Wagemans: De Zevende Symfonie

I've been listening to Peter-Jan Wagemans' marvelous Seventh Symphony on and off for over two months. Now it's time to summarise my impressions.

I discovered Wagemans a few months ago via Dutch radio 4's on-line Concerthuis. His 'Dreams. (What did the last dinosaur dream of?)' struck me as a serious and accomplished piece. A little bit of internet research led me to a very complimentary review of Wagemans' Seventh Symphony by a serious German listener. This piece seemed worth a little gamble. And how it has paid off!

Wagemans (born 1952) is a composer that has sought a middle way between abstract modernism and the trappings of all kinds of vapid post-minimal-/ modern-/ romantic-isms. It's the kind of 'third way' that I personally, as a listener, am also most interested in. I'm seeking out contemporary music that in some way connects to the great symphonic tradition of the 18th, 19th and 20th century as, for me, intuitable architecture in music is paramount. I'm still wedded to the idea of music as 'tönend bewegte Formen' (Hanslick) that I can try to grasp. I don't mind these forms being disjointed and layered. Quite to the contrary, this makes the process of internalising a work all the more interesting. But somewhere I need to be able to detect that epic sweep that is so fundamental to the conception of symphonic form that has been transmitted to us. In that sense Wagemans' idiom speaks very eloquently to me. On his website the composer writes that his aim has always been to write music that intellectually and emotionally would be graspable by someone who is thoroughly familiar with Mahler's Sixth. His Zevende Symfonie is an impressive testimonial of his ability to achieve this goal in a masterly fashion.

De Zevende Symfonie is a big symphony, in conception and duration. The live performance taped for this Etcetera CD runs to 52 minutes. There are five movements, all of them with suggestive titles that help us to trace out the cultural and philosophical ambit of this formidable work:

1. Über 'm Sternenzelt (a reference to Beethoven's Ninth) [15:04]
2. Het zwarte licht en het heldere duister [08:47]
3. Mehr Licht! (allegedly Goethe's last words) [13:06]
4. De toekomst bedrijft sodomie met de hoornen van zijn eigen herinnering (a reference to a Dali painting) [13:06]
5. Het grote lied [12:55]

A sentence from Louis-Ferdinand Céline's novel Mort à credit (1936) is inscribed at the head of the symphony: "There is no tenderness in this world, only legends, all kingdoms end in a dream." This ambiguous mixture of transgression and transcendence puts us in the right mood to dive into the piece.

I'm taking an awful shortcut by suggesting that, musically, the symphony is some sort of 'Messiaen meets mature Mahler'. But in contrast with Tyberg's Third, for example, Wagemans' idiom doesn't strike me as derivative. It sounds distinctively like his own. Nevertheless, the spectre of Messiaen and Mahler does hover over the vast musical expanses of this symphony. The mixture of Latin wonderment and Germanic Angst is, however, very compelling.

Formally, the 5-movement structure confronts us with a puzzle. Is it a traditional 4-movement symphonic structure with a short interlude (4th movt) opportunistically thrown in to psychologically create more space between two big movements? Or is it something more sui generis that doesn't orient itself towards the traditional schemata? For example, we might consider the work as one large slow movement (an Adagio, if you will, spanned by movts 1, 3 and 5) punctured by two noisy interludes (2nd and 4th movts). The more I'm listening to it, the more the latter approach strikes me as the most satisfying.

The first movement is an intriguing curtain-raiser. The basic tempo is slow and the general mood is anticipatory. Abundant percussion (glockenspiel, and much more) and raucous, unisono strings and winds choruses remind us of Messiaen's sound world. But there are fascinating, fleeting intimations of a darkly hued, Wagnerian, pastoral world as well (Siegried's Waldweben come to mind, or Parsifal first act) pointing towards a deeply buried hymnic undercurrent which drifts stealthily by. One could listen to this as an oblique night music, with the energetic and bright percussion as celestial bodies careening in vast and dark expanses stretched out by the lower strings and winds. Formally, this first movement is the most challenging to get a handle on, I find. If there are references to Beethoven's Choral Symphony, I can't hear them. However, the writing is tremendously assured and this movement alone could stand a virtuosic symphonic essay.

The second movement is an explosive, unrelenting scherzo that seems to be propelled forward by massive, stuttering rhythms in the unisono brass (another Messiaenic fingerprint). Think Adams' Short Ride in a Fast Machine, but then bigger. As the movement progresses it becomes wilder and more disjointed until it runs itself aground in a sequence of colossal glissandos, like a dinosaur dying.

The third movement starts in an exploratory, disoriented way. Dreamy sections alternate with short, violent eruptions in the lower brass. At one point the music settles in a slow march with the lower strings lumbering menacingly along. This gives way to a spine-tingling passage with Wagner tubas chanting a dark chorale that is taken over by the full string and brass section. It's as if we have entered a gate into another world. Textures brighten and a high trumpet leads into a tranquil, paradisiac garden where only the very highest strings weave a solemn melody. We're not far from the otherworldly atmosphere of Mahler's Tenth. The movement ends in a mood of undisturbed, serious bliss.

The relatively short fourth movement starts as an Ivesian pastiche of children songs, festive band flourishes, and reminiscences of Isolde's Liebestod. Suddenly the music switches mood to an impassioned question, almost a plea, from the full orchestra. After that the jollity is more subdued.

The finale opens as a majestic chorale on unisono strings underpinned by lower brass and wind choruses. Again those typical, Messiaen-like stained-glass harmonies. It's achingly beautiful. The music becomes more animated but the darkly intoning brass keep proceedings in check. The mood of the first two movements, however, breaks through in a rambunctious and mocking angelic dance. There is a moment of collapse and one wonders whether the symphony will be able to get on its feet again. It does. The chorale, of otherworldly beauty (not saccharine, rather tormented) emerges again and Wagemans superimposes it with a cosmic, Mephistophelian laughter from the tutti. An angry fortissimo chord brings the work to an end.

This überdimensional 'Also Sprach Zarathustra'-like tone poem has captured my imagination. It's serious, audacious music that strikes out on its own path, seemingly undisturbed by ideological battles or market forces. The live recording (taped from a single concert) by the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra led by the young conductor Hans Leenders is astonishingly good. They seem to play it as if they have had the piece in their bones for ages. Technically, the recording leaves nothing to be desired. It sonically showcases this complex piece in the most advantageous way possible. Great work from all involved.