Petrushka's Ghost Thumbs His Nose: Otto Klemperer's Dark Interpretation of Stravinsky's Ballet

When you think of Stravinsky's Petrushka what comes to your mind? For most of the listening audience, an aural image of a glittering orchestral showpiece is sure to come into focus. Charming folk melodies and music-hall themes, dazzling orchestral solos, and its stretches of mordant bitonality have long won the score a much deserved respect and enjoyment among concert audiences. So effective has this score been as a concert work that it is easy to forget that it began its life as a ballet.

A world that seems to be reflected from a corridor of cracked fun house mirrors, the work's libretto conjures up a world disturbing and disorienting. Life as puppet show; mechanized and soulless. At the center you have Petrushka, a brilliant and sensitive outcast. Alternately provoking his envy and affection are the Moor--your archetypal boorish, stupid, yet somehow successful "alpha male"--and the ditzy Ballerina with her bad taste in men. Most interpretations of this work gloss over its expressionism, ultimately reflected in the treatment of this work's coda. Nearly every conductor plays this as a charming non sequitur and not as the chilling question mark it ought to be. Nearly every one except for Otto Klemperer.

At first glance, the idea of Klemperer conducting Stravinsky might seem odd. Best remembered for his monumental readings of the Austro-German classics, Klemperer in the 1920's was an ardent advocate of modern music. One of the highlights of his tenure as director of Berlin's Kroll Opera was his Stravinsky triple bill evening consisiting of Mavra, Oedipus Rex, and Petrushka. Stravinsky, who attended the performance, was deeply impressed. Petrushka remained a favorite in Klemperer's repertoire long after he fled Germany. He would perform the work often taking it along with him to, among other places, Los Angeles, New York, Rio de Janeiro, Budapest, and Sydney. By the 1950's, however, his enthusiasm for performing 20th century music cooled, telling a reporter in Amsterdam his season as a partisan for the avant garde had passed. He did remain a very enthusiastic listener of the moderns well into his late years, praising Stravinsky's Requiem Canticles and attending a rehearsal for Stockhausen's Gruppen, not to mention being an admirer of Pierre Boulez's work as both composer and conductor.

The circustances for the recording at hand are interesting and happened purely by chance. EMI had long been wanting to record a stereo Petrushka but was foiled again and again. The project was suggested to Beecham, Karajan, Giulini, and Markevitch, but was either rejected by those conductors or circumstances prevented them from recording it. In 1967, Paul Kletzki was to conduct a Philharmonia program that consisted of selections from Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn and Brahms' First Symphony, among other solidly Austro-German works. Kletzki became ill shortly before the concert and Klemperer filled in for him. Unusually, he replaced the Brahms work with Stravinsky's Petrushka. Getting the hint, EMI quickly mobilized their team and initiated recording sessions. The results, according to EMI, did not find Klemperer in top form, plagued by a tired sounding orchestra and many instrumental gaffes. The master tape was withheld and remained in the EMI vaults.

Not until the mid 2000's were these tapes given another listen. The remastering engineers at Testament were surprised with the results. While the original master tape was a dull sounding recording, that was because the bulk of it was made on the third day of the scheduled sessions. They found that the tapes from the first day's session were far more impressive and have made a new master tape from those sessions. That is what you will find on this disc.

It may take a moment for the ear to adjust as this is a rather slower, more blunt Petrushka than one is normally used to hearing. But once you adjust, it overwhelms you with its sheer force. No sparkling orchestral finesse here. The New Philharmonia does suffer a few minor lapses here and there, but Klemperer's conception is so persuasive that you forget these mistakes quickly. The flute solo in the Charlatan's booth (played by Gareth Morris) is not the usual Disney-esque magic, but rather something more sinister and insinuating. The bitonal fanfares in Petrushka's cell are very heavy, almost Mahlerian. Indeed Klemperer's Petrushka seems to be one refracted through the prism of Berg's Wozzeck and Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire. It's worth it just to hear his handling of the coda. Just utter darkness. If there is one flaw here, it's that Klemperer makes a brief cut towards the end of the Dance of the Coachmen section, omitting one of the repitions of the theme.

The Pulcinella Suite included in this album is very fine too. Full blooded and muscular. But it's the Petrushka that is the star of the show here.

While I still love the recordings of Petrushka conducted by Monteux, Boulez, Ozawa, and Muti, Klemperer's is a very special reading that merits being heard. A very dark take on a beloved favorite then. It may alter profoundly how you hear this music.