R3 in Concert one-stop shop

[oddoneout]

Kirill Gerstein seems to be keeping Radio 3 on air at the moment with the concerts tonight , last night and this pm . The range , musicianship and virtuosity is worthy of the R3 equivalent of the Legion d’honneur . The amount of practice time he must have put in . Does he never sleep ?

More this afternoon as well. It seems that the BBC have taken full advantage of his LSO St Lukes residency?

[HighlandDougie]

Well I saw him on Sunday night in Lyon where he was in fine form - magisterial in Brahms PC 1 and pretty dazzling in his encore of a Chopin Waltz. He has been on tour with the Budapest FO, except for Saturday night in Paris when Andras Schiff subbed for him, when I assume KG may have been in London? Anyway, a busy man - now in or en route to the States

[LMcD]

Double delight for Sibelius fans in tonight's concert with the Halle (recorded 6 days ago) - the 7th and 5th symphonies, plus pieces by Ades and Rautavaara.

[smittims]

I enjoyed the Haydn 'Gypsy' trio in Tuesday's R3 in Concert. Famous for the old Cortot/Thibaud/Casals recording it's not often broadcast live. It was interesting to hear the Bartok songs too, as they are among the neglected parts of his output, though to my ears the singer on this occasion was no match for Vilma Medgyaszay and Maria Basilides on the old 78s with Bartok at the piano.

[bluestateprommer]

Caught the Ulster Orchestra's concert relay of Lutosławski, DSCH and Rimsky-Korsakov just before the deadline, with Anna Sułkowska-Migoń on the podium, and Barry Douglas as pianist in DSCH's Piano Concerto No. 1 (Niall Keatley taking the solo trumpet). Generally a good, solid concert, with the Lutosławski as novelty listening for me, as I'd never heard it before, and thus the freshest discovery. One slight slip from NK in the last movement of the DSCH, and a few odd tempo stretches from Ioana Petcu-Colan in the storyteller driver's seat in Scheherazade, but those are minor points.

I'd remembered a fine Philadelphia Orchestra radiocast from Anna Sułkowska-Migoń earlier this year, which was another reason to give this UO concert a listen. As well, with the principal conductor post of the Ulster Orchestra now open, in principle, every guest conductor of the UO is a candidate for the podium job there. No idea if this concert increased AS-M's stock there, though.

Also worth noting was that this concert introduced a new presenter name to me, Kathy Clugston, although she's probably a familiar name to you folks there.

[vinteuil]

... this concert introduced a new presenter name to me, Kathy Clugston, although she's probably a familiar name to you folks there.

I think she has an excellent radio voice -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Clugston

My brother likes the voice so much he has it on his sat-nav system....


.

[LMcD]

I think she has an excellent radio voice -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathy_Clugston

My brother likes the voice so much he has it on his sat-nav system....


.

KC is now a regular host on Radio 4 Extra.

[bluestateprommer]

Heard the LSO/SSR concert yesterday more or less in real time:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0026wt1

The 'more or less' is that I didn't click until the M-AT was just about to start, so that I listened, with a later rewind, in the order: M-AT, RVW, Tippett. The Turnage was the obvious novelty, and based on just one hearing, it sort of sounded like the same old that I vaguely remember hearing from other M-AT works on R3 before. To be fair, I should give it one more listen down the line. And even if my opinion doesn't change, at least the LSO and SSR, and John Scofield, are commissioning new work, at the very least.

I got the sense that SSR was trying to keep overt sentimentality, or visions of a pristine countryside, in check with his reading of RVW 5, with some comparatively "full speed ahead" tempi in the first movement in particular. I don't remember exactly how his summer Proms 2020 reading in the virtually empty RAH sounded by comparison, though, so maybe it was similar to that. I hope one day to hear RVW 5 live, but that probably won't happen. Fine opener (or closer here) with the Tippett.

This program is one that would be nearly impossible to pull off in the USA. But SSR can sell it out with the LSO. So there we are.

[smittims]

You made me think when I had heard VW5 live, as I've never been a frequent concert-goer. But there were two memorable occasions:

Halle, Barbirolli, Free Trade Hall 1968 . The other works in the programme were Schubert 5 and Sibelius 5.

Gloucester Festival 1971, The BBC Training Orchestra, conductor forgotten. Iona Brown played the Mendelssohn concerto. It was lovely to these two works in the cathedral in an afternoon concet,the sun casting coloured images on the stone floor from the stained-glass windows. .

[silvestrione]

I've heard VW5 twice now, once in RFH as part of Rattle's 'Towards the Millenium' series with the CBSO, where I was disappointed with a cool, rather detached account, and once last Sunday week, at the Barbican, Rattle/LSO, the concert that was on the radio here on Monday. That, I thought, was sublime. A marvellous balance of symphonic structure, argument, with intense feeling. I noted that Fiona Maddocks in the Observer said something like, how can you not come out of a performance like this of this work without being changed. Yes indeed.

I've listened to the Tippett a few times now, and marvelled at it, though I do prefer the original context in the opera, i.e. the last 'dance' with vocal soloists and chorus.

[duncan]

Tonight's In Concert is structured around Kaija Saariaho's final work Hush, a trumpet concerto composed when she knew she was dying of a brain tumour. I attended the concert last Friday and enjoyed it very much.

It's hard to know what I would have made of Hush coming to it blind, as it were, but with the back story it was rather moving. Possibly the first time I have heard a piece that intentionally references the noises of an MRI scanner (I can think of some that sound like one unintentionally!). I'm a fan of 1970s Miles Davis at his most confrontational and there were hints of this in the trumpet part which probably helped it for me.

The three other works could all be listened to as commentaries on mortality and the whole programme worked extremely well in my view, a concert planned to showcase the new piece rather than hide it amongst easier listening.

The Times liked it too.

[edashtav]

You made me think when I had heard VW5 live, as I've never been a frequent concert-goer. But there were two memorable occasions:

Halle, Barbirolli, Free Trade Hall 1968 . The other works in the programme were Schubert 5 and Sibelius 5.

Gloucester Festival 1971, The BBC Training Orchestra, conductor forgotten. Iona Brown played the Mendelssohn concerto. It was lovely to these two works in the cathedral in an afternoon concet,the sun casting coloured images on the stone floor from the stained-glass windows. .

I encountered RVW#5 lovingly played and wonderfully conducted by Sir John when the Hallé were on tour in the Winter Gardens, Bournemouth. I think JB’s wife starred in the first half of the concert in a Oboe Concerto created from baroque scraps by Sir John.