Two Views of Schoenberg’s ‘Pelleas’

Forty-five years after his death, Arnold Schoenberg’s name is still invoked to frighten timid listeners. “Don’t worry, Arthur,” I once heard an audience member reassure her expectant companion, “this is the nice Schoenberg.”

The compassionate lady was referring to Schoenberg’s earliest persona, the Romantic composer of the killer tunes of “Verklarte Nacht.”

Schoenberg’s Grosse Nachtmusik has become a bit of a joke in the business, the piece you present to have listeners say, “Gosh, I didn’t know I liked modern music.” Of course, it was written in 1899 and is no more modern, or less Wagnerian, than what Richard Strauss was writing then.

So, why not try moving gingerly into the 20th Century with Schoenberg and his appealing (if not quite hummable) “Pelleas und Melisande” (1902), a symphonic poem based on the same Maeterlinck play that inspired Debussy’s opera.

The sound world of Schoenberg’s “Pelleas” is more closely related to the first part of his contemporaneous “Gurrelieder,” with its immense, brass-laden orchestra, than to the strings-only “Verklarte Nacht.” Like “Gurrelieder,” “Pelleas” takes chromaticism to agonizing extremes, as befits music about thwarted, unconsummated love. ( Pace Peter Sellars, Maeterlinck’s young lovers never did the deed.)

Schoenberg’s point of departure is Wagner’s “Tristan und Isolde.” And like Wagner, Schoenberg created soaring melodies and hyper-intense harmonies to suit the story. The result in Schoenberg is a succession of long, slow crescendos and shattering climaxes, produced by a huge ensemble that can be broken down to produce the most delicate, chamber-like effects.

Two simultaneous releases of this “Pelleas” argue its case expertly. Conductor Yoel Levi and his Atlanta Symphony present it sleekly, but not slickly (Telarc 80372). No, they haven’t transformed a Germanic dumpling into some lighter-than-air Gallic confection. But they have, with the help of Telarc’s crafty engineers, clarified what can in insensitive hands be the most opaque of scores.

Levi’s orchestra is superb, both the full ensemble and in the many opportunities provided for solo display (violin, oboe, clarinet, horn).

The accompanying work is--predictably, on a program titled “The Romantic Music of Arnold Schoenberg”--”Verklarte Nacht,” in this case, the composer’s inflation for string orchestra of his string-sextet original.

The second “Pelleas” (EMI 65078, mid-price) is a reissue of the 1967 recording by the late Sir John Barbirolli, who leads London’s New Philharmonia Orchestra. Barbirolli is less concerned with detail than with the big, lush-toned picture. Under his direction, the music sounds even more endearingly old-fashioned than from Levi.

Either way, “Pelleas und Melisande” is a beauty.

EMI does, however, have the advantage not only in price but in coupling: Richard Strauss’ belated farewell to his own and Schoenberg’s yearning youth: the sublime “Metamorphosen,” dating from 1945 (when Strauss was 80), yet as firmly rooted in the Tristanesque idiom as anything written a half-century earlier.

The performance by Barbirolli and 23 New Philharmonia string players is as lush and loving as any on recordings.

B y 1906 Schoenberg was writ ing in a more economical, but hardly less emotionally charged style than that of “Pelleas.” And in that year he tested the limits of tonality with his taut, sonorous First Chamber Symphony, for 15 solo instruments.

This once-esoteric work has been popping up with remarkable frequency lately: six different recorded versions in as many months. Outstanding among them are contrasting editions from the Frankfurt-based Ensemble Modern, conducted by Peter Eotvos (RCA Victor 61179), and the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group under Simon Rattle (EMI 55212).

The Germans illuminate the score’s edgy modernity, while Rattle’s people take the opposite tack, in an interpretation of uncommon suavity and breadth.

Each version is teamed with later Schoenberg. RCA offers the spooky “Pierrot Lunaire,” in a performance of chilling intensity by soprano Phyllis Bryn-Julson. While for EMI, Rattle and the City of Birmingham Symphony uncover unexpected lyric warmth in the usually dour Opus 31 Variations and make an orchestral feast of the searing one-character opera “Erwartung.”

The light-voiced Bryn-Julson, perfect for the intimate “Pierrot,” is, however, not happily cast as the roaring, tormented heroine of “Erwartung,” a role Jessye Norman was born to sing and does sing in the dazzling 1993 Metropolitan Opera recording (Philips 423231), conducted by James Levine.*