And here endeth my half-week residency on London's South Bank. And I still haven't properly looked at the World Press Photo 05 exhibition which is on until 6 June and deserves more than a perfunctory gaze...
Bach Choir and Philharmonia under David Hill.
Programme: Kindertotenlieder - Mahler (soloist, David Wilson-Johnson bass)
And so the night became (World Premiere) - Diana Burrell
A Child of Our Time - Tippett
Soloists, Gweneth-Ann Jeffers (s), Jean Rigby (m-s), Andrew Staples (t) and David Wilson-Johnson (bs).
Hall barely half full, if that, ironically considering that it was better than the two sell-out performances earlier in the week. In my opinion.
First of all, let's get the new piece out of the way. I am not really sure what to say. Tosh? Rubbish? Noise? All of these and more and less. Simulataneously.
Oh I know, it's new music, it's challenging, the public is unreceptive to new music until they've heard it a dozen times over two decades. Except that I would argue that I am very fond of at least four different pieces of twenty-first century music by four very different composers. I justthink that gimmickry and noise is not music. When I am wincing in pain at the screeching of violins, and when I notice that half of each of two verses (of fifteen) have something that approaches harmony and melody, it is really awful. I applauded the orchestra (who looked somewhat embarrassed) and I applauded the choir, but I could not bring myself to applaud the composer. And when I was leaving, I had to brush past her, surrounded as she was in the aisle by a group of admiring students from Guildhall SOM I felt patently unable to meet her eye.
Very poor choice to set alongside the other pieces.
I am not sure that Iwould have selected Kindertotenlieder of itself. PRetty morbid stuff - Songs of the Death of Children. A year after its premiere, Mahler's five year old daughter died. So to say it was enjoyable would be a poor choice of words. But it was meaningful and beautiful and quite moving.
I actually booked for A Child of Our Time, having been to ENO's rather strange staged version in January
It was particularly interesting hearing it after the dreadful preceding piece. Tippett uses dissonance, but it sounds like music. And it can't just be due to familiarity, because I would hardly say that I'm familiar with it.
Overall a very satisfying performance. My main quibble was that the tempi of the spirituals was wrong, in my opinion. the conductor introduced some rubato, but what it needed was soem syncopation. You either got the rhythm or you you don't. All I can say is that we had more at Primary School in the Seventies. With the caveat (a rather big caveat, admittedly) that I don't especially know the piece, I couldn't fault the orchestra or the choir. Perversely, it struck me that I would have appreciated the experience even more if the lights in the auditorium had been extinguished - because that was how I experienced it at the Coliseum, and listening in darkness to a dimly lit stage is profoundly moving experience.
As for the soloists. Well, Gweneth-Ann Jeffers and Andrew Staples were late replacememnts for the indisposed singers originally billed. Gweneth too late to get her name on the front of the programme, although she is inside.
Jean Rigby gave a competent and technically acceptable performance, but her voice seemed generic and her delivery unexciting. I've found her disappointing before. Once I can forgive, twice I draw conclusions.
David Wilson-Johnson was competent throughout. I have to say there is nothing in his voice that particularly draws me, but it's a good solid reliable bass.
Gweneth-Ann Jeffers reminded me for all the world, vocally at least, of Renée Fleming but without the idiosyncratic swoops and scoops. A good strong voice, able to penetrate the orchestra and choir, rich and mature. I would definitely want to hear her again. She seemed to have a stage presence when she was singing, and seemed to understand the meaning of what she was singing. Also, at the end, I took a photo and she smiled warmly in my direction - she'll go far, you know! She has a website but it hasn't been updated in a long time.Under other circumstances, I'd be raving about her, but, despite the fact that I have just become a fan, in my view she was upstaged by
Andrew Staples. When he sung his first few notes I just sat up and listened! What a sweet and beautiful voice. He must be quite young, but his limited web presence suggests a career that is starting with a flourish.
Theer was one point where the sheer beauty of his tone actually brought a tear to my eye. He is far from the finished article, and lacks colouring and drama. But I was so amazed at the sheer natural beauty, and conscious of his youth (mid-twenties, tops, I'd say) and inexperience, that I am overlooking them.
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