, they capture the essence of what makes Symphony No. 8 distinct, no longer articulating tangible tragedy but an altogether more diffuse kind of uncertain despair.
Symphony No. 9 (1970)
WOW. i can only imagine that was the reaction from pretty much everyone in Gothenburg Concert Hall on 18 February 1971, when Pettersson’s Symphony No. 9 received its première (at a concert commemorating the 350th anniversary of the founding of the city). Anyone even faintly aware of what Pettersson had explored and expressed in his previous symphonies could never have predicted what would have come next. Structured in a single movement lasting 70 minutes (i don’t know of any such symphonies that are longer), the piece is filled from beginning to end with speed, lightness and, dare i say it, a whole lot of fun. It marks something of a return to the more carefree contrapuntal intricacy heard in the early Concertos for String Orchestra, with a palpable sense of play and mischief.
Many of Pettersson’s trademark ideas are present, most noticeably his fondness for locking material into tight loops that circle round and round. Though where previously this invariably carried a connotation of oppression or otherwise unwilling immobility, here it’s an integral part of the unstoppable merriment that drives the symphony along, as if the orchestra were either getting unwittingly caught in various cul de sacs along the way, or are simply having so much fun that they want to cycle round for a while before moving on. It also features, extremely prominently, Pettersson’s profound lyrical impulse. This is barely glimpsed – indeed, barely relevant – for much of the work’s duration, though it rises up unexpectedly to become the symphony’s lengthy crowning peroration.
In between, Pettersson treats us to an absolute masterclass in a romping, rollocking superabundance of ideas carried along by an unstoppable flow of energy, no longer disruptive but deliriously capricious. Often, tempos become concentric, with different sections of the orchestra racing or chugging along at full, half or quarter speed. It’s flowing from the very first bar, hitting the ground running with quick rising and falling phrases that develop into fast note repetitions and snatches of high melody, once again sending the horns soaring. (Both the metric relentlessness and the way it’s scored suggest it as possible inspiration for the ‘Ecstasio’ movement of Thomas Adès Asyla.) This torrent of sheer invention, ideas gleefully falling all over each other, pulls the ear around constantly, yet over time it becomes more and more apparent that Pettersson is actually keeping the palette of ideas relatively small, creating endless variety from them through a mixture of development and juxtaposition. It wouldn’t be a Pettersson symphony without one or two wild processionals, presented here as raucous cavalcades with a distinct party atmosphere, powered by delicious oom-pahs in the bass. There are other references too, including an oblique allusion to ‘Jungfrun och Ljugarpust’, the tenth of the Barfotasånger, during one of the symphony’s more reflective interludes, and, shortly after, a direct quotation of the ‘Habanera’ from Bizet’s Carmen, a fitting allusion to a rebellious spirit in Pettersson’s irreverant yet serious symphony. Also, toward the end, a syncopated minor triad emerges in the brass that suggests the irregular heartbeat motif from Mahler’s Ninth Symphony, coming just at the point where the symphony opens out to its extended, purely melodic conclusion. The work ends – half seriously, half (i suspect) tongue-in-cheek – with the syncopated triad one final time, now major, and, of all things, a plagal cadence, ending the symphony with an implied “Amen”.
Despite its rip-roaring immensity and liveliness, Symphony No. 9 has only been recorded on three occasions. Considering that the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and Sergiu Comissiona gave the première, it’s surprising to note that their performance is staggeringly slow – stretching out what should be 70 minutes into no fewer than 85! (If that’s what happened at the first performance, the audience would have been saying “Wow” for an entirely different reason.) As it is, there’s not much to commend in what is little more than an enormous slog, where Pettersson’s motoric impetus is made sluggish and inconsistent, the repetitions sound more like the emptiness of minimalism, and almost all sense of fun has been replaced by weirdness. Comissiona seems to have approached it like a Shostakovich symphony – particularly the lyrical episode around 27 minutes in – emphasising heaviness rather than momentum, and perhaps trying to indicate a more cynical reading of the work, that its forward propulsion, as with the previous symphonies, has a grotesque, rather demented quality, rather than being playful, even joyous. It’s no bad thing that this recording has never been reissued since its original vinyl release (which compounded its problems by breaking the work up on four sides).
There’s little to choose between the other two recordings, both of which are absolutely top-notch. In the Complete Edition, Christian Lindberg and the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra are back again, doing their damndest to ensure Symphony No. 9 never lets up for a second. That being said, Lindberg keeps the orchestra impressively restrained whenever possible, which only makes the fast speed and rapid runs, flurries and figurations all the more exciting for being so mysteriously soft (though never less than absolutely crystal clear). Of course, this only makes the symphony’s high points all the more dramatic, and Norrköping inject into the tuttis a palpable tone of cheek yet without ever undermining the lyrical threads often heard in parallel with these outbursts. The sense of unstoppable momentum in this recording is almost incredible, holding us to rapt attention and making their tenacity seem more and more incredible as the work unfolds. The woodwinds deserve special praise, sounding absolutely beautiful in both melodic and rhythmic modes, while the strings often seem – in the best sense – absolutely bonkers in their sequences of swiping repetitions.
For me, though, the edge goes to the recording by Alun Francis and the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. A sense of joy and élan is here utterly unconfined and exhilarating, Francis letting the orchestra off the leash from bar one. There’s never the slightest hint of exaggeration, simply giving a transparent reading of all the work’s thrills and spills. Every member of the orchestra is in apparent sympathy with every other member, such that when ideas start tumbling, interrupting and superimposing there’s the ever-present impression of a chorus of voices all on the same page, acting to reinforce rather than redirect the music’s unstoppable forward motion. This remains true when, around halfway through, they manage to convey the sense that they’ve splintered, the adjacent shards subsequently reuniting in thrilling callithumpian climaxes, processions of madcap glory in extremis. Once again, we arrive at the end of a Pettersson symphony in a state of exhaustion – yet, this time, resulting not from enervation but from euphoria.
Thanks for this series of posts. Very valuable, especially for distinguishing performances which are very hard to assess if you don’t know the works well (and who does?).