Am I HIP enough for Gardiner? - Beethoven 1 & 9 from the LSO

John Eliot Gardiner is one of the foremost exponents of Historically Informed Performance, and what this means when he works with the London Symphony Orchestra was something flautist Gareth Davies discussed recently in this very fine blog post, one that made me think of a number of things and promise a response that I still haven't written. This isn't that response, though it has some things in common.

One of the reasons I was curious to hear this concert is that Beethoven is something that Gardiner and the LSO have in common for me: namely my two favourite recordings of the fourth symphony, in turn one of my favourites. Gardiner's, with the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, overflows with energy and excitement, and has no shortage of drama (the way he builds the tension in the opening is glorious). Haitink's, slightly lower octane but beautifully played reading, coupled with a glorious eighth is, for me, the highlight of his cycle with the LSO and one of my most treasured Beethoven discs. I'd love to hear what they'd do with the fourth, but it wasn't on the programme.

Instead they put Beethoven's first and last symphonies together, which is inherently interesting since it highlights nicely how far Beethoven travelled. Mackerras did something similar in his legendary 2006 Edinburgh festival cycle (they weren't in the same programe, since each symphony was in a concert by itself, but they followed each other in the last two).

Certainly, Gardiner gets a very different sound from the LSO than one might normally expect: gone is the vibrato, in with the calf skin timpani and hard sticks; phrasing is very clipped and he hits the accents with an almighty punch. The brass sound nicely brash in a way that I think always works well for Beethoven (something Mackerras achieves with the SCO by using natural trumpets - Gardiner hasn't gone that far with the LSO). And they played very well too, the strings in particular had a nice sound. The first symphony, which had the first half to itself, was very neat and tidy and it felt that everything was where it should be. Which, for me, was just the problem. I wanted more than that. I wanted more drama, more excitement, more passion.

Now, with works you know backwards, as I know the first, it's hard to find that danger and that unknown, yet somehow Mackerras does that, even with recordings I know well, he still surprises me. Somehow he finds the little details to bring out that you don't expect. Gardiner didn't. Mackerras often seems to get a lot of his excitement by knowing just how much to hold a pause, but last night there didn't seem to be any. The Mackeras comparison interests me because Mackerras is pretty HIP and yet I love what he does; but for him it never seems to be the ultimate goal, more a tool in delivering a performance (but I'm getting into my other post here). At other times, I found myself wishing Gardiner would give the music a little more room to breath. Were there, perhaps, lovely moments we were dashing past? But that probably wouldn't be HIP. It wasn't that it was bad, not by any means, and plenty of people loved it, it just wasn't quite to my taste.

The ninth that followed the interval was, at its best, much more successful, yet in its way even odder. There was a good degree of excitement, with Gardiner at times making the score feel very fresh indeed: there were plenty of moments where he surprised me in that opening allegro. The frenzied climaxes of the first and second movements were thrilling and left both a dry mouth and the taste of adrenalin that are side effects of good Beethoven playing; the breakneck pace of the second movement also helped. But other moments were frustrating: a fantastic climax would, almost immediately, bubble away into nothing, like all the air had been let out of the balloon. He didn't seem to hold the tension. If the pace had helped in the early movements, it hurt in the third. Now, of course, if you take a Furtwanglerian or Bernsteinian view (ultimately a Wagnerian one, I suppose) you are essentially flouting Beethoven's wishes to at least some degree, depending on how far you go. And yet, some way down that path there is the most staggering beauty, and you don't have to go to the absolute extreme to get it. Unfortunately, at the pace Gardiner took it, it was, well, a little banal. The two cutting chords towards the end of the movement, possibly my favourite moment in the symphony, were more or less lost.

The finale was again more successful in the manner of the opening movements, but here a fresh oddity was introduced: the LSO Chorus were absent. In their place Gardiner had brought his own Monteverdi Choir. Now, they're a very good choir indeed, but they're quite small. That's fine when they're with Gardiner's period ensembles such as the English Baroque Soloists and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, but paired with the LSO, even if it wasn't at its full strength, they were just too few. Gareth, in the blog post I mentioned earlier, maintains they sound like over two hundred; I can assure him that in the balcony they didn't, not close. When the orchestra was quiet these beautiful voices could be heard, when it was loud you could either hear them straining, and thus sounding less good than they ideally would, or barely at all. As a result it didn't have the force it should have. The soloists (Rebecca Evans, Wilke te Brummelstroete, Steve Davislim and Vuyani Mlinde, the latter especially) all sang well and, having heard it done twice in concert, I quite like sticking the soloists in amongst the orchestra like that; it didn't seem to matter that they were off to one side, doubtless a limitation imposed by the Barbican stage not being as roomy as some.

So, mixed then. If you're a fan of historically informed performance, you might well have loved it, as most present seemed to. I'm much more conflicted on the whole issue, having heard lots of historically informed things that I've loved and lots that I've felt haven't worked. However, this, for me, wasn't wholly successful. All that said, though, if there was a Gardiner/LSO Beethoven concert tomorrow I'd probably still go, because even when it didn't work for me it was still fascinating (in point of fact, there is another on Tuesday, but I'll be back in Edinburgh by then).

I should also report that tonight was something of an experiment. Normally I sit in the circle, but I was trying out the balcony as my brother had suggested the sound was superior. Of course, when the LSO were playing in a slightly different mode than normal probably wasn't the best time to try and find out. Certainly it was different - things seemed less dry but also a little dead. In some ways there seemed to be more clarity, but I don't think I got a good balance between winds and strings, such that when at the end Gareth Davies, principal flautist, was the first person brought to his feet, I couldn't understand why. Not, you understand, because there was anything wrong with his playing, he's excellent and there wasn't, just that I hadn't particularly noticed any flute solos, or they hadn't carried back to the gods (N.B. I think it was Gareth, I couldn't be 100% certain from where I was and the programme listed both principals, so please someone correct me if I'm wrong). I'm back in the balcony again next month when Adams is conducting which should give me a better comparison on the relative acoustics.

The whole question of how HIP things can and should be still weighs on me, and I haven't really addressed it in this review as fully as I'd like to. I plan to write a follow-up post on the subject but perhaps I really should have combined the two, it would probably have been a better review for it.


One small footnote on the choir, which puzzles me greatly. I was told a story recently about Gardiner doing something at the Edinburgh festival a few years back with the Edinburgh Festival Chorus. Apparently he put their backs up so completely that the message went to the festival management that they wouldn't work with him again. Of course, working with amateurs is tricky in that they are there for fun and love not money (I know to some extent the same is true of our poorly paid musicians, but there is a difference) and so conductors who are too bossy or abrupt tend to go down very badly, though that doesn't necessarily mean a bad performance (but that's a subject for other post). I'm not suggesting there has been such a bust up between Gardiner and the LSO chorus in the past, but possibly such experiences have led Gardiner to insist on his own choir so that he can be sure of more easily getting exactly what he wants, even when it isn't entirely appropriate.

Continued...

TV review - I Believe In...

I Believe In... BBC Three, three episodes featuring Joe Swash, Danny Dyer and Jodie Kidd, series producer Jacqui Wilson, available on BBC iplayer.

"Is believing in something that most people find ridiculous really that stupid?" asks Danny Dyer, at the start of an hour of breathtaking inanity. After watching this short series of three celebrity poppycockumentaries, you can’t help but answer this question with a definitive and resounding ‘Yes’, before going on to question why the BBC actively sought the three most irritating and ineloquent personalities to front them.

So: Joe Swash believes in ghosts, Danny Dyer believes in UFOs and Jodie Kidd believes in miracles; they are given an hour each, not to discuss why they believe, to engage with the evidence for and against their beliefs or to look into the history of the subject, but instead to travel around meeting a somewhat random selection of other believers, remaining gormless throughout.

Let’s ignore the fact that their beliefs are transparently moronic and that the token skeptics are underused and selectively quoted; this is to be expected. What is unforgiveable is how weakly structured these investigations are. Each programme starts with the fool of the week saying something along the lines of “I know there are a load of cynics, and I’m not a hardcore believer, but I just have a gut feeling that there’s something bigger out there.” Then, after a tedious hour, they look into the lens and say, “At the end of the day, I know there are a load of cynics, and I’m not a hardcore believer, but I just have a gut feeling that there’s something bigger out there.” Swash, Dyer and Kidd learn precisely nothing, haven’t the intellectual curiosity to ask any searching questions, and they never encounter anything convincing or even quirkily interesting. Ghost-believer Joe Swash, for example, tries to spend a night alone in an Edinburgh cave, and runs out not because he sees a ghost, but because he thinks he might be about to meet a ghost. Thrilling TV.

Jodie Kidd: I Believe in Miraclesis probably the worst of the bunch, partly because it doesn’t even discuss miracles for the most part. Instead it turns out be about various con artists (faith healers, crystal therapists, shamans) who offer remedies aimed at promoting a vaguely defined new age sense of wellness. It should have been called Jodie Kidd: I Believe People Who Are in Some Way Ill Sometimes Get Better After a Reasonable Period of Time Has Elapsed. There’s one woman who claims to have experienced a sudden remission from terminal cancer, but the other purported miracles are staggeringly unimpressive.

The very end of the show, for example, includes an autistic boy whose parents think that some time spent riding horses might have a positive effect on his condition. And sure enough, the boy enjoys it, it helps him relax, and opens him up to a new experience; it’s unquestionably therapeutic. But it really doesn’t qualify as a miracle. A miracle is someone walking on water, or coming back from the dead or being respected after doing Celebrity Big Brother. Or Jodie Kidd speaking for thirty seconds without you wanting to punch her in the face.

She really doesn’t come across well in her programme. There’s a hilarious episode in which a Nepalese shaman predicts (by performing an elaborate ritual based on breaking open uncooked eggs and interpreting the contents) that she is about to get ill. Kidd then falls ill with Salmonella – you know, that one famously caused by handling or eating infected raw eggs. Blissfully unaware, she genuinely believes the shaman’s foresight to be miraculous. It’s that level of stupid we’re dealing with here. And it might just be my imagination, but there are times I swear you can hear the production team snigger from behind the camera.

VERDICT: Awful. I firmly believe that the I Believe In... series is part of a nefarious government scheme to so anesthetise us with bad TV that we’ll be too depressed to go out of the house and vote come the next election. The cynics will say there’s no scientific evidence for that claim, but I know it’s true.

Continued...

Vanska and the LPO finish their Sibelius cycle in style

I've only heard Osmo Vanska live once before, that too was for an all Sibelius programme where he provided the highlight of the BBC SSO's 2006 cycle with blinding readings of the third symphony and Kullervo (which was sadly absent from the London Philharmonic's cycle).

We seem to get precious little Sibelius north of the border so these concerts were sorely tempting, but in the end only one concert was a realistic prospect. Fortunately that one contained the sixth and seventh, two of my absolute favourites (along with, in no particular order, three, one, four, two and five).

They began, however, with Tapiola. Composed some years after the last two symphonies it seemed a slightly odd choice. I must confess the work has never completely grabbed me in the way his symphonies do. I found it a little disjointed and while the orchestra played well enough, it didn't seem as vividly textured as the best Sibelius can: the string motifs evocative of icy winds felt neither quite icy or windy enough. It was not without its moments, but it didn't sweep me away.

It was followed by a pair of oddities Cantique and Devotion: Two Serious Melodies for Cello and Orchestra. These were rather nice, and Sibelius at his sunniest rather than the wintery feel that is more common. Kristina Blaumane was a rich and warm soloist. Yet, enjoyable though they were, one could see why they're not a regular feature in the concert hall.

The best by far was yet to come. The sixth symphony is achingly beautiful and Vanska judged the opening well. Everything felt sharper - the tones of the orchestra richer and move vivid. He gave the music a wonderful flow. The third movement was almost overflowing with joy. There was some fine playing from the orchestra, especially some of the rich cello chords in the finale. Yes, the sixth is my favourite. It has a beauty that at times brings the listener close to tears, though not because it's sad. True, Vanska didn't equal Barbirolli in this regard, but he got more than close enough.

They closed with the seventh, the first Sibelius symphony I ever heard (in a performance by Oramo and the CBSO in Basingstoke). Bad performances of it suffer terribly from what I like to call Mahler Nine Syndrome, namely the tendency both works have to sound like a disconnected series of miniatures when played badly (it's named after the Mahler because that's where I first heard it). There was not a trace in Vanska's reading, which flowed seamlessly from one section to the next. Indeed, as with all good performances, I was left wondering how Mahler Nine Syndrome can ever occur in the first place. Along the way Vanska found some wonderful details, an early section with the violas stuck out particularly. Then came perhaps my favourite moment: the wonderful trombone theme, but then I'm a trombone player, albeit a very bad one. He judged the balance well, with the theme carrying clearly over the orchestra and yet without being overly prominent. If anything, the orchestra seemed on even better form than for the sixth. I don't like 'top this' lists and 'greatest thats', but if you told me I could only keep one symphony in my collection, the seventh would surely be near the top of the shortlist. Within those twenty-two odd minutes Sibelius somehow manages to say everything that needs to be said. As the trombones make their return, with what I like to call the journey's end motif, I feel like I've been on an epic voyage; Vanska was no exception and he had showed plenty of wonders along the way. Actually, there's no question, the seventh is my favourite.

Okay, the truth is my favourite is probably whichever one I've just heard last. They're glorious works and well done to the LPO for celebrating them with one of the top Sibelius conductors.

It was well received, but the encore, Valse Triste, was a mistake. After the seventh nothing more needs to be said, and though they played it nicely, and Vanska clearly had fun, particularly with a pause at the end, the evening would in some ways have been finer without it: those weren't the bars I wanted ringing in my head as I left. True, it was not as if he'd followed Mahler's resurrection with an encore, and hence he doesn't get our inappropriate encore away.

Still, I do need to dole out an award. Etiquette for encores is tricky. If you decide to make your exit before the applause has ceased, you run an inverse musical chairs. Should the music start up again you have only one decent choice: freeze and, if you are lucky, sink into a vacant seat nearby. If you're very close to a door you can nip out the rest of the way, ditto if you have a exceedingly quiet step. Why do I mention this, you may well ask? Well, a gentleman, no, sorry, that's a serious abuse of the word. A person in the audience chose a third way: from three quarters of the way up the second aisle of the balcony, he clomped down the stairs and out of the hall, treading with what was clearly deliberate force, with a furious expression on his face as if to demand how very dare Vanska interrupt his exit with some music. It was staggeringly rude to players and audience alike. I mean, I might have preferred not to have an encore, but I have some manners. Of course, this presents a slight snag as far as our awards are concerned, since they are always eponymous, but we can rise to the occasion:

The Anonymous/[insert name here] Award for Staggeringly Rude and Unbelievably Obnoxious Behaviour by an Audience Member

If the person in question is reading this, and would like to claim his award, or apologise, the comments are below. However, it was not sufficient to detract from the superb music. Now, if only we could get a little more Sibelius north of the border.....

Continued...

A Master Class with Donald Runnicles - A guest post by James Lowe

The question I most often get asked in pubs (apart, of course, from “Don’t you think that’s enough of that now?”), is what does a conductor actually DO? Isn’t it just a matter of standing at the front and waving your hands about whilst the musicians play in spite of you? My usual answer (when I haven’t had the forethought to tell them I do something more appealing for a living, such as working for the tax office or designing city-centre one-way systems), is obviously, yes. That is pretty much what we do...

This came up recently on the BBC Scottish Symphony Blog in an excellent post on the subject by cellist Anthony Sayer. He points out that conductors tend to get a bit defensive and edgy when they have to explain themselves. Gordon Bruce, a friend of mine who plays double bass in the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, told me his stock pub answer is to compare the conductor to a football manager. If you watch a match and try and figure out what Alex Ferguson is doing, he just seems to be turning red and generally getting worked up, never actually kicking the ball. His work has been done before in training, just as the conductor’s has been in rehearsal. It’s a neat analogy, but I think only tells half the truth.

I think the reality is that all great conductors somehow carry a sound of their own. The timpanist and composer Werner Thärichen tells a wonderful story of his time in the Berlin Philharmonic. Some average conductor or another was on the podium and they were in a “business-as-usual” rehearsal. Thärichen was busy reading his score during a stretch of rests when out of nowhere the orchestra’s sound changed into something much more special and beautiful than before. He looked to the podium and saw nothing new there, but then followed his colleagues eyes to the door. Furtwängler had just entered and was standing at the back listening.

It was his presence alone that had created this incredibly beautiful sound... [Furtwängler] carries the sound so strongly within himself that he brings out the sound in others… the most beautiful thing that an orchestra can experience is when this person is totally open, and you are invited to join him…. that’s when you make this kind of music.

Bernard Haitink, the revered elder statesman of conductors, has this quality in spades. He only has to raise his hands and somehow the Haitink sound - clear and balanced yet somehow warm - emerges immediately. Haitink is rare in being pretty much universally loved by the orchestras with whom he works. He also says very little in rehearsal (which helps), working instead by gesture and eye contact with the players and keeping anything he says short and deceptively simple. This is another great lesson for conductors. Our art (if I may grandly call it that) is a physical one. Players will happily listen to your hands, but hate it when you painfully explain the quality of sound you want. Neeme Järvi, the possessor of possibly the finest manual conducting technique around, goes further in stating that if a conductor can’t create a sound with their hands, they are not a conductor.

What is certain from the magnificent Bruckner Eighth I heard the BBCSSO give recently is that Donald Runnicles is certainly a conductor with a sound. With his baton in his left hand he coaxed textures from the orchestra that seemed to hang in mid-air. The high-points of the music shattering yet balanced. How exactly he achieves all this was the subject of his master class with students from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. The participants Duk-Kyung Chang, Alejandro De Palma Garrido, Hamdan Al Shuelly and Jessica Cottis conducted Beethoven’s Creatures of Prometheus Overture and Elgar’s First Symphony, a work which in my humble opinion is a masterpiece, the slow movement alone being worth the price of your ticket.

Runnicles has real presence, but is very softly spoken. He refrained from demonstrating and was supportive but direct with the students. His main thrust was about contact with the players, asking again and again for the student not to conduct a universal play-with-me, but rather to “seek people out”. Not just the melody is important for him, but rather they should be constantly looking for something interesting ticking away under the hood of the engine. Two pearls were seemingly quite obvious: always tell the story of the music, and phrase it just as you would sing it. But like all the best crystallizations of knowledge, these things run far deeper than they appear to on the surface.

Technical tricks, such as holding the baton at the balance point to allow it to float seamlessly through a quiet passage, were balanced with some pretty good practical advice, such as when a student couldn’t quite get a subito pianissimo (suddenly quiet) moment: “Like when riding a horse you need to think the next jump well ahead.”

He also spoke a lot about what I would call being centred. This is a deceptively tricky thing to achieve. After all, we can all stand still at a bus stop without waving around like a reed in a storm, and yet put most young conductors in front of an orchestra and all of a sudden we seem to have flamingos' knees and the elbow joints of an octopus. Runnicles advised that we all need to find our central “Zen” place and that like an oak “the trunk never moves”. He advised them to imagine a wall behind their head with which they shouldn’t break contact.

He also passed on a superb story told to him by the orchestra at Bayreuth. The great Hans Knappertsbusch was conducting Götterdämmerung, Wagner’s epic summation of the Ring cycle. He sat for the entire performance until the climax of the Funeral Music when he slowly stood up. The effect was electrifying and the orchestra nearly fetched the plaster off the roof and the paint from the walls.

The impression Runnicles gives is one of a conductor who has arrived at a great simplicity through years of mastering the complex. Runnicles has taken the long way around to reach the top of his profession. He was not shot to the top at a young age, but rather has worked up from repetiteur (rehearsal pianist) in the German opera houses perfecting his craft all the way. This simplicity-through-mastery reminds me of when I was in Den Haag and went to visit the Mauritshuis gallery, which numbers amongst its treasures Vermeer’s Girl With a Pearl Earring. It’s such a familiar work, but one I’d never seen in the flesh before. The guide told me to get close up and peer deeply at the pearl. It is made with barely more than two strokes of the brush. A single twist of white paint and a small dab to pick out a reflection. In that twist-and-dab Vermeer captures a whole and perfect iridescence that seems to stand out from the canvas into reality. Simplicity arrived at though mastery.

Runnicles touched on a difficult subject, pointing out that for years all orchestral musicians have trained to be the best they possibly can, reaching a professional level that is simply staggering. Yet in an orchestra they have to subsume their musical desires to the whole, or worse still, to the conductor. Players always say that the best conductors are the ones who “don’t get in the way”, which can give a false impression of someone who they can easily ignore. I think that in actual fact the greatest conductors give room for all the musicians to play with their feelings and instincts, yet knit everything together into a single unity. Being the central point for chamber music, rather than a central dictator. When these stars are aligned, an orchestra takes flight.

It seems to me that within all of this is the essence of conducting. Now this is not, perhaps, the most simple explanation, but then again it’s not a simple matter. Perhaps I should print this off and take it with me to the pub so I can slip a copy to the next person who asks, “so what is it you actually DO.....?”


© 2010 James Lowe.

James Lowe is Artistic Director of both the Hallé Harmony Youth Orchestra and the New Bristol Sinfonia and has previously been of Associate Conductor of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. He made his Scottish Chamber Orchestra debut in 2008, standing in impressively at the last minute. He is currently the only person to have receive two different Where's Runnicles awards.

Continued...

Berlioz's L'enfance du Christ - Ticciati and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra

In the advance publicity, Karen Cargill, the superb mezzo who is featuring so heavily in the current SCO season, was front and centre. After the concert it's a little tricky to see why. That's not to say that she didn't sing beautifully, she absolutely did, but so too did Matthew Rose, Yann Beuron and Ronan Collett, not to mention the chorus, on fabulous form, and the exemplary playing of the orchestra; it's not as though Mary is a show stealing part.

Anyone who knew only the Symphonie Fantastique and was expecting a big orchestra and lots of razzamatazz would have been surprised. L'enfance du Christ may lack the out and out fireworks of pieces like The Damnation of Faust or Romeo and Juliet, or the epic forces of the Requiem, but it has something else very special indeed: it is one and a half hours of sublime beauty. That's not to say it isn't without some flashes of fire, such as during the march that follows the prologue or some of Herod's scenes, but they are few and far between and not the overriding impression the work leaves you with.

I never think French is the easiest language to sing in, and when done badly (Abbado's DG recording of Don Calros, I'm looking at you) it grates like nails on a blackboard. No such problems were present last night. Doubtless Yann Beuron, who sang the narrator, had the advantage of being Francophone by birth, but he was by no means head and shoulders above the rest. Cargill sang as clearly and beautifully as we have come to expect and was nicely complemented by Ronan Collett's Joseph. But for me the outstanding vocal performance of the evening was Matthew Rose's reading of both Herod and the Ishmaelite Father, the former especially chilling.

The chorus, under their recently appointed new master Gregory Batsleer, were on scintillating form (Batsleer, even younger than Ticciati, gets rave reviews from those I know in the chorus, and on the strength of last night seems a shrewd hire). Ticciati showed a Runnicles-esque flair in his placement of them, with the women spending the first part at the very top right of the organ gallery, giving their portrayal of the angels quite literally an added lift.

Throughout Ticciati balanced his forces to perfection. The orchestration was fairly light, more so when the brass and chamber organ left the stage after the first part. Often it felt like it had been written for string ensemble alone, from which he drew such beautiful sounds. The other orchestral stars were the flutes, especially Alison Mitchell, in their sublime trio with the harp, played to perfection. I've said it before, but one thing that really impresses me about Ticciati is his understanding of how less is often more, volume wise, and how, instead of deafening the audience, he brings out wonderful details in the score.

Ticciati had wisely chosen to play through without sapping the drama with an interval. Similarly, he allowed the work to sit in the programme alone. It was a magical hour and a half that required no accompaniment.

The only minor niggles were entirely beyond the control of the artists. The Usher Hall were doing their normal bang up incompetent job (no, I don't mean the fact that the temporary seat number signs are still wrong, nor the fact that the new hand rails clash with the existing safety rails): the house lights were dimmed such that it was very hard to read the text and it took until midway through scene four before they thought to turn them up a bit. I wouldn't mind, but this is a repeated problem at the Usher Hall. Listen Karl Chapman (general manager), it's not rocket science: if there's a sung text that isn't in English, we need the house lights on a bit. That and the fidgety woman next to me who seemed to think all Berlioz's orchestration wanted was an annoying jangling arm bracelet which hopefully won't trouble the Radio 3 broadcast you should all tune into in a month's time. Those in Glasgow and Aberdeen should try and catch the repeat performances.

Can't wait or make those? Well, Cargill, Rose and Beuron can all be heard on Colin Davis's rather fine LSO Live recording.

Continued...

The extraordinary District 9, or Sharlto Copley was robbed

Every year at Oscar nomination time I usually discover at least one performance or film which has been disgracefully overlooked. This year is no exception. Where's Runnicles has to ask, how could Sharlto Copley (District 9) have been overlooked in the Best Actor category?

Last night Mr P came round for dinner, bringing with him the District 9 DVD. I was initially sceptical. I had a vague recollection of seeing a trailer many months ago which looked very bloody and violent and not my cup of tea at all. How wrong can you be....yes there is considerable violence in this film (some of it pretty horrifying) but all of it is essential to the story, and that story is compelling and very dark.

The film begins as a documentary detailing the arrival of a huge alien ship above Johannesburg twenty years before. We follow in snapshots the adaptation of the aliens to a district in the city which gradually becomes a slum walled off from the rest of the city. We see the rising distrust, disgust and ultimately hatred of the humans towards these arrivals, a developing feeling given added point by the South African setting and the film's careful mingling of white and black faces. This backstory is interspersed with 'footage' of Multi-National United workers as they prepare for a huge relocation operation – moving the aliens out of the city to a new purpose built camp (for which read concentration camp).

From the very beginning the film plays with the viewer's expectation. Utilising the documentary format to begin with builds up the sense of tension and unease. It is clear that something is going to go badly wrong but when it does it was certainly not what I had anticipated. Design is also key here, the aliens are distinctly unappealing in behaviour and appearance, which makes the evolution in relations, and the viewer's reactions to them, during the film the more striking. The special effects work should also be singled out. I don't know whether producer Peter Jackson offered director Neill Blomkamp any advice on the basis of his Lord of the Rings experience but the achievement has its parallels – the aliens are completely integrated into the environment – that is I never doubted for one moment that these races were interacting with each other – it was wholly, often terrifyingly, real.

However, at the centre of the film, is the already mentioned extraordinary performance of Sharlto Copley. Copley plays Wikus van der Merwe, the junior employee appointed by MNU bosses to manage the eviction of the aliens. The brilliance of Copley's performance lies in the layering: again and again as the film goes on another layer is stripped away – the character's evolution from junior bureaucrat with a Napoleon complex to tragic victim is utterly compelling even when the bloodiness was forcing me to hide my eyes. It is remarkable that this should be his first major film role.

It is not really possible to write much more without giving away the plot, and this is to my mind undoubtedly a film which it is better to come to cold. Suffice it to say this is a film asking important questions at every turn, about the limitations of our humanity, about how we treat the other among us, about how far we are willing to go in pursuit of what we imagine are our interests and what we are prepared to sacrifice to that end. Many of the answers suggested are profoundly unsettling. Yet there remains hope – not a sugary fantastical hope, but something hard won, fragile and very moving. In short, see this film.

Continued...

The third instalment of our infamous, absurdly time-delayed, tweet by tweet, coverage of Pop Star to Opera Star

There was no live tweeting on Friday (I had been at a colleague's leaving do, and returned a little too merry). Then, over the weekend, between a trip to War and Peace and some DIY not going entirely according to plan, I didn't feel at all in the mood.

However, Monday evening found me full of mushroom risotto and armed with a nice glass of wine. Bed beckoned, but somehow the prospect of being rude about terrible TV was more appealing.

So, here it is, tweet by tweet (albeit absurdly time delayed), as @wheresrunnicles saw it.

Warning, as with previous instalments, the following may contain traces of irony:

I should be going to bed now, instead I am commencing my much delayed live-ish tweeting of Friday's #popstarstooperastars

Tonight's whisky is, in fact, not whisky but instead a rather nice glass of New Zealand sauvignon blanc

Jimmy is to sing a proper aria - that's a novelty. I wonder where they got the idea to do that

Good grief - who is that with the Marge Simpson tribute hair??!!!

Is Ronaldo Villazon now taking the same medication as Meat Loaf?

I'd say this lady singing Carmen has a slightly thin voice but that would be an understatement

I'm sure everyone said it on Friday, but how the [multiple expletives deleted] can a part possibly belong to someone who's never sung it!!!

Steady on Meat Loaf - there may be children watching (though for the sake of them ever developing a taste for opera I sincerely hope not)

"left him relying on the public to save him" hang on, don't they all?

side note, there's been nary a mention of the show at work (& normally my colleagues don't miss a chance to gas about talent shows)

which is my roundabout way of suggesting I don't think either that ratings can be very good, or this is likely to bring in new audiences

Alan thinks he's just been to the opera does he? Clearly he's never actually been then!

now judging them as opera stars are they - they don't resemble opera stars to my obviously inept ears

She's going to try the Queen of the Night aria - this should be funny

Because, of course, the Queen of the Night only has the one aria.......

Actually, in fairness, she didn't disgrace herself (though it was in the wrong key)

Listen Meat Loaf, pal, don't quote Shakespeare unless you can get it right: he did not say "call out the dogs of war"

Oh my God, they've got Russell Watson to help this guy (I feel rather sorry for him)

[Whichever pop star it was, not Russell Watson.]

Apologies for the delay there - I had to pause as twitter wasn't letting me update my status!

[The beauty of this summary is that, hopefully, there is no apparent delay. Of course, that does mean the last tweet makes precious little sense.]

Hmm - I just can't place what opera this 'Time to Say Goodbye' thing comes from....

Again I'm impressed with their ability to flummox me with obscure repertoire

@mlaffs I clearly have so much to learn from this show!

[@mlaffs had enlightened me to the fact that the Queen of the Night aria is the only thing Mozart ever wrote.]

Grenada - good lord, it's all go tonight, I've no idea which opera this comes from either.

But according to wikipedia that well known opera singer Frank Sinatra sang it, so it must be just another shocking gap in my knowledge

[And here's the wikipedia link if you're remotely curious.]

Darius had the chance to be classically trained, passed it up, but he's apparently making up for it now

Really? Perhaps my classically trained friends can correct me, but I doubt they went through anything much like this

Hmm a 50yr old singing Cherubino. Are they going for the Ian Bostridge/Captain Vere miscasting award?

Well, she tried very hard, and did creditably well, bless her, but it just didn't work

Hey, how come she doesn't get feedback from the judges? That surely isn't fair

Ah sorry, I spoke too soon there (the perils of live tweeting). Well, I say live.....

Wow, Ronaldo Villazon's career finally reaches the dizzy heights of singing amplified on TV - those years in opera houses weren't wasted!

Wow - they didn't bring it down to a tie-break this week. The panel was unanimous but I didn't think there was much to choose

Danielle de Niese is on next week. No, say it ain't so, surely she's better than that! :(

And that concludes tonight's massively time delayed live tweeting of Friday's #popstartooperastar

Don't worry, though, where's Runnicles will return to live tweet next week's [insert appropriate adjective here] instalment. It will not be live, of course (maybe one day, perhaps), instead I'll be at a proper concert, in London no less; but, via the magic of the internet, or by some other means, whisky, or equivalent alcoholic beverage, in hand, there will be tweets. Hopefully you'll not have to wait four days for them. Until then, I hope you had as much fun reading this as I did writing it.

Continued...

The RSAMD presents War and Peace

If you're a War and Peace buff, Saturday night's performance, or the preceding ones in both Edinburgh and Glasgow, represent a particularly exciting prospect, since they present the premiere of Dr Rita McAllister's reconstruction of Prokofiev's original version.

I'm not a War and Peace buff, however, having never heard it before, save for a few radio broadcasts. I am, though, a great fan of live opera and there is precious little of that in Scotland, and what Scottish Opera does programme is often not that interesting, such that the RSAMD's annual production is very much welcome.

It's an impressively ambitious piece for any institution to take, requiring a cast of hundreds. In a sensible move, it is a collaboration with the Rostov State Rachmaninov Conservatoire, which provides a fair few of the key singers. Partly as a result, vocally the standards were high and everyone seemed comfortable in Russian. Michel de Souza was impressive as Prince Bolkonsky, so too Dmitry Ivanchey as Pierre. Elsewhere Maria Kozlova's Natasha was solid if unmoving. Acting was similarly decent and Rebecca Afonwy-Jones more or less stole the show for me when, as Maria Akhrosimova, she bossed Pierre around.

Sadly there are inevitable drawbacks to having such a uniformly young cast. For the most part their performances were sufficiently fine to mask such concerns but Aram Ohanian lacked, both in voice and physical presence, the feel needed for the aged Kutuzov - while I'm not his greatest fan at this stage of his career, this is the sort of role that cries out for the likes of John Tomlinson.

In the pit, Timothy Dean (the RSAMD's head of opera) led Scottish Opera's orchestra, augmented by academy students. The results were impressive: fine playing and sufficient drama. He was, too, a good judge of balance, ensuring his soloists were audible in a big house. And yet, it was good solid work without ever quite moving into greatness.

Given the epic scope of the narrative, director Irina Brown and designer Chloe Lamford have therefore done well in conceiving a production that is in many ways economical without appearing overtly so. The basic set, a vast pillared facade, set about two thirds of the way back on the stage, remains in place throughout, instead being modified by the opening and closing of sliding panels, lighting, and the addition of props, to double pretty effective as both Moscow drawing rooms and battlefields. It always manages to look suitably impressive.

However, it isn't always completely successful. Especially in the earlier scenes, the panels are rather over-used and slide about a little too much. Similarly, some of the scene changes are a little over-acted and seem played for silliness, particularly the case with the maid on the change into scene six.

More puzzling, there seemed to be an insistence in the first half that the cast always stand fully facing the audience. This doubtless helped ensure voices carried, and yet it led to blocking that, at times, felt oddly awkward.

When the setting moved to the war of the second half there were other minor irritations. The pyrotechnics promised by the warning posters escaped my notice if they were present at all. Were they missing from the repeated executions? Certainly they felt disappointingly underwhelming when simply mimed. As a result, there was not quite the spectacle that it felt there should be.

Elsewhere, one or two chorus members needed to bear in mind that while the sandbags they were lifting might not have been filled with actual sand, they ought to act as though they were, rather than, as sometimes happened, tossing them about like pillows. Similarly, having spent scene seven preparing an elaborate and visually impressive defensive position, trenches and all, it was a pity that when they finally took to it, while it looked quite exciting, it also looked for all the world like it had be designed by a general some way beyond incompetence.

There was, too, an unfortunate moment when the surtitle operator appeared to lean on the button and skipped through several pages of text. Fortunately Andrew Huth recovered his place with impressive speed.

Such niggles are, of course, minor. It was, overall, impressively done and very fine to hear and to look at. Certainly it's nice to see a straight laced production, free of the directorial silliness and excess which seems so fashionable these days. This was the kind of production that those both new and old to the opera house alike would have no trouble enjoying. The RSAMD and Rostov Conservatoire can be justly proud of what they've accomplished.

What is less clear is why the opera never won the favour of the authorities. It seems suitably stirringly patriotic. Apparently, this first version is the least over the top in that regard, with many more layers added subsequently. It's many years since I read the book, so I can't remember how much Pierre praises how great the peasants are or whether the triumph of the people motif is so strong. Similarly, I can't comment on the relative merits of this edition against those more normally performed. It's true, though, that it does feel rushed in places, adapting such a vast work how could it not? Yet at times this is unfortunate - Natasha's taking arsenic should not really provoke a titter of laughter. Perhaps this flaw was addressed in later versions, or was simply down to misconceived delivery of the line.

It leaves me wanting to get better acquainted with the work - it would be interesting to hear what Gergiev would do with it. It was nice to be back in the Festival Theatre again for some opera, though their front of house staff are clearly desperate not to be outdone by the Royal Opera House in snubbing the plebs: one bar was sealed off for a reception, fair enough, but did that make it essential to close down half the staircases while we were trying to get out? I'm surprised we weren't required leave by the tradesmen's entrance!

Continued...

Sherlock Holmes, or Guy Ritchie's triumphant Homage-a-thon

Rarely have I seen a film quite so replete with homages to the work of others as Guy Ritchie's new take on Sherlock Holmes. At times the viewer might be forgiven for thinking that he has wandered into one of Tim Burton's Batman movies, Young Sherlock Holmes (a film for which I must admit some affection), Doctor Who Victoriana (whether of Tom Baker or Sylvester McCoy vintage) or the Da Vinci Code franchise (I must admit I have never actually seen a whole movie from the last stable but judging by the trailers there seems to be some overlap). More distantly one can also glimpse echoes of other classics of the period adventure romp, the score occasionally sounds a little Pirates of the Caribbean and the ensemble is reminiscent of Indiana Jones. Why then, you may ask, should you bother going to see this film? Because despite these many influences it is hilariously funny, keeps you on the edge of your seat, boasts a superb cast and an excellent script (the latter a sad rarity in the film world and therefore the more deserving of praise).

It is the twin elements of very successful casting and scripting that make this film such a triumph. The script has been produced by no less than three writers (Michael Robert Johnson, Anthony Peckham and Simon Kinberg), none of whom seem to have done much in the way of films before if IMDB is to be believed. Yet the script shows no signs of the clunkiness one might expect from a multiple production. It is often very funny, but can be moving without tipping over into melodrama, and cleverly keeps you guessing about the key McGuffins of the plot – is Lord Blackwood (a suitably demonic Mark Strong) really achieving all his successes by black magic and is Holmes in some way implicated in the crimes. They are also extremely clever in their characterisation of Holmes: in place of Jeremy Brett's mordant figure, Robert Downey Jr gives us a master detective whose brain is forever working overtime and keeping him dangerously close to madness. This may not be completely Conan Doyle's creation but it is to my mind a successful re-imagining, true to much of the spirit of the original, rather than a travesty. Ritchie's direction persistently shows Downey uncovering clues, but these moments are submerged into other scenes, often through distracting dialogue from Watson, so that it really is a surprise (as it often is in the stories) when Holmes finally reveals how he has deduced various key points. The point of course is, as I seem to remember Holmes saying in at least one story, that most of the information is before our eyes, and if we had a mind like Holmes's we might see it.

Downey's partnership with Jude Law's Dr Watson is at the heart of the film, and is superbly brought off. From the very first moment we see them together, through all the twists and turns of the complex plot, they are completely believable particularly perhaps the exasperation which both use to cover how far they depend on each other. Rachel McAdams is suitably stunning as Holmes's love interest and intellectual match, and if the script does not always work so effectively for her as the others this is not her fault. Given that she is identified as Irene Adler, this is probably the point most likely to have Sherlockian purists up in arms. Yet A Scandal in Bohemia emphasises a kind of connection between her and Holmes, whom she does successfully outwit, so her role here is not so completely far-fetched. Also worthy of mention are fine turns from Eddie Marson (as Inspector Lestrade) and the marvellous Geraldine James, who is criminally underused as Mrs Hudson, an error one trusts will be rectified in the rumoured sequel.

To sum up, despite the occasional unconvincing bit of CGI (the fight on Tower Bridge at the end is particularly culpable) and the odd melodramatic turn of phrase, this is a rollicking good yarn, featuring a superb partnership of performances by Downey and Law. I look forward to the sequel.

Continued...

What are you doing a year on Sunday? - The LSO unveils its 2010/11 Season

I love a good season announcement as much as anyone, but I can't help thinking, as I've thought before, that January is a little early. We won't know what The SCO, RSNO, BBC Scottish and Royal Opera are doing until March/April time. This matters to me, since as travelling south is expensive, I like to ensure I get the most bang for my buck and that I'm not missing any gems on my own doorstep (I inevitably wind up with one or two clashes all the same). This means that, exciting though the London Symphony Orchestra's 2010/11 season is (PDF download here.), I'll not be booking anything just yet.

Well, almost nothing. I've already booked one thing: a year on Sunday you'll find me, baring calamity, in the Barbican to hear Mark Elder conduct them in The Kingdom. It doesn't come up all that often, and to find it under the baton of one of the greatest Elgarians represents an unmissable opportunity. (And if you doubt how unmissable Elder's Elgar is, read what he did with Gerontius last summer, not to mention the fact that I prefer the Kingdom as a work.)

Don't panic though, it was only in December last year when I got round to planning my February & March LSO visits and found tickets easily for everything I wanted (including Beethoven one and nine with Gardiner). What other highlights, though, present themselves for later booking.

Well, the first thing that leaps out at me is Janacek's Glagolitic Mass, one of my favourite works by one of my favourite composers (and given it's getting Sunday and Tuesday runs, we can presume it's being recorded). True, the lack of a real organ at the Barbican is a shame, but it should be fine none the less. Davis conducts, which causes me to speculate that Gergiev might do something very interesting with the piece.

For those who like Gergiev's Mahler, there's another substantial dose, and if you're wondering why it's back so soon, the fifth and ninth symphonies are being taped again, not having been captured to everyone's satisfaction last time around. The first also gets a look in. Personally, I've found what I've heard of the series a little rushed, but I do plan to give it a fuller exploration at some point, perhaps when LSO Live finally makes it to Spotify.

The Mahler flavour is continued elsewhere, though, with something arguable far more fascinating, namely Marin Alsop's programme early in December. She gives us Beethoven's Leonore III overture and seventh symphony as orchestrated by Mahler. Given, to my mind, orchestration was one of Mahler's greatest talents, this promises to be very interesting indeed. Certainly his version of Schubert's Death and the Maiden made rather special listening with the SCO last April. Sandwiched between them we find a composition by Mahler, but in a surprise Alma and not Gustav: seven lieder arranged by David and Colin Matthews.

Elsewhere Rattle will be around to do Bruckner nine and some Messiaen, Noseda brings Bartok's second violin concerto and Prokoviev's sixth symphony, Gardner does Mendelssohn's Italian symphony, Harding accompanies Grimaud in Mozart's sublime K488 concerto and Gergiev kicks of the season with Pictures at an Exhibition.

In short, there's an awful lot of interesting stuff. My main reservation is that the season is relatively light on concert opera, with a sole offering in the form of Candide with Kristjan Jarvi. (Well, I suppose I should also ask "Where's Runnicles?", but we do see plenty of him up here these days.)

Playing the game of what is being recorded is also good fun - it's usually a safe bet that it's those works up twice in a row. Thus we may expect to see future LSO Live releases including Bruckner four from Haitink and Tchaikovsky's first three symphonies from Gergiev.

Not content, however, with selling the 2010/11 season now (tickets went on sale on Monday), the LSO is reaching yet further, with a concert series coupling Beethoven's piano concerti and Nielsen's symphonies with Davis and Uchida that runs up to December 2011 (the symphonies look set for disc). I suspect these may be ones that will go quickly, and which are worth booking now.

While I'll hold off the remainder of my booking for the time being, I think it's safe to say that I won't be a stranger to the Barbican next season.

Continued...

Making it worse? How could it be worse? - Popstar to Opera Star, tweet by tweet, Part II

Making it worse? How could it be worse?

So demands a character in Monty Python's immortal Life of Brian as he's about to get stoned to death for suggesting that the fish his wife prepared for supper was good enough for Jehovah. Those who watched the first instalment of Popstar to Opera Star (I refuse to follow them in conjoining opera star into a new word) might well have asked the same question. Sadly, ITV was ready, willing, and able to demonstrate the foolishness of asking such questions: it was straight over the precipice in top gear as songs, heaven forfend arias, with increasingly tenuous connections to the world of opera were trotted out and, frankly, stoned to death. So, here it is, tweet by tweet (albeit somewhat time delayed, as I was once again at a proper concert), as @wheresrunnicles saw it.

Warning, as with last week's instalment, the following may contain traces of irony:

Commencing my time delayed #popstarstooperastars tweeting

"Today our pop stars are pushed to their limits". To, you say. Hmm, I think they need to look behind them (possibly using the Hubble)

[West Wing fans, spot the reference!]

"To learn a completely new song." Yes, for god's sake let's not challenge the audience by calling it an aria

You can't argue with that, Katherine Jenkins does indeed "have a simply staggering voice"......

What's the challenge of singing in a foreign language? Good question - what Laurence Lewellyn Bowen would know about that is a better one

Incidentally, tonight's whisky is a cask strength Caol Ila (bottle doesn't give an age so presumably less than ten years)

These really seem to be the most unproductive rehearsals I have ever witnessed.

"Is this in French?" he asks after having been rehearsing it for some time - I wonder if this is all really some comic setup

@DrGeoduck well, she tends to sound pretty terrible to me

[DrGeoduck had suggested that Jenkins' voice was simply dull.]

To be filed under: for the love of God why? RT @TimesMusic Viva Forever: Mamma Mia creator creates Spice Girls musical http://bit.ly/7ApuXk

[Oh, sorry, that's a completely unrelated but no less appalling musical travesty, please disregard.]

Good grief - there's a chorus in this number. I know music students are hard up, but surely it's not that bad???

I wonder if Meat Loaf needs to be sedated?

@Kateviola it's certainly easing the pain

[@Kateviola had expressed the view that the Caol Ila was a good choice.]

Are they trying to cut this ironically - if so, the exert that just followed "she's got a beautiful voice" was judged to perfection

Are the people on the panel not allowed to say anything critical to any of these people. I thought that was the point of talent shows

Ah yes, that well known opera aria, the love theme from The Godfather. I don't know that opera - can anyone tell me who wrote it?

But I'm impressed they're ploughing the more obscure parts of the canon amidst all the well known favourites

Ah, I take it back, there is criticism - she was slightly ahead of the orchestra (but that doesn't matter to our Katherine)

RT @STManson @wheresrunnicles It's from the Opera-"The Public Won't Know So Let's Just Sing Opera-Like Things"

[@STManson provides an answer to my question about that obscure opera The Godfather.]

And just what the **** (if you'll pardon my French) does this Volare thing have to do with opera?

[That would be this Volare thing. Apparently Pavarotti sang it once.]

I think I need something stiffer than this cask strength whisky. I mean they want him to sing it in an opera way, what next, Iron Maiden?

"You did something with your hand and it was sexy." - okay, now I'm really disturbed

[As if in answer to that unasked question as to whether Meat Loaf could do anything to make his contribution to the programme any more disturbing, he demonstrated that indeed he could.]

Well quite! (Though I can proudly say I have no idea what that sounds like) RT @Gert @wheresrunnicles Or the theme from The One Show?

[@Gert provides a possible answer to my Iron Maiden question.]

15p from each call goes to Music Therapy charity Nordoff-Robbins. That's nice, but give directly and ITV doesn't get 35p http://is.gd/6Q5QG

[Yes, even amidst my mockery there is time for something serious - it's a good cause, and you can give without ITV getting a penny.]

Oh, what a coincidence, once again the judges are tied. If I was cynical, I' d suggest that was contrived, but that would never happen.....

And that concludes the not particularly live tweeting of part two of #popstarstooperastars

[Well, with the exception of a few comments to @karenasoprano while she watched it the next day.]

@karenasoprano oh, just you wait until you get onto some of the later stuff whose connection to opera is beyond tenuous

@karenasoprano i.e. Pavarotti once sung happy birthday, I want you to sing it in an operatic manner (okay, I exaggerate, but barely)

@karenasoprano Indeed. @STManson tells me: It's from the Opera-"The Public Won't Know So Let's Just Sing Opera-Like Things"

@karenasoprano It gets worse.

And that really is it. @wheresrunnicles' live(ish) tweeting may well return next week (though it will not be live - I have a leaving do for a colleague).

Continued...

Tippett, Shostakovich and Schumann from Lill, Davis and the RSNO

Friday night's Royal Scottish National Orchestra programme is in some ways a tough one to review because I don't really know two of the three works. But I'm not about to let that stop me.

My last significant encounter with Andrew Davis was a set of Dvorak symphonies on RCA with the Philharmonia which I found dull beyond measure and where it felt like the orchestra were asleep, if occasionally waking up in the finales. Fortunately no Dvorak was on the programme and everyone seemed wide awake.

I'm not a hundred percent certain, but it's possible I haven't heard any Tippett in the concert hall since I first encountered the peerless concerto for double string orchestra about five years ago. That made the appearance of the Ritual Dances from The Midsummer Marriage all the sweeter. It often seemed to call to mind features I love in the double concerto and the RSNO seemed on fine form for Davis. Hopefully it won't be so long until I next encounter some Tippett live. Sadly, even this was enough to raise the hackles of a small minority amongst Edinburgh's generally conservative audience for whom even this was too modern and who sat stoically refusing to applaud. Fortunately they were significantly in the minority.

Tippett was followed by Shostakovich's second piano concerto with John Lill. He gave a clear and lucid reading, and, impressively for such a large work, didn't feel the need to resort to thumping the keyboard. He, Lill and the RSNO gave us plenty of fireworks in the outer movements while providing a sublime reading of the adagio. Not, perhaps, Shostakovich's most profound work, but a pleasure to hear. (Note, I don't know the work well enough to comment, but I'm reliably informed that Lill got lost and was improvising for twenty or thirty bars in the finale.)

After the interval we were treated to Schumann's third symphony, the Rhenish. It's a nicely jolly work and they had plenty of fun with it. I always feel Schumann works best when played with plenty of drive and romanticism and my favourite recordings are those in the Bernstein mould, not least the man himself. Davis didn't go down that route, and yet for the most part it was success, if the first movement didn't quite have the lit and flow I'd like. True, the second movement really feel nearly a very moderate as marked, but in general it was an enjoyable reading and such minor quibbles didn't really get in the way.

Throughout, Davis seemed to be having a great deal of fun, with a huge grin spread across his face every time he turned to face the audience. It was a perfectly decent evening in the concert hall then, though as quality of this review (not one of my best) indicates, I think part of my mind and heart were still with the previous night's Bruckner which was still ringing in my ears twenty-four hours later.

Continued...