Boulez 100

[gurnemanz]

... in fact his brother Gerard McBurney

Oops. Thanks for correction.

[oliver sudden]

Some interesting Boulez reminiscences from Simon McBurney on Private Passions. He visited him near the end of his life when he was an invalid, nearly blind and his memory was confused. McBurney found one crossed-thread utterance distressing, yet beautiful, whereby Boulez suddenly smiled and recalled with delight a two piano piece called Structures which Stravinsky
had written for him and Yvonne Loriod during the war. Structures is a work by Boulez himself.

Thanks for the heads-up. Not much actual Boulez in the programme but what there was was definitely worth hearing.

[oliver sudden]

Some more from McBurney:

In 2007 (I think) he came to Chicago to conduct a Mahler symphony. The performance was astonishing, brutal and dramatic, Mahler the modernist. After the performance my wife and I rushed backstage to congratulate him. We were the first visitors. My wife shook his hand and said: “That was wonderful! Such darkness, sensuality and violence!”

Pierre laughed gleefully, like a teenager: “Aha! I adore that! I like to do in music what I do not do in my life!”

[Barbirollians]

Very good point re Marteau.

Re composer’s bedrooms . I did find interesting (in a non prurient way) that Pears and Britten had separate bedrooms and ,more crucially , had separate Steinways. Both are key to a successful long term relationship perhaps - or at the least the possibility . But I what found really interesting was that Britten had a photo of Frank Bridge by his bed. I even asked whether it was placed there by the staff . No it had been there for years - clearly the debt Britten owed to his teacher and mentor was immense.

Separate bedrooms for gay couples before 1967 was a form of protection from prosecution.