Dresdner Philharmonie in HK (德累斯頓愛樂在香江)

Hong Kong is really blessed. As the Tao Te Ching says, "bliss may be based on blight the way that blight may result from bliss." Despite its inglorious past, it's now a thriving commercial and a financial hub (fast losing the glitter of its status as the so-called "Pearl of the Orient) at the mouth of the Pearl River Estuary in South China, having been exposed to Western influence since the mid-19thC. People blithely forget that Swire and Jardines, two of the biggest English hongs here, started out as drug pushing smugglers trying to openly "sell" opium into China  and when stopped at Tun Mun by General Lin, the British Empire declared war on the then decadent and corrupt Tsing Empire in the iniquitous Opium Wars following which Hong Kong was ceded "in perpetuity" to Britain under the Treaty of Nanking 1841. Whatever its past might have been, we can often benefit as one of the stops of a greater East Asia tour including Japan, Taiwan, Korea, China, by famous European orchestras and other artists.  We had one such at the Cultural Centre last night. It came from Dresden, a German city which established a philharmonic orchestra as far back as 1870. According to the programme notes, the Dresdner Philharmonie had had as its guest conductors such notables as Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Dvoràk, Strauss, Jochum, Kleiber, Nikisch, Järvi, Marriner, Masur, Torteliar  etc.  So I had great expectation of this rare appearance.



The orchestra was led by a tall lanky young conductor Michael Sanderling who had been conducting this venerable ensemble since 2005 and was made its Principal Conductor in 2011. Prior to this, he had already conducted the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Sifonieorchester des Beyerischen Rundfunks, the Mühcen Philharmonker, the Konzerthousorchester Berlin, the Radio-Sifonieorchester Stuggart and the Nederlands Philharmonisch Orkest etc.  He says that Hong Kong is one of the most important destinations on their Asian tour.

What has Sanderling to offer us? First, a very popular piece, the Prelude to Act III of Wagner's (1813-1883) Lohengrin. which premiered 1850 under Liszt, depicting the wedding of Elsa to a mysterious knight she saw in a dream who would save her name when accused of murdering her brother Gottfried so that she might have control of her father's kingdom with a secret lover. It contains a song which we invariably hear during modern weddings. Perhaps because it started with a really loud announcement from the brass and  they needed time to warm up, the performance by the orchestra somehow failed to display the kind of unity that I was expecting. But as the piece proceeded, it became better and better.

That grand opening piece was followed by one of the most romantic violin concertos: violin Concerto in D, Op 77 by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897), which he completed in 1878, dedicated to his violinist friend Joseph Joachim who both offered some very useful advice and actually performed it on New Year's day in 1879. It opened with a long orchestral introduction but its first main theme, introduced by the cellos, doublebass, only enfolded fully with the entry of the violin solo which brought in its second main theme with the help of the first violins. Everybody loves its second movement because it is so lyrical, so pastoral and so deeply moving, although Brahms was far from happy with it. The final movement in rondo form was a bit like gypsy music because of its fast pace. The soloist was a young lady violinist Julia Fischer who had  already recorded 24 Paganini Caprices and some Bach violin concertos and the necessary technique but somehow didn't allow her violin to fully breathe so that the feelings in the notes had time to do their work. I really don't know why. Perhaps she was too anxious for technical speed?  She gave as an encore one of Bach's Gavottes.

The final piece of the evening was another favourite: Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. It was done with force and bravura and fully conveys the joy of that piece but seems to lack a little subtlety in the softer passages. But the orchestra shows quite impressive discipline. As encore, we had a lovely piece adapted from a piano work by Beethoven, full of fun and humor. It was a fitting close to the evening.The orchestra seems to get into shape more and more the further we were into the concert so that the last was the best and one would really wish that it could have started the same way.