Final bouquet for Mikko Franck at the Radio France Philharmonic

After ten years in the musical direction of the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra, Mikko Franck bows out in a concert where the Radio France choir participates with a very beautiful Choral anthem.

Replacement at the foot of Chung in Tristan and Isolde From Wagner in 2012 to the Pleyel Hall, Mikko Franck had then become the most obvious chef to succeed the Korean at the head of the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra. Ten years later, the balance sheet is more contrasted between very successful concerts, especially in the works of Sibelius or this year in Richard Strauss, and a certain form of breathlessness, also marked by numerous cancellations for several years. But today, the time is more for the party than on the record, with a last concert in the form of a “final bouquet”, without a welcome bouquet for the successor, since the new musical director designated Jaap Van Zwen only arrives from the 2026-27 season.

To start his latest director program, Mikko Franck had the good idea to also call on Radio France choir, for a Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda From Gustav Holst which would have probably been even better suited if he had been played last. In this work emerge the qualities of Mikko Franck chief, complete and as attentive to the choir as his musicians. The training prepared by Lionel Sow (well occupied in recent weeks between a Duruflé concert and the preparation of the NFM Choir for the You of Escaich) offers a relatively clear pronunciation of the English text, started by an ardent War hymn and finished on a touching Funeral hymn.

Less meditative, the ” Egyptian »De Saint-Saëns finds one of his flagship performers, French Jean-Yves Thibaudet. But if the pianist recorded it with Charles Dutoit almost twenty years ago (for Decca) and still has its style, and especially suitable colors (much more than Seong-Jin Cho in the same auditorium with the other radio formation France last year), the game no longer contains the same power and even seems to be weakened. Well accompanied by the Philharmonic, this Concerto N ° 5 Always demonstrate with what ease of the pianist’s fingers evolve on the keyboard, but without finding this magnitude recently heard from other touches. Thus, the nubian theme so superb of the second movement seems almost erased, and the final lacks flame, without anyone knowing if not wanting to cover the pianist, Mikko Franck did not also participate in making the sound too small. In bis, the Pavana for a deceased infant From Ravel taken on a quick tempo is removed all pathos, and has some blatant imperfections in the left hand.

Festival concert obliges, there is a surprise in this evening, presented in English by a chef who will not have taken the time to learn our language in a decade. Obviously, this surprise is so for Mikko Franck too, forced to turn to the partition to name it, in this case a Elegy From Fauré very easily accompanied by the orchestra, and above all magnified by the Gabetta soil gesture. Come to integrate at the start of the second part, the room precedes that of Camille Pépin, Inlandsiscommanded and created by the same performers in 2023. For a chef who always loved and defended his compatriot, Rautavaara, disappeared in 2016, would undoubtedly have been better suited to this farewell program. Playing the harmless partition of La Française tonight is a breeze, but has little interest. Even more than two years ago, the work already appears from another century, as it does nothing other than coloring very wisely an orchestral material that is both linear and redundant, mixed with a fashionable ecological subtext.

Fortunately, the Don Juan De Richard Strauss gives a little energy to make us take advantage of what remains today one of the best French training courses, moreover in his best nomenclature thanks to the presence of the young first violin Nathan Mierdl. To make the soloists of the greatest German orchestras pale, his solos on the magnificent Hieronymus Amati 1696 bring all the playful and the fiery of youth to a symphonic interpretation if not neat, at least well revitalized in the last moments. After the concert, the musicians of the Philharmonic will offer Mikko Franck a handwritten partition of the other Franck, in reference to one of the referent moments of their long collaboration, the album Franck by Franck (Alpha).

Photographic credits: © Resmusica

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