3 Classical Concerts

3 Classical Concerts

Like buses aren’t they?

Monday was Lang Lang at the RFH. I thoroughly enjoyed it, especially the first half which featured Mozart’s Sonata in B Flat and Schumann’s Fantasie in C, the latter being my highlight of the evening, its soft haunting melodies transporting me somewhere very nice indeed. The second half began with 6 traditional Chinese pieces. It was interesting to see the different ways the arrangers had tried to adapt the Eastern scale for the Piano, but the pieces lacked the meditative otherworldliness of the real thing. Then we had some Granados, extracts of Goyescas – I was hoping for something a little it more Death In A French Garden, but this was a bit too dramatic, rather than mellow. To finish were two Liszt pieces, Isoldens Liebstod: Schlufszene aus Tristran und Isolde, which I tried not to listen to, it being a transcription of Wagner, and Hungarian Rhapsody No 6 in D Flat, which was ok if a bit bangy. Then much ecstatic applause, especially from the contingent of pretty Japanese and Chinese girls. Overall it was an exciting, stimulating, even refreshing event, rather like popping a couple of Smints for the brain.

So I was surprised when the reviews came in to see that the critics hated it, especially the Schumann. Shows what I know. I could see their point when they complained that Lang Lang only operated in very very quite mode or very very fast and banging mode, and I agree that Lang Lang’s mannerisms, curling his non-playing hand, exaggerated body movements, and much gurning, were a bit OTT and didn’t quite ring true, but I couldn’t quite see how they could say that he massacred the pieces, or that his playing was “empty”. He is a bit of a superstar of the Piano world, and his fanclub get a bit over-exuberant, and I suspect that this has as much to do with his mauling as his playing – you know the British press, they love to try and drag people down to their own sordid level.

Maybe Lang Lang plays with a “pop sensibility” which might explain why I liked it so much?

Wednesday and back to the RFH for the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Beethoven’s Piano Concerto 3 in C Minor with Richard Goode on Piano and Mahler's Symphony 4 in G.

It began with the National Anthem, presumably because there was a Duchess in attendance (no it wasn't Mademoiselle de Latte Days, it was a real Duchess, of Gloucester I believe) . It was great! When I was a lad any night at a theatre would begin with the National Anthem. No singing unfortunately. And you bastards on the platform who didn’t stand, don’t think we didn’t clock you! What with all this talk about integrating people into our English/British identity, I tell you what to do – every public event should begin with the Anthem. It’s great.

Another very enjoyable concert, and I even found myself smiling a few times for no reason other than that I was enjoying the music. But somehow I didn’t enjoy the Beethoven quite as much as the LSO / Kissin version I saw earlier in the year (in fact looking it up I was amazed to see that it was the same piece of music, I thought it was a different Concerto!), nor the Mahler as much as Mahler 2. Maybe the venue has something to do with it? At the Barbican you are somehow closer and it is all much louder. Certainly the song bit at the end of the Mahler wasn’t as in your face as it had been in the Barbican. Maybe it was my mood, maybe it was the piece, maybe it was the Orchestras/Soloists/Conductors. All very perplexing!

Last and least was the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican with an event called “Seeing Debussy, Hearing Monet”, a blatant an attempt to get ignoramuses like me into the place with the promise of a multi-media audio-visual performance. Instead of a full on synesthesiatic experience, what we actually got was the conductor , David Robertson, blathering on for ages, and giving quite a technical analysis of the Debussy, using ideas from Monet as metaphors for describing the music. So certain phrases were said to ‘float like Monet’s water lillies’ or one phrase on flute was echoed by another on oboe, ‘like a shimmering reflection in the water’. Rather than being a way in to the music for a novice like me, it was a bit of a turn off, it was just too much like hard work trying to follow it all, and when we finally got to hear the pieces, Prelude a L’Apres-midi d’un faune, Jeux and La mer, they didn’t do an awful lot for me. I’m not sure quite how much I got from the visuals. I was just beginning to get somewhere with the water lillies, that magical moment when the eye settles and different sections of the painting come to the foreground, just trying to work out whether there was any synchronicity with the music, when the image started to move, it being a triptych, so it was displayed from the point of view of a camera panning across it, so that the eye couldn’t settle. The very nice lady sat next to me, who told me she had been lecturing for 35 years on Monet and Debussy, fell asleep for most of the first half, waking up at the interval and declaring the whole thing to have been marvellous. And she had probably discovered the best way to enjoy the event, asleep and most likely pissed!