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Robin Zebaida

Ever tried that children’s game of trying to pat your head while rubbing your stomach? Or drawing a circle with one hand and simultaneously a triangle with the other? The key is coordination, of course, and plenty of that is required if you are playing the piano and singing at the same time.
Born in the UK, raised in Canada and based in Germany, pianist-soprano Rachel Fenlon is renowned for her self-accompanied concerts. On May 12, she made her Hong Kong debut with a performance of Franz Schubert’s Winterreise.
We are not talking about casual, barroom-style singing and playing here, but possibly the longest, most challengingly intense song cycle ever penned. The shadow of death hangs over much of Schubert’s late music, and Winterreise – a cycle of 24 songs – features around 80 minutes of almost unremitting gloom.
Here, through the poems of Wilhelm Müller, the composer explores the psychological descent of a lonely old traveller through a barren, wintry landscape.
Unlike Die Schöne Müllerin (The Beautiful Miller’s Daughter), Schubert’s earlier song cycle that features a semblance of plot and also some hope, Winterreise is more a series of scenes and emotional states, ranging from heartbreak and isolation at the sunnier end of the scale, to utter despair by the end – a fairly typical day at the office for a German Romantic poet.

Coordination was but one of many qualities evidenced in Fenlon’s near-flawless delivery at Hong Kong City Hall. Radiant tone, intelligent and insightful interpretations of the text, and a clear sense of musical and dramatic pacing were also to the fore in Fenlon’s performance of this work that can too easily drift into a static oeuvre of monothematic moodiness and introspection.
Sometimes, the beauty of sound was achieved at the expense of audibility. Notwithstanding generously dramatic, even operatic, projection and confident high notes, the tone was occasionally liable to peter out before the end of the phrase, rendering some words indistinct.
Musical multitasking on this scale throws up other issues, too. The freedom to make facial expressions and other gestures is normally an intrinsic part of the platform presentation and communication toolkit of any singer. Yet, the constraints of performing seated at the piano, the face only in profile, as opposed to eyeballing the audience while standing and freely mobile, put something of a crimp on visual adjuncts to interpretation.
The hands, needless to say, were busily unavailable for anything other than Schubert’s involved piano writing.
Less is often more, however, and with searing poignancy, in the final, bleakest song, “Der Leiermann” (The Organ Grinder), Fenlon was able to turn and fully face the audience for the first time, thanks mainly to the spartan piano part. After more than an hour of profile, that one gesture alone packed a powerful punch.

Also notable were her renditions of “Rast”, in which the hypnotically repetitive piano part contrasted effectively with the dramatic outpourings of the text, and a more than usually wistful account of “Die Krähe” (The Crow).
“Der Lindenbaum” (The Lime Tree) was likewise on the reflective side, with a peaceful approach to the opening piano flurries portraying gentle breezes rustling through leaves. Towards the end, “Das Wirtshaus” (The Inn) featured majestic, beautifully balanced chords on the piano, along with a nod to Die Schöne Müllerin in the symbolic use of the colour green in the poetry.
The last handful of songs coaxed out some of the most telling performances of the evening. The dramatic intensity was ratcheted up as Fenlon graced them with crisp accompaniments, incisive rhythms and clear melodic lines.
George Crumb’s Apparition: VI. The Night in Silence Under Many a Star fell distinctly into the “and now for something completely different” category of encore.
Fenlon, shoeless, reached into the piano to strum the strings, harp-like, with one hand while playing the keyboard with the other and, of course, singing. This weird and wonderful creation, which pretty much reflected what it said on the tin, was simultaneously utterly different from, and thematically very much in tune with, the mood of the evening.

It was an innovative ending to a remarkably innovative evening. I look forward to Fenlon’s return to Hong Kong.
“Rachel Fenlon: Winterreise”, Hong Kong City Hall Concert Hall. Reviewed: May 12.


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Fenlon was the epitome of coordination in a near-flawless self-accompanied performance of Schubert’s Winterreise at Hong Kong City Hall


Fenlon was the epitome of coordination in a near-flawless self-accompanied performance of Schubert’s Winterreise at Hong Kong City Hall.


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.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Fenlon was the epitome of coordination in a near-flawless self-accompanied performance of Schubert’s Winterreise at Hong Kong City Hall

Fenlon was the epitome of coordination in a near-flawless self-accompanied performance of Schubert’s Winterreise at Hong Kong City Hall