Helmut Lachenmann: Allegro sostenuto, Serynade

Two dazzling large-scale chamber pieces for small forces by the German composer and éminence grise Helmut Lachenmann performed impeccably by Yukiko Sugawara, Shizuyo Oka, and Lucas Fels. Released in 2001 by the ever industrious Austrian boutique avant recording house, Kairos.

This disc contains two large-scale works by the avant-garde German composer Helmut Lachenmann. Both Allegro sostenuto, for clarinet, cello and piano, and Serynade, for piano alone, are weighty works lasting about half an hour.

Lachenmann's music has moved on from the time when it was largely dominated by extended playing techniques to the near-exclusion of conventional playing styles. In these, more recent works, he chooses different foci: in Serynade, the resonance effects available within the piano, in Allegro sostenuto, the contrast between rapid motion (allegro) and stasis (sostenuto).

Allegro sostenuto (1987, revised the following year) is in a single movement with six clear sections. The work begins by asserting the two sides of the composition's dialectic–rapid toccata-like figurations (often hinting towards arpeggios) and long held notes (contrasting the ability of cello and clarinet to hold notes for long with the way that when played on the piano they die away). Both of these sides of the work are developed, analysed, questioned before the closing pages make some attempt to create a synthesis between them.

This is a work that can sound dry and arbitrary in a poor performance. Fortunately, the performers here, members of the excellent ensemble recherche (including the pianist Yukiko Sugawara, Lachenmann's wife), are more than capable of turning what on paper is a mechanical work into one full of delightful turns of phrase, fragments of melody and thought-provoking sounds.

Serynade, completed in 2000, is the most recent of Lachenmann's works to appear on disc. In this lengthy, multisectional single movement, the music is not just shaped by a mixture of held chords and rapid virtuoso passagework but also by silently held clusters, chords and notes, incredibly detailed pedalling and some fascinating passages where notes of chords are released one by one, constantly shifting the harmony.

Again, this is a work that could appear very dry in a poor performance. I don't think it's quite as major a work as Allegro sostenuto, and I have heard a couple of live performances that were arguably superior to Sugawara's rendition here, but she certainly brings the work to intriguing life. Even if one only regards Serynade as a pendant–though an exceedingly interesting one–to Allegro sostenuto, this is still a very valuable disc.

-Edward Wright, amazon.com

Helmut Lachenmann
Allegro sostenuto, Serynade

1) Allegro sostenuto; für klarinette/baßklarinette, violoncello, und klavier
2) Serynade, für Klavier

Track 1 performed by Shizuyo Oka, klarinette; Lucas Fels, violoncello; Yukiko Sugawara, klavier.
Track 2 performed by Yukiko Sugawara, klavier.