Nothing about Daniel Barenboim, 81, has ever been routine. He made his London debut – as pianist, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra – when he was just 13 years old, on 17 January 1956. Ten years later he made his conducting debut at Abbey Road studios, with the English Chamber Orchestra. His career was prodigious long before he added global humanitarian – for which he has been awarded countless honours – to his CV. Born in Argentina, based in Berlin, in 2008 he became the first person to hold an Israeli and a Palestinian passport. He is a citizen of the world, with a special affection for the UK. This is not said out of nationalist fervour. A one-time resident, frequent visitor and former BBC Reith lecturer, he has stated it himself. That he was married, long ago, to the British cellist Jacqueline du Pré (who died in 1987) is only part of the story.
This background gives context to the exceptional atmosphere of admiration and poignancy at last Sunday’s Prom. There had been every possibility that Barenboim, unwell since 2022, might not manage to travel. Those who know him never doubted that willpower, if not good health, would get him here. They might needlessly have added, especially in current circumstances. He was here to conduct the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, the ensemble he founded 25 years ago with the Palestinian-American philosopher Edward Said. Musicians from Israel, Palestine and other Arab countries meet each summer for rehearsals, workshops, discussions and an international tour. Of its many offshoots, the Barenboim-Said Akademie, Berlin, is the most prominent. The orchestra’s title comes from Goethe’s collection of lyric poems exploring the division between cultures. Barenboim, steeped in literature, would certainly have read them. Song settings from them by Schubert, Robert Schumann, Schoenberg and others he reveres might have piqued his interest.
At the Royal Albert Hall there was no hiding his debility. With understated watchfulness, and no fuss, the German violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter took his arm as they walked on to the stage. He sat to conduct her in Brahms’s Violin Concerto, a majestic work familiar to both through several recordings by each, and countless performances. Orchestra and soloist played the same programme, with Schubert’s “Great” C major symphony as the other work, earlier this month at Berlin’s Waldbühne: open-air, in heavy rain, to 20,000 people under umbrellas and macs. The Albert Hall, full to capacity, audience rigorously attentive, must have felt merely hot in comparison. (“There’s bound to be trouble… Palestinian flags…” someone told me, emphatically, as we went in, a misunderstanding of a crowd who came to honour these musicians and their conductor. I can’t claim panoptic vision, but among the 6,000 people no one seemed to be doing anything with their hands except clapping.)
Barenboim characteristically opted, in both works, for a dignified pace. The Brahms – the Schubert too – can vary in length by a good 10 minutes, current preference being to speed matters along. Barenboim could, I am sure, have gone quicker had he fancied: his gestures were minimal, almost invisible from the back of the hall. Had he not been in complete control, the work’s many pauses, renewals, junctions would have been a ragged mess. Instead, the architecture was secure, the sound muscular, the exchange between Mutter and orchestra intimate and chamber-like.
Few players equal her mastery at effortlessly sustained bows and phrases, vital here: this was Brahms on a slow boat, each passing detail relished. Mutter’s willingness to take the music where Barenboim wanted was touching, her playing impeccable. It cannot have been easy for anyone. The oboist (players are not named) seemed airily untaxed by the breath control needed for the extended solo in the second movement. Noticeably, too, violinist Michael Barenboim, leading the orchestra, was not also leading his father. It was as if he deliberately avoided showy, grand gesture lest anyone thought he was trying to act as buffer, rather than co-pilot, to his frail parent. All this was moving to witness.
Mutter’s choice of encore was the sarabande from a work Brahms loved, Bach’s Partita No 2 in D minor, BWV 1004. She described it as her prayer for lasting peace in the Middle East, playing it softly, with minimal vibrato, letting phrases hang in the air, unanswered questions. It was an astute choice, intentionally or not. The sarabande dance originated in Latin America, Barenboim’s place of birth, and was shaped by Arab influences.
Then came the Schubert: muscular, shapely and elegant, with notably zestful brass and woodwind solos. If there was a sense of luxuriating in the sheer scale and originality of this symphony, no one should complain. This singular combination of conductor and orchestra is drawing to a natural close. Since the outset, Barenboim has been the public face and creative power source of the Divan. For these brave and exemplary players, the next 25 years will look very different.
The British composer Steve Martland (1954-2013), always outspoken, regarded creativity as “against what is going on in the world right now” – a path to understanding. In the year he would have turned 70, his explosive Drill, played on two pianos by Siwan Rhys and Joseph Havlat, formed part of a concert at Bold Tendencies. With percussionists George Barton (with Rhys, half of GBSR Duo) and Sam Wilson, all four players gave compelling performances of Steve Reich’s Quartet (2013) and George Crumb’s Music for a Summer Evening. That work ends with the spangly, sensuous Music of the Starry Night. There were no meteor showers over London that night, but hundreds of red aviation lights glowed, and an arc of moon rose on the skyline.
Star ratings (out of five)
Prom 31 ★★★★★
GBSR Duo ★★★★
Prom 31 is available on BBC Sounds. The Proms continue until 14 September
