recent concerts
Thursday, November 22nd, 2007 04:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranthconcert reviews in brief ...
15th November: Prokofiev - Love of Three Oranges; Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto #1; Rachmaninov - Symphonic Dances
Still not keen on the Prokofiev: still adore Tchaikovsky's lush romanticism and the palpable tension between pianist (Nikolai Lugansky, not seen before, vg) and orchestra. Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances seem a lot more primitive / primeval to me than Stravinsky's Rite of Spring: the three triplets of the main theme are just so sprightly.
And the conductor, Stephane Deneve, was fab. He looked like a caricature of himself, or like a cartoon conductor from the Golden Age of cinema cartoons. Deneve himself belongs in an earlier age of cinema: the last time I saw anyone with a face -- nah, whole body -- even half as expressive, they were acting in a silent movie. And hurrah for seats in the choir: I wanted to cheer when, at stray applause between the first and second movements of the Tchaikovsky, Deneve rolled his eyes at the orchestra, inviting them to share the joke.
Also re this performance: I have never seen the RFH go from thunderous applause to pin-dropping silence as quickly as when Lugansky sat back down at the piano to play his encore.
20th November: Khatchachurian - Piano Concerto; Orff - Carmina Burana
Both premiered within a year of one another in the 1930s, but it just goes to show: the Khatchachurian was Modern (in the 'this one go plunk' sense of the word) and I couldn't unravel it. There were tuneful bits but as soon as I thought I'd worked out where they were going, they changed tempo or tune or whatever. There were some very nice moments, but most of these can be heard, reworked, in his more (only?) famous work, the Spartacus soundtrack.
Carmina Burana, live, is a marvellous spectacle: huge choir (so we'd been banished from our usual seats to the balcony), choristers, heavy-duty percussion, two pianos and a celeste ... I found I do actually know the music pretty well (not quite by heart but I generally knew what was coming next): suspect this is from over-exposure to Ray Manzarek's 1983 rocktastic version. But familiarity has not bred contempt. Even with pieces I adore (Beethoven's Ninth, Rach 3, etc) there tend to be passages that engage me less than others. I was completely immersed in this performance almost all the way through, to the extent that I'd lost track of time, and was astonished when (checking K's watch to note the timing of a particular passage) I realised I'd been sitting, rapt, for fifty minutes.
And it's such fun. There are playful bits and sublime melodies, flowing sunny strings, staccato rackets: soft as a lullaby, raucous as Saturday night. The baritone (William Dazeley) did a masterful physical impersonation of a reeling drunkard; the tenor (David Kuebler) sounded exactly like someone who'd had several too many an' was never gonna drink again, never, honest ... Perhaps it's all too varied and hectic,.too little sense of progress and resolution: but it's rivetting.
15th November: Prokofiev - Love of Three Oranges; Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto #1; Rachmaninov - Symphonic Dances
Still not keen on the Prokofiev: still adore Tchaikovsky's lush romanticism and the palpable tension between pianist (Nikolai Lugansky, not seen before, vg) and orchestra. Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances seem a lot more primitive / primeval to me than Stravinsky's Rite of Spring: the three triplets of the main theme are just so sprightly.
And the conductor, Stephane Deneve, was fab. He looked like a caricature of himself, or like a cartoon conductor from the Golden Age of cinema cartoons. Deneve himself belongs in an earlier age of cinema: the last time I saw anyone with a face -- nah, whole body -- even half as expressive, they were acting in a silent movie. And hurrah for seats in the choir: I wanted to cheer when, at stray applause between the first and second movements of the Tchaikovsky, Deneve rolled his eyes at the orchestra, inviting them to share the joke.
Also re this performance: I have never seen the RFH go from thunderous applause to pin-dropping silence as quickly as when Lugansky sat back down at the piano to play his encore.
20th November: Khatchachurian - Piano Concerto; Orff - Carmina Burana
Both premiered within a year of one another in the 1930s, but it just goes to show: the Khatchachurian was Modern (in the 'this one go plunk' sense of the word) and I couldn't unravel it. There were tuneful bits but as soon as I thought I'd worked out where they were going, they changed tempo or tune or whatever. There were some very nice moments, but most of these can be heard, reworked, in his more (only?) famous work, the Spartacus soundtrack.
Carmina Burana, live, is a marvellous spectacle: huge choir (so we'd been banished from our usual seats to the balcony), choristers, heavy-duty percussion, two pianos and a celeste ... I found I do actually know the music pretty well (not quite by heart but I generally knew what was coming next): suspect this is from over-exposure to Ray Manzarek's 1983 rocktastic version. But familiarity has not bred contempt. Even with pieces I adore (Beethoven's Ninth, Rach 3, etc) there tend to be passages that engage me less than others. I was completely immersed in this performance almost all the way through, to the extent that I'd lost track of time, and was astonished when (checking K's watch to note the timing of a particular passage) I realised I'd been sitting, rapt, for fifty minutes.
And it's such fun. There are playful bits and sublime melodies, flowing sunny strings, staccato rackets: soft as a lullaby, raucous as Saturday night. The baritone (William Dazeley) did a masterful physical impersonation of a reeling drunkard; the tenor (David Kuebler) sounded exactly like someone who'd had several too many an' was never gonna drink again, never, honest ... Perhaps it's all too varied and hectic,.too little sense of progress and resolution: but it's rivetting.
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A pedant writes ...
Date: Thursday, November 22nd, 2007 05:06 pm (UTC)Re: A pedant writes ...
Date: Thursday, November 22nd, 2007 05:09 pm (UTC)