Usher Hall, Edinburgh
Three stars
I hate indecisiveness in music criticism. So why did I spend the short journey between the Usher Hall and Waverley Station agonising about whether I should be soft-pedalling, or even diplomatic, about what I had just heard? Plain old human embarrassment, I guess.
I have not one critical syllable to utter about the Edinburgh Festival Chorus's singing in Monday night's performance of Brahms' German Requiem. They are melodious, mellifluous, subtly modulated in their colouring and, though their genial director Christopher Bell will probably have my guts for garters after this review, impressive in their articulation and sonorous in their harmony.
And I have no issues with the ensemble, balance or sonority of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, a lovely band whose praises I sang on Monday. But their Brahms Requiem fell absolutely flat for this listener. As chorus and orchestra thundered into the second verse of All Flesh ... I was cold and far from pinned to my seat. I could not lilt and sway to How Lovely Is Thy Dwelling Place; and at the great catharsis as the Requiem pours into the final Selig sind, the performance ossified and I turned to stone.
Why? Two words: David Zinman, a conductor whose direction of the Requiem was trapped by the beat, the barline and the pulse. It was inflexible, profoundly un-supple and stultifyingly rigid: variously three-square and four square. There was neither heart nor spirit in it. It is the only time in my life that Brahms' Requiem has failed to release the tears.
And despite the presence of luminaries, baritone Florian Boesch and soprano Rachel Harnisch, Zinman committed the worst crime of all: he was boring.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article