Featuring:
- Liszt Mephisto Waltz No. 1 (The Dance in the Village Inn)
- Brahms Violin Concerto
- Ravel La Valse
- Haydn Symphony No. 45 'Farewell'
Daniel Hope - Violin
Mario Venzago - Conductor
This concert is special in the sense that it is the very last concert where MSO performs in Hamer Hall before the hall undergoes major renovation, scheduled to finish in 2012. The program is an interesting mix of tone poems, concerto, and a symphony befitting to such an occasion. So did the audience, actually, the hall was pretty close to being sold-out.
Liszt's music hasn't always convinced me, but this time, I quite enjoy his program music of Mephistopheles taking command of music making in a tavern. On the other hand, Brahms's violin concerto is the violin concerto I hold in the highest regard. Daniel Hope's performance was a little bit insecure in the first movement, esp. during the entry of the violin solo where it sounded a little sharp. You can kind of see him struggling to produce the required sound in the technically challenge passages in the first movement due to the sharpness of his instrument, but he played better in a more lyrical passage. The cadenza, was taken quite slowly, and by the time the orchestra re-entered at the end of the cadenza, I felt like I just woke up from a deep meditation. Daniel then re-tuned his violin in the little break in the between, and dispatched 2nd and 3rd movements easily, and more convincingly. Very enjoyable performance, but unfortunately, the emotional high point of Brahms' violin concerto is in its first movement. Ultimately, while the big moments are still there, they failed to break me down into tears.
Next up after interval is Ravel's La Valse. Ravel is a funny one for me, some of his music I love to death - the G major concerto for example. But his other orchestral musics sound like a big poo-poo pretty superficial music, e.g. Bolero, The Mother Goose, and Valses nobles et sentimentales which I heard in London and bored me. I was preparing for the worst with La Valse, but it turned out to be much better than I expected. An interesting beginning, the program describes it as 'waltz viewed from a distance', in which low strings, and winds playing fragments of waltz. It was not long until we were thrown directly into the middle of a ball, with the waltz in full force and you can probably trace some melodies of your most famous waltzes in there. The same music returned in the end, making the ending overwhelming, and very pleasing.
The final and main dish of the concert is Haydn's Farewell Symphony. Long known for its theatrical finale, I am enlightened by a very informative program on the structure of the symphony. First of all, the tonality, F-Sharp minor, is rather rare during Haydn's time. The minor tonality gave this piece a special twist in Haydn's mostly major symphonies, very much Sturm und Drang style. I remembered the minuet ending with a violin solo from the concertmaster, before the Presto section of the finale broke out. A horn note signals the adagio, in which, one by one and turn by turn, members of the orchestra left the stage (including the conductor which gave his best effort signaling to the audience not to clap yet). In the end, only the concertmaster and the second violin leader played the same melody in thirds, before the second violin leader had enough and left the concertmaster on stage by himself. There's only one stage light remaining at this stage, and by the time the concertmaster finished his last note, the stage went dark, and I felt a small ache in my heart. The applause broke out, and all the members of the orchestra playing in the symphony came back and took their well-deserved bows. A minority but noticeable portion of the audience gave a standing ovation. A heart-felt performance, and befitting to such an occasion.
A word about the conductor. He's the same person who conducted MSO in a rather strange program containing Mozart's D minor concerto, Schoenberg's variations for orchestra, and Ravel's Bolero. He's the person who opened up my mind and encouraged me not to fear Schoenberg's music and made the variations for orchestra performance such a memorable occasion that I felt completely bored with Ravel's creativeless Bolero. I attended the pre-concert talk and he was really informative on how he viewed the Ravel's La Valse and the aspects of conducting that he drew in terms of producing the sound that he prefers for different kind of repertoire. He's just delightful this man, and I'll be sure to attend his next concert should he come again next time (I think I remembered Huw Humphreys mentioning he'll be back next year).
So for now, farewell Hamer Hall. I'm sure you'll look, feel, and sound better after your renovation.
Tuesday, 29 June 2010
Tuesday, 8 June 2010
Australian Chamber Orchestra concert 7 June 2010 - Romantic Symphony
Featuring:
- Jonny Greenwood Popcorn Superhet Receiver Australian Premiere
- Schubert Symphony No. 8 "Unfinished"
- Brahms Symphony No. 1
Well, due to some circumstances, I need to change my ACO concert to Monday. Offered the choice of stall or balcony seats, I decided to take on the latter seat. As much as I hate balcony seats in Hamer Hall because they tend to make me feel nauseous, it's still better to have a clear view of the orchestra, rather than stuck somewhere in stall seats where all you can see is the first two rows of musicians.
My decision paid off immediately when ACO gave the Australian Premiere of Radiohead's lead guitarist's piece with its quirky and rather cute title. Plagiarising the program notes, "A superhet (superheterodyne) receiver generates a fixed tone as a result of the frequency difference between two carrier waves - in the early days of wireless transmission, this was a frequency equivalent to a note at the very top of the violin's range. Popcorn is a low-fat, high-fibre, maize foodstuff". That last sentence made my day :). As I'm not familiar with Radiohead music and Jonny Greenwood in general, let's just jump to the music itself. Scored for a moderate-sized string orchestra (around 30, if I'm not mistaken), it's a lush string showcases lacking a recognisable main theme. In place of this, it exploits almost all strings playing techniques: bowed, pizzicato, Bartok pizzicato, even treating the violins like a guitar, you name it, I think they're all there. To grossly simplify the music, I think it's in ternary form with a slightly longer first part, and a very interesting second part. The first and last part of the music concerns with creating the soundscape of musical waves. I was trying to find a scientific term to express this soundscape more accurately when my companion for the night suprised me by uttering "Doppler effect" - brilliant!. To create this effect, Greenwood resorted to glissandos, tremolos, passing main musical ideas from a string divisi to the other, and even sometimes from one player to the other so that almost every strings plays a solo at different places in the piece. All these musical tricks are a feast to my eyes: the sights of the bows going up and down from one player to the other created an effect of a - well of course - wave. Thank goodness I chose the balcony seat :).
The second part of the music was really fun, the violins and violas were held like a guitar by the musicians, and they played a repeating rhytmic pattern with the cellos playing out the main theme here (IIRC). This is definitely rock-influenced music, well implemented in classical music and with good taste. Richard conducted the orchestra (he did not play in this piece), and the orchestra maintained the precision, clarity, and yes, sonority which in turned help the audience to grasp this music. While tightly textured, the piece is very accessible, and consists of some interesting harmonies. It actually reminds me a little bit of the Xenakis's Shaar which ACO played last year, but with less amount of dissonances.
In general, I like the piece - I just had troubles with its title. I can see the superhet connection with the wave soundscape it created, but I can't find any connection on the popcorn. Maybe the idea that radio static noises do not always necessarily a noise - not a music - and can be transformed and expressed as something pleasant, to the ear of listeners is the popcorn bit.
The woodwind, brass, and percussion guest musicians joined the enlarged strings to play Schubert's arguably most famous symphony, the 'Unfinished'. A much loved symphony, it famously contained only 2 movements. The first movement contained one of the most well-known Schubert's melody, the second theme, which was played right after the dark, gloomy opening first theme in the low strings. The cellos are gorgeous here, singing in the beautiful melody, while signalling the tragedy to come in the opening murmuring theme. In general, I like the tempo Richard took in this movement: brisk enough to keep the tension high throughout and delivered the high tension development phase with fierce staccatos, and extreme contrast in dynamics. The tension was so high here that I am thankful when the first movement is over to finally have a breather. This movement to me is a prime example of trademark Schubert, easily transforming a dark gloom moment to a beautiful moment effortlessly, and back again with the same simplicity. Another example of this is the beautiful 2nd movement of Schubert's A major sonata (#20), and the Credo from his G major Mass (#2). In the Credo, Schubert changed the pious mood in the beginning effortlessly to doom tragedy in 4 bars when the choir reaches 'Crucifixus', and transform this gloomy mood into exuberant rejoice in 8 bars in the 'Resurrexit' section. Anyway, I digressed from this concert.
I have to disagree with Murray Black's review on the second movement tempo. I found it to my liking, with plenty of time given to the woodwinds to unfold the lyrical second theme. After the high tension drama in the previous moment, it comforted me so much to listen to the woodwinds playing these lyrical melody. Not saying that the tension has gone, it's still there, lurking around, and yes, Schubert summoned them again in the contrapuntal march-like section soon after. And yet, in the end, it sounded like all is finally well. Brilliant performance from the ACO, definitely first-rate!
After the break, my favourite Brahms' symphony is on the table. Here, I agreed with Murray Black in that there are some issues with the performance in general. While the first movement worked well with brisk tempos, the second and third movements did not. Richard's solo in the second movement made it up a little bit, but the graceful woodwinds melodies are not realised to the their potential in the third movement. The coda of the finale while was brilliant and well-executed, lacked the majestic quality I yearn from this symphony, partly due to the super fast tempos. There were also some minor ensemble issues, the horns were under-pitched in a couple of spots in the finale, but overall the balance was really good. Oh yeah, love the colour the contrabassoon provided in the last movement too. Anyway, despite my usual nitpickings, ACO did one heck of a good job in giving a worthy performance of a Brahms symphony despite the fact that they have not played this symphony before. A major symphony orchestra could easily bore me playing the same symphony by lacking the punch and the energy that ACO delivered.
On a last note, this will be the final time ACO played in Hamer Hall this season as the renovation work of this hall will commence soon. To be honest, I'm a bit worried with ACO performing in the Town Hall as I don't really enjoy its acoustic that much, and its acoustic definitely favours larger ensemble. I'll be glad to be proven wrong.
- Jonny Greenwood Popcorn Superhet Receiver Australian Premiere
- Schubert Symphony No. 8 "Unfinished"
- Brahms Symphony No. 1
Well, due to some circumstances, I need to change my ACO concert to Monday. Offered the choice of stall or balcony seats, I decided to take on the latter seat. As much as I hate balcony seats in Hamer Hall because they tend to make me feel nauseous, it's still better to have a clear view of the orchestra, rather than stuck somewhere in stall seats where all you can see is the first two rows of musicians.
My decision paid off immediately when ACO gave the Australian Premiere of Radiohead's lead guitarist's piece with its quirky and rather cute title. Plagiarising the program notes, "A superhet (superheterodyne) receiver generates a fixed tone as a result of the frequency difference between two carrier waves - in the early days of wireless transmission, this was a frequency equivalent to a note at the very top of the violin's range. Popcorn is a low-fat, high-fibre, maize foodstuff". That last sentence made my day :). As I'm not familiar with Radiohead music and Jonny Greenwood in general, let's just jump to the music itself. Scored for a moderate-sized string orchestra (around 30, if I'm not mistaken), it's a lush string showcases lacking a recognisable main theme. In place of this, it exploits almost all strings playing techniques: bowed, pizzicato, Bartok pizzicato, even treating the violins like a guitar, you name it, I think they're all there. To grossly simplify the music, I think it's in ternary form with a slightly longer first part, and a very interesting second part. The first and last part of the music concerns with creating the soundscape of musical waves. I was trying to find a scientific term to express this soundscape more accurately when my companion for the night suprised me by uttering "Doppler effect" - brilliant!. To create this effect, Greenwood resorted to glissandos, tremolos, passing main musical ideas from a string divisi to the other, and even sometimes from one player to the other so that almost every strings plays a solo at different places in the piece. All these musical tricks are a feast to my eyes: the sights of the bows going up and down from one player to the other created an effect of a - well of course - wave. Thank goodness I chose the balcony seat :).
The second part of the music was really fun, the violins and violas were held like a guitar by the musicians, and they played a repeating rhytmic pattern with the cellos playing out the main theme here (IIRC). This is definitely rock-influenced music, well implemented in classical music and with good taste. Richard conducted the orchestra (he did not play in this piece), and the orchestra maintained the precision, clarity, and yes, sonority which in turned help the audience to grasp this music. While tightly textured, the piece is very accessible, and consists of some interesting harmonies. It actually reminds me a little bit of the Xenakis's Shaar which ACO played last year, but with less amount of dissonances.
In general, I like the piece - I just had troubles with its title. I can see the superhet connection with the wave soundscape it created, but I can't find any connection on the popcorn. Maybe the idea that radio static noises do not always necessarily a noise - not a music - and can be transformed and expressed as something pleasant, to the ear of listeners is the popcorn bit.
The woodwind, brass, and percussion guest musicians joined the enlarged strings to play Schubert's arguably most famous symphony, the 'Unfinished'. A much loved symphony, it famously contained only 2 movements. The first movement contained one of the most well-known Schubert's melody, the second theme, which was played right after the dark, gloomy opening first theme in the low strings. The cellos are gorgeous here, singing in the beautiful melody, while signalling the tragedy to come in the opening murmuring theme. In general, I like the tempo Richard took in this movement: brisk enough to keep the tension high throughout and delivered the high tension development phase with fierce staccatos, and extreme contrast in dynamics. The tension was so high here that I am thankful when the first movement is over to finally have a breather. This movement to me is a prime example of trademark Schubert, easily transforming a dark gloom moment to a beautiful moment effortlessly, and back again with the same simplicity. Another example of this is the beautiful 2nd movement of Schubert's A major sonata (#20), and the Credo from his G major Mass (#2). In the Credo, Schubert changed the pious mood in the beginning effortlessly to doom tragedy in 4 bars when the choir reaches 'Crucifixus', and transform this gloomy mood into exuberant rejoice in 8 bars in the 'Resurrexit' section. Anyway, I digressed from this concert.
I have to disagree with Murray Black's review on the second movement tempo. I found it to my liking, with plenty of time given to the woodwinds to unfold the lyrical second theme. After the high tension drama in the previous moment, it comforted me so much to listen to the woodwinds playing these lyrical melody. Not saying that the tension has gone, it's still there, lurking around, and yes, Schubert summoned them again in the contrapuntal march-like section soon after. And yet, in the end, it sounded like all is finally well. Brilliant performance from the ACO, definitely first-rate!
After the break, my favourite Brahms' symphony is on the table. Here, I agreed with Murray Black in that there are some issues with the performance in general. While the first movement worked well with brisk tempos, the second and third movements did not. Richard's solo in the second movement made it up a little bit, but the graceful woodwinds melodies are not realised to the their potential in the third movement. The coda of the finale while was brilliant and well-executed, lacked the majestic quality I yearn from this symphony, partly due to the super fast tempos. There were also some minor ensemble issues, the horns were under-pitched in a couple of spots in the finale, but overall the balance was really good. Oh yeah, love the colour the contrabassoon provided in the last movement too. Anyway, despite my usual nitpickings, ACO did one heck of a good job in giving a worthy performance of a Brahms symphony despite the fact that they have not played this symphony before. A major symphony orchestra could easily bore me playing the same symphony by lacking the punch and the energy that ACO delivered.
On a last note, this will be the final time ACO played in Hamer Hall this season as the renovation work of this hall will commence soon. To be honest, I'm a bit worried with ACO performing in the Town Hall as I don't really enjoy its acoustic that much, and its acoustic definitely favours larger ensemble. I'll be glad to be proven wrong.
Saturday, 5 June 2010
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra concert 4 June 2010 - Mozart Magic
Featuring:
- Mozart Cosi fan tutti: Overture
- Mozart Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
- Mendelssohn Capriccio brilliant for Piano and Orchestra
- Haydn Symphony No. 96 'Miracle'
Howard Shelley - Piano/Conductor
First Town Hall Proms this year. And Town Hall Proms = Organ recital by Calvin Bowman. That night he played Sinfonia from Cantata No. 29 Wir danken dir, Gott which turned out to be the arrangement of the famous Preludio from the 3rd Partita for solo violin. Next on the offering was Mendelssohn's Third Organ Sonata in A major, Op. 65. I enjoyed this 2 movements piece very much, the first movement sounded like a majestic Bach chorale, and the second movement more introspective in nature, and calming. Franck's rather lengthy and less interesting piece Chorale No. 3 in A minor closed the recital.
The title of this concert is your usual cheesy marketing programming, "Mozart Magic", and would infer that the night triumph would belong to Mozart's music. Sadly, it's Haydn's music who stole the show for the night.
Mozart's overture to Cosi fan Tutti started the concert, but the MSO was just getting warmed up for the night. While the woodwinds passages are beautifully rendered, the performance in general lacked energy, and the strings sounded muffled. It's a good performance, and yet there's nothing so memorable about it. After this short piece, the members of the orchestra stood up to have the seat arrangements fixed up. A piano is needed for the next piece and this which should have been clear from the program was apparently not so clear after all for a patron sitting behind me which uttered quite loudly, "what? that's it?". Anyway, Howard Shelley came back stage and with the piano positioned so that the audience faces the performer's back, explained the reason of this awkward position and also the glass cover that replaces the piano lid on the piano. To be succinct, the glass is so that he can see the woodwinds section, and help with the clarity and the acoustics of the hall. He also talked a little bit of Mozart's composition which was composed during the same period. He also played some excerpt of Mozart's 19th, 21st, 23rd, and 24th piano concertos.
After all that, he finally started the concerto. MSO was better here, but still lacking punch (for my taste). I always associate the d minor key signature to pieces with high tension. On top of my head, I can name Mozart's Requiem, Mozart's Don Giovanni, Brahms' 1st piano concerto, 2nd movement of Brahms' 2nd piano concerto, Beethoven's 9th Symphony, Mahler's 3rd Symphony, Sibelius' violin concerto, Haydn's Nelson Mass, Bach's Chaconne for solo violin, Schumann's 4th symphony, Rachmaninoff's 3rd piano concerto, Dvorak's 4th and 7th symphonies. All of them are masterpieces which are famous for their high tension. My disappointment is that MSO did not play these high tension passages as tense as they could be played, the string attacks are not furious enough, I might say that they played the music just a bit fierce compared to how they would play a major key classical symphony, where I would have liked VERY FIERCE. Anyway, that's only my problem. The piano playing was fine, I enjoyed the beautiful 2nd movement a lot, although the contrasting episode was rather tame. Howard played Beethoven's cadenza for the 1st movement, as he did for the last movement. I like Howard's phrasings in general, and he did take some liberty in changing some notes in the 2nd movement to my fascination. The piano's clarity was much better this time, maybe because of the fact that it's a brand new concert grand piano just shipped from Hamburg (as told by Howard)?
Mendelssohn's piece was okay, but I couldn't say I enjoyed the performance very much. I enjoyed the arpeggios that started the piece, but from there it all went downhill. There were some passages in the piece that reminded me of one of Mendelssohn's own piano concertos, but I couldn't remember which one.
Finally, some remarkable playing from the orchestra. Howard brought some wits and energy to Haydn symphony which he didn't for the other programs that night. The highlights were a graceful minuet in the 3rd movement with the long oboe solo. The finale was played as marked, 'Vivace assai', the best moment of the night for me, really. And as always, a wise lesson for newcomers to Town Hall Proms: there's always encore after. You can kinda see it when David Thomas (principal clarinet) running back to the stage. I wondered what would happen if the audience didn't really like the performance and the planned encore would not go ahead simply because the applause is not long enough :). Anyway, Howard teased the audience if they would like some romantic music to end the night, and offered Sibelius' Valse Triste, but unfortunately, despite beautiful playing, no one seemed to take Howard's suggestion to waltz to this music in the concert hall.
Next concert: ACO playing 2 of my favourite symphonies: Schubert's Unfinished symphony, and Brahms' majestic 1st symphony.
- Mozart Cosi fan tutti: Overture
- Mozart Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
- Mendelssohn Capriccio brilliant for Piano and Orchestra
- Haydn Symphony No. 96 'Miracle'
Howard Shelley - Piano/Conductor
First Town Hall Proms this year. And Town Hall Proms = Organ recital by Calvin Bowman. That night he played Sinfonia from Cantata No. 29 Wir danken dir, Gott which turned out to be the arrangement of the famous Preludio from the 3rd Partita for solo violin. Next on the offering was Mendelssohn's Third Organ Sonata in A major, Op. 65. I enjoyed this 2 movements piece very much, the first movement sounded like a majestic Bach chorale, and the second movement more introspective in nature, and calming. Franck's rather lengthy and less interesting piece Chorale No. 3 in A minor closed the recital.
The title of this concert is your usual cheesy marketing programming, "Mozart Magic", and would infer that the night triumph would belong to Mozart's music. Sadly, it's Haydn's music who stole the show for the night.
Mozart's overture to Cosi fan Tutti started the concert, but the MSO was just getting warmed up for the night. While the woodwinds passages are beautifully rendered, the performance in general lacked energy, and the strings sounded muffled. It's a good performance, and yet there's nothing so memorable about it. After this short piece, the members of the orchestra stood up to have the seat arrangements fixed up. A piano is needed for the next piece and this which should have been clear from the program was apparently not so clear after all for a patron sitting behind me which uttered quite loudly, "what? that's it?". Anyway, Howard Shelley came back stage and with the piano positioned so that the audience faces the performer's back, explained the reason of this awkward position and also the glass cover that replaces the piano lid on the piano. To be succinct, the glass is so that he can see the woodwinds section, and help with the clarity and the acoustics of the hall. He also talked a little bit of Mozart's composition which was composed during the same period. He also played some excerpt of Mozart's 19th, 21st, 23rd, and 24th piano concertos.
After all that, he finally started the concerto. MSO was better here, but still lacking punch (for my taste). I always associate the d minor key signature to pieces with high tension. On top of my head, I can name Mozart's Requiem, Mozart's Don Giovanni, Brahms' 1st piano concerto, 2nd movement of Brahms' 2nd piano concerto, Beethoven's 9th Symphony, Mahler's 3rd Symphony, Sibelius' violin concerto, Haydn's Nelson Mass, Bach's Chaconne for solo violin, Schumann's 4th symphony, Rachmaninoff's 3rd piano concerto, Dvorak's 4th and 7th symphonies. All of them are masterpieces which are famous for their high tension. My disappointment is that MSO did not play these high tension passages as tense as they could be played, the string attacks are not furious enough, I might say that they played the music just a bit fierce compared to how they would play a major key classical symphony, where I would have liked VERY FIERCE. Anyway, that's only my problem. The piano playing was fine, I enjoyed the beautiful 2nd movement a lot, although the contrasting episode was rather tame. Howard played Beethoven's cadenza for the 1st movement, as he did for the last movement. I like Howard's phrasings in general, and he did take some liberty in changing some notes in the 2nd movement to my fascination. The piano's clarity was much better this time, maybe because of the fact that it's a brand new concert grand piano just shipped from Hamburg (as told by Howard)?
Mendelssohn's piece was okay, but I couldn't say I enjoyed the performance very much. I enjoyed the arpeggios that started the piece, but from there it all went downhill. There were some passages in the piece that reminded me of one of Mendelssohn's own piano concertos, but I couldn't remember which one.
Finally, some remarkable playing from the orchestra. Howard brought some wits and energy to Haydn symphony which he didn't for the other programs that night. The highlights were a graceful minuet in the 3rd movement with the long oboe solo. The finale was played as marked, 'Vivace assai', the best moment of the night for me, really. And as always, a wise lesson for newcomers to Town Hall Proms: there's always encore after. You can kinda see it when David Thomas (principal clarinet) running back to the stage. I wondered what would happen if the audience didn't really like the performance and the planned encore would not go ahead simply because the applause is not long enough :). Anyway, Howard teased the audience if they would like some romantic music to end the night, and offered Sibelius' Valse Triste, but unfortunately, despite beautiful playing, no one seemed to take Howard's suggestion to waltz to this music in the concert hall.
Next concert: ACO playing 2 of my favourite symphonies: Schubert's Unfinished symphony, and Brahms' majestic 1st symphony.
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