Many years have passed since London critics dismissed Mahler's Fourth Symphony as suitable only for the simple-minded. Even now, its blend of playfulness, grotesquerie and reverie can be baffling, especially in a performance that accentuates its unpredictability. This is exactly what the Austrian conductor Manfred Honeck, making his Hallé debut, achieved - with mixed results. His approach was ideal for Mahler in whimsical mood: there was not a single laboured or contrived phrase in the first movement, and all of Mahler's quirky characters protruded mischievously into the orchestral texture exactly as they should. The Scherzo, too, was refreshingly spiky, with Lyn Fletcher's scordatura solos sounding appropriately demonic.
Despite the Hallé's impressive control of the spacious phrases of the slow movement, however, Honeck dragged out the tempo to such an extent that the audience simply lost interest. Long passages of serene beauty were punctuated by crashes as slumbering members of the audience dropped their programmes. This was a terrible shame, since there was some exquisite playing: the Hallé could not have responded to Honeck's drawn-out approach with more commitment.
But everything was salvaged in the song-finale, radiantly sung by Barbara Bonney. Despite Mahler's instructions for the singer to sound like a child who believes he is in heaven, the finale is far from simple. The poem's obsessive descriptions of food are set to music that sounded desperate rather than playful here, but it was convincing.
The five of Strauss's orchestral songs selected for this concert perfectly suited Bonney's light, flexible voice. With her effortless grasp of line and colour, the gentle Wiegenlied was meltingly lovely, while Morgen, Strauss's tender love song to his wife, radiated a deep inner peace. Honeck's control of tone and balance was superb here, as it was in the Mahler.
But in some ways it was Weber's Oberon overture that made the most dramatic impression. With taut, crisp strings, a punchy rhythmic definition and mellow, rounded brass, the overture glowed with joyous exuberance and warmth.
