Olli Mustonen can sound perverse at times; I saw him give a totally demented (in the bad sense) performance of Schumann’s Symphonic Etudes a few years back, but then again some of his recordings, including Shostakovich and Alkan Preludes, and Hindemith’s Ludus Tonalis (both for Decca) have been extraordinary. So is this performance of Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations. In his typically observant booklet notes, Harris Goldsmith makes a significant point: “To obtain the requisite drama and coherence, each and every performer must, by his or her hypothesis, distill in a suitable way of relating the disparate ingredients to one another.” Fair enough. We then must ask ourselves two questions: Is Mustonen’s approach “suitable”, and how well does he fulfill his own “hypothesis” regarding the work?
About the suitability of approach there can be few questions. Mustonen tends to avoid pedal, but this doesn’t mean avoidance of legato. Rather, he lets his fingers do the work. The wonderfully dreamy Fughetta (Variation 24) reveals just how smoothly he can phrase long, legato contrapuntal lines, and when he does opt for the occasional sustained wash of color (as in the second half of Variation 4, for example), the result has all the more impact as a consequence. In the final analysis, the greatest challenge in performing this mammoth work is the avoidance of monotony. Beethoven’s unity is, in a sense, built in: the consistency of phrase length, of key, the frequent references to the melodic surface of the theme. Mustonen understands this and successfully balances on the razor’s edge of giving each variation the maximum character and contrast, without permitting the piece to break up into a series of disconnected fragments.
He does this, first, by connecting most of the variations into a continuous stream and choosing his tempos so as promote rhythmic continuity. However, within each variation he allows himself a generous amount of rubato (check out No. 6), and a huge amount of dynamic contrast. This, combined with his extreme clarity of touch, permits a wide range of characterization while also allowing him to pinpoint each variation’s derivation from the initial waltz tune (especially in regard to melodic and harmonic features). He thus avoids the monotony that disfigures, for example, Pollini’s recent DG account (compare Pollini’s rigidity in Variation 8 to Mustonen’s mercurial, fantastically timed echo effects). Even Mustonen’s presentation of Diabelli’s theme emphasizes the rhythmic disruptions in the left hand rather than the repeated notes in the right in a way that’s utterly distinct from other similarly left-leaning, pedal-free interpretations (say, the frantic Gulda on HM, or the classically chiseled Buchbinder on Teldec).
What, then, is Mustonen’s “hypothesis”? In the first place, no other performance brings out as much of the music’s inherent wit, whether of the obvious sort such as Variation 22 (on Mozart’s “Notte e giorno faticar”), or in the more subtle concluding Tempo di menuetto, whose ornate ruffles and flourishes can’t help breaking out into humorous cascades of descending scales. And along with the wit comes a sense of fantasy, a dash of the grotesque, and more than a hint of sentiment courtesy of Variation 31’s Largo. You won’t find here the almost painful introspection that Arrau (Philips) brings to the work’s latter stages, nor the improvisatory freedom of, say, Maria Yudina (Russian Disc or Philips). But the answer to the question of whether or not Mustonen has a concept of the work big enough to encompass much of its range, and successfully realizes this concept in performance, is certainly “Yes!”
A few final odds and ends: The shorter works make intriguing encores (particularly the piano transcription of the projected String Quintet in C, Beethoven’s final, fragmentary musical thought), but obviously aren’t terribly important when compared to the main attraction. RCA’s sonics render Mustonen’s special sound very faithfully, if with a touch of hardness in the treble register. This recording was released some time ago in Europe and appears here as a special import through domestic BMG. The company reportedly has no plans to make further recordings with Mustonen, yet apparently also refuses to permit him to record as a pianist for other labels. Hopefully this shameful situation will be resolved soon. He deserves better treatment, just as this intriguing recording merits the attention of anyone who loves this music.
