Gustavo Dudamel, nearing the complete of his tenure as music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, recently undertook a monumental challenge: Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis. The performance, held over the weekend at Walt Disney Concert Hall, marked Dudamel’s first time conducting the sprawling, deeply spiritual function, a piece often considered one of the composer’s most ambitious and elusive creations. The undertaking was part of a month-long focus on Beethoven by the L.A. Phil, and followed an earlier performance of Beethoven’s Egmont, updated with a text serving as a protest against authoritarianism.
Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, a mass for large orchestra, chorus, and four vocal soloists lasting approximately 80 minutes, has long presented a unique challenge to conductors. As biographer Jan Swafford notes, the work is “Beethoven talking to God, man to man. And what they talked about is peace.” Despite its profound spiritual depth, it remains relatively infrequently performed, a fact Swafford attributes to its sheer scale and intricate complexities. Some, like conductor Simon Rattle, have even admitted the piece remains beyond their grasp.
Dudamel’s approach to the Missa Solemnis was characterized by a commitment to encompassing the work’s full emotional and spiritual weight. He conducted from memory, and notably, brought in two Spanish choruses – Orfeó Català and Cor de Cambra del Palau de la Música Catalana – comprising a total of 130 singers, under the direction of Xavier Puig. The vocal soloists – soprano Pretty Yende, mezzo-soprano Sarah Saturnino, tenor SeokJong Baek, and bass Nicholas Brownlee – were positioned mid-orchestra, a deliberate choice to enhance their integration with the overall sound.
The performance wasn’t simply a musical event; it was a theatrical experience. The Missa Solemnis, as Swafford points out, doesn’t adhere strictly to the liturgical narrative, instead functioning as a dramatization of feelings. Dudamel’s conducting style reflected this, eschewing a baton and using his entire body to shape the sound, embracing the musicians on stage as if holding the world in his hands.
