Critics.....good guys or not ??

[salymap]

My dad took the Telegraph when I was young and I soon discovered the very good music critics they had in the 40s to 60s. Dyneley Hussey, Alec Robertson and [wild guess at spelling] Ferrucio Bonavia.
Why do I remember those names, they must have made an impression on me? Does anyone remember them?

Just looked up FB and he also played in the Halle orchestra. Alec Roberton presented the BBC Music Magazine.

[Richard Tarleton]

Just before my time but I remember Peter Stadlen in the 60's-'70s in the Daily Telegraph

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

My dad took the Telegraph when I was young and I soon discovered the very good music critics they had in the 40s to 60s. Dyneley Hussey, Alec Robertson and [wild guess at spelling] Ferrucio Bonavia.
Why do I remember those names, they must have made an impression on me? Does anyone remember them?

Dyneley Hussey and Ferrucio Bonavia were significant contributors to the series of Penguin Scores.

[Mandryka]

I have some old copies of Records And Recording, from 1969: all the big guns wrote for that one....including Richard Osborne (who was only in his 20s, but even then conjured the mental image of an emaciated old sage) and Thomas Heinitz, who doubled as a stereo salesman.

The majority of critics are well-intentioned, I feel, but a noisy minority are only there to crack cheap gags and sneer.

The standard of criticism does seem to have plunged with the advent of the soundbite age: to digress from music criticism briefly, there was once a theatre critic called Helen Dawson (she later married John Osborne), who could give you an honest appraisal of a production, even if she hadn't liked it. You don't seem to get people like that nowadays.

I've noticed that Lorin Maazel rarely gets good reviews in the UK: presumably this is because he is a) American, b) a multi-millionaire, c) possibly somewhat right-wing, and d) very clever. Tall poppy syndrome indeed.

[makropulos]

"I've noticed that Lorin Maazel rarely gets good reviews in the UK: presumably this is because he is a) American, b) a multi-millionaire, c) possibly somewhat right-wing, and d) very clever. Tall poppy syndrome indeed."

Actually as someone who has written a few unenthusiastic reviews of Maazel (and a few enthusiastic ones too) I can only say that this is, with respect, nonsense. Maazel is a conductor whose music making can be extraordinarily unsympathetic (to my ears), and occasionally he produces something excellent - none of this has anything whatever to do with nationality, wealth, politics or IQ - it has to do with the music.

[Mahlerei]

makropulos

Yes, that is just mischief-making. And I'd also agree that Maazel is capable of some fine performances; a pity there aren't more of them.

[Mandryka]

makropulos

Yes, that is just mischief-making. And I'd also agree that Maazel is capable of some fine performances; a pity there aren't more of them.

As per usual, the mischief-making is yours. I made a reasonable point, based upon the reviews Maazel generally gets in the British press.

You can't even troll interestingly, can you?

[makropulos]

As per usual, the mischief-making is yours. I made a reasonable point, based upon the reviews Maazel generally gets in the British press.

You can't even troll interestingly, can you?

You made a point that Maazel often gets a bad press in Britain, and you may be right (I can't be bothered to look for evidence either to confirm or refute it). The problem your suggestion that the reason for this was "presumably" because he was a clever, wealthy American. So was Bernstein, and he generally got very positive reviews and a very warm welcome in this country - but then he was an inspiring musician.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I like Peter Gammond's gentle stab-in-the-back of critics in his "Bluff Your Way In Music":-

"Critics don't know what they are talking about, especially in the eyes of other critics. They are all failed composers or musicians and therefore know better than anything else what failure is and tend to harp on it. When they suddenly find themselves agreeing, they are greatly surprised and tend to overdo it.
Everyone else on our list, impresarios. The BBC, record companies, musicians and composers, pretend that they don't care what critics say. If it happens to be nasty and true, however, kick up quite a fuss. And 50 per cent of the working hours of any editor of a musical journal are spent pacifying outraged gentlemen who show a marked tendency to withdraw their advertising..."

Etc.

[cavatina]

there was once a theatre critic called Helen Dawson (she later married John Osborne), who could give you an honest appraisal of a production, even if she hadn't liked it. You don't seem to get people like that nowadays.

When I wrote reviews, I always had that in the absolute front of my mind. If you err on the side of being a little too positive nobody cares (except other critics, who write you off as a simp), but if you're unfairly negative, you're doing everyone an injustice. Yourself most of all.

Come to think of it, I wonder how I would have reviewed Dudamel's Mahler? Certainly nothing like the subjective account of my emotional response I gave here. That's all fine and good when you're talking to "friends" (and I use that term in the most general sense possible, heh) but it really wouldn't be appropriate to discuss a performance in those terms in print. When I get home and have the time, I might try my hand at it, just to see if I can pull it off.

Something occurred to me at tonight's Prom as I was ecstatically floating along with the music, completely enraptured and lost in my Chambord-fueled Dionysian imaginings: when I used to review concerts, I never, ever enjoyed them in any meaningful hedonic sense. I was so focused on thinking objectively, taking notes and comparing this and that, my ability to experience the inner beauty of the music itself was completely squashed. Any spiritual sense of music as something that takes you beyond yourself was completely lacking.

Perhaps in the end--to paraphrase Norman Lebrecht-- writing music criticism is a profoundly unmusical act.

[Serial_Apologist]

when I used to review concerts, I never, ever enjoyed them in any meaningful hedonic sense. I was so focused on thinking objectively, taking notes and comparing this and that, my ability to experience the inner beauty of the music itself was completely squashed. Any spiritual sense of music as something that takes you beyond yourself was completely lacking.

Perhaps in the end--to paraphrase Norman Lebrecht-- writing music criticism is a profoundly unmusical act.

That would be just one consequence of over-egging prior or on-site importance that the critic be expected to know the score. This would then become the major source of the critic's communication of her experience of the concert to the public. (How one could possibly do this score-studying beforehand and then spot "inconsistencies" in a performance is another matter: one would be missing out while thinking: hmmm - that didn't comply!).

Lebrecht has come in for some stick on previous threads - that remark wouldn't exactly boost his reputation.

S-A

[bluestateprommer]

Meaningless aphorism of the day: the job of a critic is to critique. (Note that I didn't say criticize, although critics no doubt do.) Critics write about events that the rest of us cannot necessarily attend in person. Granted, with radio and the internet, we can now all be armchair critics, the difference being that we don't get a salary for it, but critics for the papers do. (Maybe that's why, deep down, they're such easy targets.) No, they won't be read for pleasure in 100 or even 25 years, but guess what: they're not writing for 25 years from now. They're writing for now. And if they get it wrong sometimes, do the rest us always get it right? Hardly. Put yourself in their posts, and see how you would enjoy getting the kind of written abuse that they regularly receive.

I've noticed that Lorin Maazel rarely gets good reviews in the UK: presumably this is because he is a) American, b) a multi-millionaire, c) possibly somewhat right-wing, and d) very clever. Tall poppy syndrome indeed.

Actually, while one can call Lorin Maazel many things (and who hasn't), I don't think somewhat right-wing would be one of them, if his appearing on The Colbert Report is anything to go by:

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/162605/march-03-2008/maestro-lorin-maazel

His salary demands over the years, however, have been pretty outrageous, certainly compared to the annual salary of orchestral players. One wonders why, especially because he apparently has no agent. One critique I've heard from a friend about Maazel goes as follows (badly paraphrased):

"The best place to see Maazel in action is in rehearsal. He has some of the best ears in the business, and really knows how to fix problems in rehearsal quickly. In fact, he is so efficient in rehearsal that by the time of the actual concert, he's bored."