Afternoon Concert - general thread

[jayne lee wilson]

I enjoyed the first minute or two but it became increasingly dull and to my ears at odds with the organ original. Try Lionel Rogg or Christopher Herrick both on superb Metzler organs which bring this piece to full vibrant life.

But this misses the whole creative point of what Holland Baroque are about. The Bach piece is just the starting point for a fresh musical creation, just as in the Steenbrinks' adaptations and improvisations on their marvellous Silk Baroque Album I referred to, where their take on Telemann, Rameau, Vivaldi etc is of a startling beauty of texture, melodic improvisation and often very lively rhythmic ingenuity. None of these are supposed to be "faithful" to the originals, and are - of course - far truer to the genuine Baroque Musical Spirit of endless improvisation, recomposition and adaptation as a result.
But with the BWV582, they were going for a serene slow-dance effect, as I said like a gracious adumbration of the Sarabande, but full of light and lift, reminiscent of the famous Jesu Bleibet from Cantata 147.

Listening again now, I can only admire Tineke Steenbrink's instrumentation, restrained compared to some of the extravagant Silk Baroque collaborations, but of a lovely lucid transparency and delicacy, judging well the moment to release the full weight of the band, and allowing the winds to sing out the theme more boldly as we progress (reminding me a little of Haydn's Lamentations Symphony). So I'm baffled why anyone should describe these sounds as "dull" let alone "mannered" (a word upon which a critical moratorium should surely have been declared long ago). I only hope they record more Bach - perhaps get the sheng-meister back in to sharpen the profile...

If only you could all hear their take on Rameau's gorgeous Tristes Apprêts, (complete with Wu Wei's contributions on the Sheng) that might offer you some insight into Holland Baroque's creative aims..... even if you finally decide that it isn't for you.

(I'll always find it hard to resist an album with a track entitled "Polonois Chinois (after G.P Telemann...)".....a title which does seem very echt-Telemann...)

[gradus]

Well your explanation helps me to understand the purpose behind the arrangement/recomposition but I suppose I find it difficult to reconcile what I heard with what I experience from the original.

[Frances_iom]

what's happening today with afternoon concert ? - seems to have no resemblance to the sequence of items in the online schedule.

[oddoneout]

what's happening today with afternoon concert ? - seems to have no resemblance to the sequence of items in the online schedule.

Welcome to the "new improved" (not) AC. I have grumbled about this several times on the forum and complained to the Beeb. I see that on today's schedule summary they've missed out the cop-out word "Including", which means that those pieces mentioned will appear, probably in the order listed (for a while there was a phase of not even broadcasting in the order listed...), but that they will be interspersed with a random selection of other pieces, some of which might have been from an original properly constructed concert, but which have been extracted, put in a hat, and then broadcast in the order they are pulled from said hat.
There are two major negatives as far as I'm concerned, one being not knowing what will be played, and only having a single time indication to help with keeping track of whatever you might have been hoping to listen to. Given that this is recorded material and they know what is going to be played, why no playlist - I can manage without timings if I know what pieces are going to appear.
The other which has become increasingly tiresome to my ears is that the sequence of music doesn't have any cohesion or sense and sometimes makes for very uncomfortable segues which detract from the piece just heard and that which follows. Since the material used is often complete concerts it makes no sense to cut and paste as they now do, and frankly seems rather arrogant - implying that the original programme was not satisfactory.
I assume there will be more Jordi Savall related music during the programme as 15 mins at 3pm seems rather inadequate for a featured performer.

[gurnemanz]

Re random order and lack of cohesion:
Last Friday's concoction included two items of a concert from last summer's Rheingau Festival, a fine performance of the Sibelius Violin Concerto from Augustin Hadelich and Mendelssohn' Fingal's Cave, but interspersed among diverse other items. The other work, Mendelssohn Reformation Symphony had been played on Tuesday.

Why not let us hear the concert a) as it was conceived and b) all together in the very specific acoustic of the Kloster Eberbach where the concert took place?
.

[edashtav]

A warm welcome for this Friday’s (19.11) performance of Schumann’s #4 Symphony in D minor with Alan Gilbert , the newly appointed Chief Conductor of the NDR Elbphilharmoniev Orchestra, recorded live on tour in Wismar during the Stecklenburg Pomeranian Festival. This performance was terrific, every phrase was shaped and neither the musical line nor its direction was allowed to lapse. I remember Alan Gilbert making a strong case for Schumann’s 2nd Symphony when he was with the NYPO. His profound understanding of this composer is, I fear, too rare and, thus, I cherished this great interpretation of the 4th all the more.
Do please catch up with this marvellous performance on BBC SOUNDS.

[gradus]

Not another performance of La Valse - well actually yes but an extraordinary one in this afternoon's concert by the Royal Danish Orchestra under Vasily Petrenko. The closing pages took off like no other performance I've ever heard and the piece sounded as unhinged as Ravel surely intended. A keeper I think.

[Nick Armstrong]

Not another performance of La Valse - well actually yes but an extraordinary one in this afternoon's concert by the Royal Danish Orchestra under Vasily Petrenko. The closing pages took off like no other performance I've ever heard and the piece sounded as unhinged as Ravel surely intended. A keeper I think.

Agreed! And the same forces’ Rachmaninov PC#3 with Kirill Gerstein was a cracker too, later the same afternoon

[oddoneout]

On Monday 6 items were listed on the schedule prior to broadcast. In the event 14 pieces were played, and one of the items on the summary list was not played (Hildegard von Bingen - a cut and paste mistake from Hannah French's current Breakfast feature?) and two of the items were fillets from longer works.
This seems to be the current format - larger works, listed ahead of broadcast (sometimes with approx timings), with random non-listed smaller bits infilling. Now I realise that that format makes it easy to insert the adverts and waffle(getting ever more evident/obtrusive), but I still don't see why that precludes listing them ahead of broadcast. Why should Imogen Holst's Leiston Suite be something happened on by accident? It's not as if they don't know it's in the programme or that they have no idea where it is in the running order.
One bit of serendipity ( for me) was two violin items - James Oswald leading on to Bela Bartok.

I've just noticed it was 3 not 2 filleted pieces...

[Cockney Sparrow]

On Monday 6 items were listed on the schedule prior to broadcast. In the event 14 pieces were played, and one of the items on the summary list was not played (Hildegard von Bingen - a cut and paste mistake from Hannah French's current Breakfast feature?) and two of the items were fillets from longer works.......

I admire your persistence in noting this and setting down the deficiencies. I can't say that Afternoon Concert is inveterate listening for me - depends what I'm doing. I'd be tempted to give up on it as a bad job - sort of Classic FM scenario - piece is here at the moment, gone in 10 minutes (likely as not) with no chance of noting what the music was or finding out - + adverts - only here relentless and repetitious self-promotion. Rather like the morning schedule although I should be cautious in my comparison - I haven't listened to that (except Martin Handley) for a good while.

Its a while since I worked in a bureaucracy but I suspect it might be due to relentless cost cutting - so the text on the website is just seen as data entry and its done (as is apparent) by anyone who can type and cut and paste, regardless of their awareness of radio 3 content. That said, the information must surely come from some list generated by the production team which is why I suspect the work is done by some 21st century equivalent of a typing pool - except without the skill levels and "mind engaged" approach of the best of the typists who used to work in them*. Management these days is interested in delivering the savings, and any deficiencies are part of "managed risk" - meaning if there is enough challenge and criticism they'll maybe put more resource into it; otherwise they've got away with it and it becomes the new acceptable standard.

Cost cutting comes in the wrong place - I find myself thinking along the lines of the convinced anti-BBC faction in that they really need to get rid of the layers of overpaid senior and executive management and spend the money where it matters. My experience (and my reading of Private Eye) suggest the first priority of the executive elite is to preserve their empires, the layers of management on the organisation chart and the group of "people like us". I'll leave it there, I'm beginning to sound to mysef like a UKIP'er. I've never begrudged the licence fee but this poverty of delivery is beginning to make me wonder.

* And just to say - an irrelevant piece of info. - Mrs Mills had to be persuaded to give up her job as a superintendant of typists even though she had sold hundreds of thousands of records...... (Mrs Mills? - you might say - well,its my Cockney Roots, innit?)

[Ein Heldenleben]

On Monday 6 items were listed on the schedule prior to broadcast. In the event 14 pieces were played, and one of the items on the summary list was not played (Hildegard von Bingen - a cut and paste mistake from Hannah French's current Breakfast feature?) and two of the items were fillets from longer works.
This seems to be the current format - larger works, listed ahead of broadcast (sometimes with approx timings), with random non-listed smaller bits infilling. Now I realise that that format makes it easy to insert the adverts and waffle(getting ever more evident/obtrusive), but I still don't see why that precludes listing them ahead of broadcast. Why should Imogen Holst's Leiston Suite be something happened on by accident? It's not as if they don't know it's in the programme or that they have no idea where it is in the running order.
One bit of serendipity ( for me) was two violin items - James Oswald leading on to Bela Bartok.

I've just noticed it was 3 not 2 filleted pieces...

Have you thought about writing in and enquiring as to why there are so many unlisted pieces . My guess is that the biliings are written before they have had time to do final timings and these pieces are then inserted to make up time. I don’t have any inside knowledge of what’s happening on Radio 3 but I do know that working from home and covid absence is making a lot of the detail work in and around broadcasting and media production cumbersome and prone to error. I also suspect that there’s been a huge fall off in the amount of recorded music being produced (again through covid restrictions) and these Afternoon concerts are being slightly “cobbled together.”

[oddoneout]

Have you thought about writing in and enquiring as to why there are so many unlisted pieces . My guess is that the biliings are written before they have had time to do final timings and these pieces are then inserted to make up time. I don’t have any inside knowledge of what’s happening on Radio 3 but I do know that working from home and covid absence is making a lot of the detail work in and around broadcasting and media production cumbersome and prone to error. I also suspect that there’s been a huge fall off in the amount of recorded music being produced (again through covid restrictions) and these Afternoon concerts are being slightly “cobbled together.”

It's on my to-do list, as emails have got nowhere and I think are now not even read.

[Ein Heldenleben]

It's on my to-do list, as emails have got nowhere and I think are now not even read.

I would be surprised if you don’t get a reply even if it’s a standard reply . Broadcasters get more complaints about unannounced schedule changes than anything else. Though technically this isn’t a schedule change but a re-ordering within a magazine programme.

[Cockney Sparrow]

It's on my to-do list, as emails have got nowhere and I think are now not even read.

An email isn't a complaint - there is a process for complaints, so that would be the next step. I'm sure you know, you get an acknowledgement and then a polite email explaining why the BBC doesn't need to agree with whichever complaint you made.

I think the next step is to complain to OFCOM, but I'd need to check the process as I've never gone that far. Even egregious breaches of the BBC's obligations (I understand) aren't taken up by OFGEM because (I also understand) basically they aren't interested..........

[french frank]

I think the next step is to complain to OFCOM, but I'd need to check the process as I've never gone that far.

I have. They denied all responsibility for regulating that particular area of complaint (I've forgotten what it was). In truth it's difficult to pin down the essentials of Radio 3's remit, and it becomes ever more difficult as fewer people value what has been lost.

As the BBC focuses on pursuing its own interest with its programmes, gradually people become first inured to them and then postively to appreciate them.