Andreas Scholl live at Wigmore Hall: Monday 17th

[Mary Chambers]

Ah - I've discovered that the Britten Greensleeves arrangement, which I didn't know and wasn't very impressed by, was published posthumously. It was written in about 1940 or 1941, but Britten obviously didn't like it enough to publish it in his folk song collections. I found a clip on YouTube of a performance by Ian Bostridge with Julius Drake, in which the piano part sounds a lot better.

[Stanley Stewart]

I do hope somebody here writes something thoughtful and in a bit of depth about the performance of the Randy Newman song.

if not I will try......

( heard the first half of the concert, and you certainly can't fault the attempt to do something interesting, at least.....)

I've just listened to the Randy Newman Songbook, Vol 1, on the Nonesuch label. Newman's compassion shines through a prism of despair and rejection. In Germany Before the War, specifically 1934, A man in Dusseldorf - wasn't this also the location for Fritz Lang's "M" some years earlier? - a man makes his way,

'And every day at five-o-nine
He'd cross the park down to the Rhine
And he'd sit there by the shore.

I'm looking at the river
But I'm thinking of the sea
I'm looking at the river
But I'm thinking of the sea...'

as he muses on his need to be there and the conclusion is unsettling. He brings the same jaundiced sense of despair to an earlier song, The Great Nations of Europe, as new settlers arrive in a new world bringing little but disease and prejudice in their wake.

'...The Grand Canary Islands
First land to which they came
They slaughtered all the canaries there
Which gave the land its name
There were natives there called Guanches
Guanches by the score
Bullets, disease, the Portugese, and
and they weren't there anymore
Now they're gone, they're gone, they're really
gone
You've never seen anyone so gone
They're a picture in a museum
Some lines written in a book
But you won't find a live one no matter where you look...'

Newman probes without sentiment and a sense of emotional truth which stirs the imagination.

[Pianorak]

I'm not really very keen on counter-tenors, but starting off as a Baritone, as he did, was quite clever - because it had me first puzzled and then hooked - and I stayed the course. The whole programme was just superb.

[teamsaint]

I wonder what people made of the programming of the Randy Newman song?

It’s a truly extraordinary song, painfully moving, in fact one of the most moving songs that I know. It isn’t difficult to shock with material such as this, but it must be very difficult indeed, to present sensitively.
But I have worries. If I was a singer, this is a song I would be longing to sing, and perhaps bring to an audience that didn’t know it. That said, I honestly don’t think I would be able to programme it, because I don’t know how or where you would do that appropriately, or how it could be performed in an appropriate manner. It is hard enough to listen to, and certainly I find it is one of those pieces where, once heard, music stops, for a while.

I don’t wish to cast aspersions about Andreas Scholl’s motives, but my overpowering feeling is that in being presented with the song , I feel pushed towards what feels like an unseemly voyeurism. Now that may be irrational, and Randy Newman may be very happy that is work is being brought to new and different audiences. I suppose there is the matter of interpretation of the lyrics, and others have suggested that there are political sub texts, but for all that, it just feels too intrusive, too painful, and too unnecessary. Artists need to confront difficult ideas, situations, emotions, but does this particular song and subject matter benefit from this kind of concert hall treatment?
Perhaps mine is an unduly sensitive and irrational (over)reaction . I would love to know what others think.For me, this is a song for the writer alone to sing, until somebody else is needed to continue his tradition.

Edit: FWIW , I though the performance was ok, didn't add to Newman's own versions, but really didn't bring out the awful nature of the unfolding story. Perhaps he was down playing it.

[Padraig]

Edit: FWIW , I though the performance was ok, didn't add to Newman's own versions, but really didn't bring out the awful nature of the unfolding story. Perhaps he was down playing it.

I enjoyed your piece, teamsaint, and I am inclined to agree with your conclusion. I feel that the dual vocal treatment was inappropriate. If you believe that the song is a powerful statement about a time and place, then it is also a challenge for a singer to convince an audience of its integrity as art, and for that reason I think it was right, and brave, for the performer to choose it. Randy Newman is notoriously oblique and contrary, and his style of delivery would be difficult to equal, even more so when genres are crossed. I wonder if any other classical artist has attempted this song.

[Mary Chambers]

I didn't know the song, and all I know about Randy Newman is the name - though when I googled I found I knew of some of his songs. Perhaps because I had nothing to compare it with, I was quite happy with Scholl's interpretation of it. I'll probably listen to the repeat on Sunday and see what I think then.

I gather there is a certain amount of discussion and disagreement on the subject of what the song is 'about'.

Edited to say that hearing Scholl sing this song immediately took me back to hearing Thomas Allen, years ago, sing Alex Glasgow's Close the Coalhouse Door. I hadn't known that song previously, either, and it was both riveting and terrifying.

[gurnemanz]

Thanks for the reminder. I was out yesterday and missed it. I generally tend to like these imaginative, mixed-content recitals. I've just listened again and really enjoyed it.

[Lento]

I felt that his baritone was rather undistinguished by comparison with his "usual" voice, and I wasn't at all sure about his idea of juxtaposing anyway. I agree there was some rather off-putting pronunciation.

[Richard Tarleton]

What? Actually I didn't know the Greensleeves one, and didn't like it much at first hearing. I love the others, and have a particularly soft spot for The Ash Grove, especially the blackbird.

I remember in the '60s and '70s there was a bit of an outcry from 'genuine' folk singers of the more traditional kind about the Britten settings. Far too arty and not earthy enough.

Indeed - pace Jean, one of my very favourite Britten settings. Just caught up with this recital. Wasn't keen on the Greensleeves, Scholl's pronunciation at its oddest in "Sally Gardens", liked the Queen Jane. I had to google the Randy Newman song to see what it was about though the image of the reflection in the glasses a joltingly strong clue. I stuck with it until the end of the Ash Grove, but...his baritone nothing special, obviously, and I'll just have to stop listening to counter-tenors.

Spoken typo from SMP at the start - Scholl's voice "piecingly" clear, obviously reading out her notes.

[Despina dello Stagno]

What?I remember in the '60s and '70s there was a bit of an outcry from 'genuine' folk singers of the more traditional kind about the Britten settings. Far too arty and not earthy enough.

I agree. I find the Britten settings too "arty": they fall into the same trap as do the Haydn and Beethoven arrangements, written by rote and the ream, and with little understanding of the genre.
But it is a mistake to demand that folksong should necessarily be "earthy". Two more memorable (IM'UO) examples of simple yet effective++ renditions in this genre would be Bathsheba Everdene http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuHlMn1scAI or this, from an unlikely source http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNRjPBc9rbQ

[Mary Chambers]

I find most of the Britten settings beautiful, and I don't care myself whether they are authentic or not. There's no reason why they should be. I'm always quoting Graham Johnson in this context. He called them 'liederisations'. It may be a clumsy word, but it's an apt description of what Britten did.

They were also simply practical - useful items to round off a programme and delight the audience.

[teamsaint]

I find most of the Britten settings beautiful, and I don't care myself whether they are authentic or not. There's no reason why they should be. I'm always quoting Graham Johnson in this context. He called them 'liederisations'. It may be a clumsy word, but it's an apt description of what Britten did.

They were also simply practical - useful items to round off a programme and delight the audience.

I don't know the Britten settings really , but surely a major feature of folk music is to keep the tradition alive and vibrant, in whatever ways work for certain audiences?

Britains currently most successful folk act Bellowhead aren't really "authentic" in any way, but they are bringing new audiences to the tradition in a way that seems to work.

Time I investigated the Britten settings....

[Richard Tarleton]

I agree. I find the Britten settings too "arty": they fall into the same trap as do the Haydn and Beethoven arrangements, written by rote and the ream, and with little understanding of the genre.

I wonder if there's some category confusion here: the words, the tunes are those of folk songs - they are folk songs - but Britten's arrangements turn them into something more akin to art songs with, in particular, the accompaniment being raised to a new level, becoming an equal partner as it is in a German lied. The blackbird in The Ash Grove is an excellent example of the elevated status of the accompaniment.

I remember an earnest discussion, I think on BBC2 many years ago, during which they compared Anthony Rolfe-Johnson's rendition of (Britten's) O Waly Waly with an unaccompanied version by a lady folk singer - they decided the latter was better, of course, more real, earthy, etc..Which was rather to miss the point, I thought. Both were equally valid treatments of the source material.

As to "written by rote and by ream", I can't think of anything less applicable to Britten's settings, which invariably involve a deeply personal and individual response by the composer to the words of each song. I find Britten's settings, and Pears and Britten's performances of (for example) Oft in the stilly night (words by Thomas Moore to a "Scotch" [sic] Air), Tom Bowling and Ca' the Yowes, all quite beautiful in their various ways.

The most recent version of O Waly Waly to stray into my collection is by Arianna Savall (daughter of Jordi) and friends. Different again.

But it is a mistake to demand that folksong should necessarily be "earthy".

Quite.

teamsaint - if it's still available, there's a collection by Pears and Britten on London 430 063-2. I used to have an LP by Robert Tear, which was also outstanding.

[Despina dello Stagno]

As to "written by rote and by ream", I can't think of anything less applicable to Britten's settings

Yes, sorry: collateral damage. I didn't mean to include Britten in this particular charge. Personally, I find the Britten well-intentioned but unconvincing (like the Purcell brothers' forays into "Scotch songs" before him). The true target was the vile Beethoven arrangements of similar Scotch and Thomas Moore material.

[Richard Tarleton]

That's OK then! I don't know the Beethoven arrangements, I now know to avoid them!

Not all Britten's arrangements work for me by any means - his "Last Rose" (Moore again) doesn't work, IMV.