This is the first of a projected three-CD series that will include Emilie Mayer’s complete surviving orchestral works played on period instruments. Several recordings of Mayer’s orchestral oeuvre have been issued over the last decade, including four CDs on CPO that include all surviving orchestral music as well as a reconstruction of the fourth symphony. Mayer’s time has finally arrived, and this new recording is further proof, if any is still needed, that this music is fully worth our attention.
This program (with almost 80 minutes of music) includes the overtures in D minor and C major (No. 3), Mayer’s one and only concerto for piano in B-flat major, and her first symphony. These Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin performances are consistently energetic and quick-paced: this is the fastest of three recordings of the concerto, and the symphony is about a minute faster than CPO’s recording with the NDR Radiophilharmonie under Leo McFall.
While some period instrument ensembles adopt a weightier, more homogeneous string sound for late Classical and Romantic music, the AAM Berlin continues to play with lean, silvery strings (7/7/4/4/3) that resolutely avoid vibrato. With its fruity and characterful woodwinds, the sound world offered here is substantially different from earlier recordings.
I was most impressed by the performance of the concerto. We do not know when Mayer composed it (she did not date her manuscripts), but it is her most overtly classical work, Mozartian in substance and style. Its fast outer movements feature a great deal of virtuosic filigree, which Alexander Melnikov dispatches with deceptive ease. Interplay between the piano and orchestra has an intimacy and joie de vivre that outshines the overly earnest performance by Ewa Kupiec (Neubrandenburger Philharmonie/Stefan Malzew/Capriccio).
AAM Berlin also find more rhythmic lift than do the Kölner Akademie and Michael Alexander Willens (CPO) accompanying pianist Tobias Koch. Melnikov draws out a greater variety of colors from his 1867 Blüthner. Yet I find Kupiec best in the slow second movement, where she finds a richer strain of lyricism than either of her colleagues.
Both overtures are expertly played here, though Willens’ CPO renditions of both (found on the same recording as the piano concerto) are a tad quicker and more dramatically telling.
Emilie Mayer (©️ The Classic Review, AI generated)
The first symphony reveals a vivid compositional imagination. The opening movement’s brooding slow introduction is a funeral march in all but name, followed by an urgent Allegro energico. The energy of this new reading is undeniable, but the ensemble, closely recorded in a dry hall, lacks sufficient weight to fully capture the music’s dramatic twists and turns.
The NDR Radiophilharmonie, led by Leo McFall, is similarly energetic, with winds balanced well to the fore, but has an added weightiness that better serves Mayer’s dramatic writing. The same is true of the third movement, which features contrasts of color, range and dynamics. The AAM Berlin cellos and basses play with gusto, but their small numbers cannot match the heft of the NDR performance.
The NDR reading is particularly impressive in the Adagio, where the woodwind arabesques positively cry out for greater flexibility and rubato than the AAM Berlin’s concertmaster Bernhard Forck allows. McFall is only about 30 seconds slower, but he allows for more give and take in the phrasing, which draws out a more melancholic strain from the writing. An instance, perhaps, where a conductor’s leadership and shaping make for a more emotionally convincing reading.
Harmonia Mundi’s ancillary materials are excellent, with especially informative notes by Linus Bickmann. These AAM Berlin performances are first-rate, but for me the sonority and leadership from the podium make the NDR symphony performance more involving, though I believe no one has quite realized the work’s full dramatic potential. Still, there is much to admire here, and I look forward to hearing future releases in this series.
Recommended Comparisons
Emilie Mayer: Symphony No. 1
NDR Radiophilharmonie, Leo McFall
Emilie Mayer: Piano Concerto in B-flat major
Album Details |
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| Album name | Emilie Mayer: Piano Concerto – Symphony No. 1 – Overtures (Symphonic Works, Vol. 1) |
| Label | Harmonia Mundi |
| Catalogue No. | HMM 905417 |
| Artists | Alexander Melnikov (piano), Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Bernhard Forck (concertmaster) |
