Halle / Elder / Shostakovich 5th

[DracoM]

THAT'S how you play the Fifth!!
What a fantastic performance!!

That third movement alone!!!

[Andrew Slater]

Yes, it was rather good, but I had to leave after the second movt to catch a train.

The pre-concert talk was fascinating, showing links to Bizet's Carmen, which I don't think Mark Elder mentioned in his intros.

How was the finale? ME made a case for it being defiant as against the hollow victoriousness which is how it's usually played.

That's enough typing on this phone

[DracoM]

Yes, Andrew, NOT a rumbustious 'up yours' at all, but measured and building to a statement of 'this is where I stand.'
Some wonderful woodwind playing and strings, and as ppp a ppp as I've heard any orchestra play for some time.
But that third movement - slow, articulate, finely shaped....you must get it on iPlayer. As good as I have ever heard, and that's where the moral, emotive core of the perf was for me.

A truly moving performance and as you say, the pre-perf talk was quiet, pointed, less-is-more of the best kind.

[AjAjAjH]

A brilliant concert all round. I know some on these message boards dislike Mark Elder's 'talkettes'. Tonight's were so well done. I wonder what he can tell us about the symphony next time he schedules it. The last time it was about the number of references to Bizet's 'Carmen' in the score because at the time he composed it Shostakovich was in love with the leading 'Carmen' of his day. The Halle's Thursday series of concerts go from strength to strength. I'm just so glad that I have my season ticket.

[BBMmk2]

What other works were on?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

What other works were on?

All-Dmitri, Bbm:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09mj883

[BBMmk2]

All-Dmitri, Bbm:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09mj883

Fabulous, Ferney! Looking forward to this!

[Bryn]

All-Dmitri, Bbm:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09mj883

Must also catch up (very early night last night). Good to see Elder revisiting the link between the Pushkin songs and the Fifth, as highlighted by Gerard McBurney, with the Pushkin songs being included on the CBSO/Elder Hypothetically Murdered CD:

[BBMmk2]

A brilliant concert all round. I know some on these message boards dislike Mark Elder's 'talkettes'. Tonight's were so well done. I wonder what he can tell us about the symphony next time he schedules it. The last time it was about the number of references to Bizet's 'Carmen' in the score because at the time he composed it Shostakovich was in love with the leading 'Carmen' of his day. The Halle's Thursday series of concerts go from strength to strength. I'm just so glad that I have my season ticket.

I quite enjoyed these concerts. I also enjoy the talkettes as well. Very informative indeed. I wouldn’t have known otherwise about why Shostakovich included these in his works. We may know these works very well, but behind alll the ink that’s been put down, the reason why?

[Barbirollians]

I quite enjoyed these concerts. I also enjoy the talkettes as well. Very informative indeed. I wouldn’t have known otherwise about why Shostakovich included these in his works. We may know these works very well, but behind alll the ink that’s been put down, the reason why?

Sheffield got Alisa Weilerstein playing the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No 1 regrettably the blue rinse audience found this a too difficult piece despite her outstanding playing and did not clap loudly or long enough for us to get the encore she played in Manchester .

The second half was an admittedly outstanding performance of Mussorgsky’s Pictures in the Ravel orchestration . That sent the audience wild and led to a level of applause that the Shostakovich deserved .

Good to hear Delius’s Paris open the concert too in a splendid atmospheric performance .

[BBMmk2]

Sheffield got Alisa Weilerstein playing the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No 1 regrettably the blue rinse audience found this a too difficult piece despite her outstanding playing and did not clap loudly or long enough for us to get the encore she played in Manchester .

The second half was an admittedly outstanding performance of Mussorgsky’s Pictures in the Ravel orchestration . That sent the audience wild and led to a level of applause that the Shostakovich deserved .

Good to hear Delius’s Paris open the concert too in a splendid atmospheric performance .

I really enjoyed the performance of the cello concerto. it's a work by Dmitri all too often ignored, imo.

[bluestateprommer]

Robert Beale at The Arts Desk shares the general enthusiasm for this Halle / DSCH concert:

http://www.theartsdesk.com/classical-music/weilerstein-platt-hall%C3%A9-elder-bridgewater-hall-manchester-review-insight-and-passion

RB noted the link from the beginning to the end:

'Sir Mark, having presided over a "Beyond the Score" evening on Shostakovich’s Fourth Symphony in October, was this time keen to illuminate the path that led to the Fifth, the so-called "Soviet artist’s reply to just criticism". The orchestra, with bass James Platt, began the concert with the composer’s Four Romances on Poems by Pushkin (originally written with piano accompaniment: three were later orchestrated by Shostakovich himself and the set completed by Gerard McBurney). The connection is an almost unassuming passage for violins and harp, in the first song – which is about an artist and his work surviving attack – which pops up in the finale of the symphony.'