American conductor Lance
Friedel www.lancefriedel.com won
wide critical acclaim for his recordings of music by Carl Nielsen with the
Aarhus Symphony Orchestra for MSR Classics (MS1150) and by Josef Bohuslav
Foerster with the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra for Naxos (8.557776).
He has served as Music Director of the Providence Chamber
Orchestra in Rhode Island and Assistant Conductor of the Peabody Symphony
Orchestra in Maryland, and has also directed various ensembles in the New York
area.
In 1994 Friedel was the first-prize winner at the Czech Music
Workshop in Hradec Králové and was invited to conduct the Hradec Králové
Philharmonic Orchestra the following season.
In 1995 and again in 1996, Lance Friedel was awarded first prize at the
Marienbad Conducting Workshop in Mariánské Lázně, and was invited to conduct
concerts with the West Bohemian Symphony Orchestra.
He was awarded first prize at the 2001 Mario Gusella
International Conductors Competition in Pescara, Italy resulting in engagements
to conduct concerts with orchestras throughout Italy, as well as in Hungary.
Since then Friedel has been invited to conduct orchestras
throughout Eastern Europe, including the Wrocław Philharmonic Orchestra in
Poland and the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine in Kiev. He has conducted new productions of Aida and
Le Nozze di Figaro in Slovakia, as well as premiere performances of several new
American symphonic works in Bulgaria. More recently, Friedel conducted the
Berlin Sinfonietta and Berliner Symphonie-Chor in a performance of Beethoven's
Ninth Symphony at the Konzerthaus in Berlin.
Mr. Friedel has attended master classes under such esteemed
maestros as Leonard Slatkin, Andre Previn, and Lorin Maazel, and has attended
numerous workshops and seminars, including the Mozarteum Summer Academy in Salzburg,
the Aspen Music Festival and Tanglewood.
His conducting teachers have included Gustav Meier, Michael Charry, and
Georg Tintner. A magna cum laude graduate of Boston University, Mr. Friedel has
also studied at Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, the Hochschule für Musik in
Vienna, and the Mannes College of Music in New York.
Friedel's most recent
recording is a new SACD of Bruckner's Fifth Symphony with the London Symphony
Orchestra http://lso.co.uk for MSR Classics www.msrcd.com
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| SACD MS 1600 |
It is interesting that one of Lance Friedel’s conducting
teachers should have been the great Bruckner conductor, Georg Tintner, raising
expectations as to what ideas might be brought to this music.
The Adagio – Allegro
of Anton Bruckner’s (1824-1896) Symphony No. 5 in B flat major rises slowly
and quietly out of silence with a fine pizzicato pulse in the basses before rising
up in some of Bruckner’s fine chordal harmonies. As the allegro arrives,
Friedel soon finds a flow with a pacing and tempi that are impressive. The
orchestral detail is laid bare, with a great awareness of the overall
structure, never rushed, a natural beautifully drawn flow, laying out this huge
canvas most wonderfully. The London Symphony Orchestra’s brass sonorities are
impressive. This conductor brings a freshness to this music with flexible tempi
and some gorgeous hushed string and woodwind passages. Friedel brings moments
of impetuosity unusual in a Bruckner performance, quite spectacular. The quieter
intervals allow the build up to climaxes to achieve even more significance and
power, especially the fast, forward moving lead up to the coda that has a
directness and impact that is very fine.
There is a well-paced pizzicato opening to the Adagio: Sehr langsam that brings a real
air of expectancy before the oboe leads ahead, soon joined by the rest of the
orchestra. This conductor draws some very fine orchestral textures from the LSO,
again beautifully paced. His subtle
little tempi changes add an emotional tug together with a naturalness and sense
of spontaneity. He is not afraid to keep the momentum going, allowing the
dynamics to rise naturally, fitting beautifully within the overall canvass. Later there are some wonderfully controlled
passages, detailed yet with a fine flow as well as some terrific orchestral surges
of great breadth before a fine hushed coda.
The Scherzo: Molto
vivace – Trio has a finely conceived opening, well controlled with some terrific
outbursts. Friedel brings such fleet
delicacy in the pizzicato passages with a real Austrian flavour to the slower
melody. There are finely judged accelerandi with more moments of fine
spontaneity. The Trio section keeps a fine pulse with many fine instrumental
details. This conductor whips up some terrific climaxes interspersed by some
lovely Austrian ländler passages before a fine coda.
Beautifully paced pizzicato basses open the Finale: Adagio – Allegro moderato with
the most exquisite clarinet interventions over which the strings of the LSO
sweep. There is a beautifully done sequence as the pizzicato and oboe alternate
with the little clarinet motif. Soon the strings find an incisive forward
drive, developing a fine overlay of textures. This conductor is happy to allow
the music to flow quickly forward, apparently unrestrained. When the orchestra
bursts out it has a real impact yet all within the natural landscape of this
music’s architecture, as is seen when it falls so naturally to a hushed passage.
The very fine brass chorales contrast so well with the
quieter intervening passages and some fine sweeps of sound, full of breadth as
the music ever develops. Friedel
captures the wayward harmonies and intervals brilliantly, later finding a
terrific forward drive, fleet and unforced. When the music picks up great
energy and dynamics, with clarinets sounding over the top of the orchestra, it
brings a moment of thrilling excitement. Friedel continues to develop the music
through subtle passages of restrained power before rising up with impressive strength
and force as he and the orchestra find the ultimate climax he has so obviously
been working towards from the beginning.
This is an exceptional performance that surely ranks amongst
the finest recorded.
Lance Friedel and the London Symphony Orchestra are given an
SACD recording of depth, impact and detail that emerges from an inky black
silence. There are informative booklet
notes though I must point out that Mahler, though a friend and supporter of
Bruckner, was strictly never a pupil of his.
We need to hear more from this fine conductor.
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