London,

One Evening

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Queen Elizabeth Hall

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Chill winds and prose in Katie Mitchell's One Evening

 

Mark Padmore: sings the songs in an admirable translation

Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise has, in recent years, been done on film, with dancer, with puppets, probably on ice.

Now it has had the Katie Mitchell treatment, in a presentation called One Evening, with tenor Mark Padmore, speaker Stephen Dillane and pianist Andrew West.         

A few weeks ago the National Theatre director gave us her take on Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, cross-cutting with three contemporary narratives and a barrage of sound effects produced in front of the audience’s eyes.         

The result with Dido was too much information. In One Evening, Mitchell perversely jettisons the narratives (which genuinely enhanced the Dido story), leaving just the sound effects. Thus Padmore and Dillane stand behind a long table, closely miked, scrunching leather, shaking branches and turning wind machines to create a soundtrack for the song cycle.         

A constant leitmotif is the trudge through snow. In the Serenade we have birds warbling and undergrowth rustling before icy winds obtrude. Elsewhere, a tongueless bell stroked by a violin bow suggests a glint of sunlight hitting the snow. For a real (cracked) bell, a beer can is struck.

For the audience it’s like watching an Archers recording session: fascinating, mesmerising, a virtuoso performance by all three. But does it enhance our understanding of the cycle? Perhaps a virtue is that it forces us to imagine our own visual narrative.

There’s another element, however: Dillane intersperses poems and prose by Samuel Beckett, entirely apposite and an illuminating commentary on the Schubert. Moreover, Padmore sings the songs in an admirable translation by Michael Symmons. Why don’t more singers do this? We hung on every word, not needing to scan programmes or surtitles.         

But closely miked himself, Padmore sang with a far more restricted tonal palette than usual, while West’s accompaniment — sensitively played on an upright piano — was insufficiently audible. Indeed, the whole musical experience was altogether too peripheral.         

To appreciate this presentation you have to accept that the music is just one element of a reflection on, or deconstruction of, the cycle. It’s not essentially a performance of Schubert’s Winterreise. But then, to be fair, it’s not billed as such.

Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.

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