Radio3 Live in Concert

[EdgeleyRob]

Tonight at 7.30 on R3 the New York Phil, no less, conducted by Alan Gilbert. Soloist Joyce DiDonato [mezzo] in Berlioz Nuits d ete. Also Thomas Ades Polaris[1st UK performance], Stravinsky Symphony in Three Movements,and Ravel Daphnis and Chloe. Suite no 2. From the Barbican.

I listened to the concert this morning and although it isn't the sort of music I would normally listen to, I thought with it being the New York Phil I would give it a try..
Adès: Polaris, not for me I'm afraid a bit boring (sorry)..
Berlioz: Les nuits d'été, lovely piece with some fine singing.
Stravinsky: Symphony in Three Movements, ok.
Ravel: Daphnis and Chloe Suite , now this was excellent and seemed to me to be very well played.

[salymap]

I listened to the concert this morning and although it isn't the sort of music I would normally listen to, I thought with it being the New York Phil I would give it a try..
Adès: Polaris, not for me I'm afraid a bit boring (sorry)..
Berlioz: Les nuits d'été, lovely piece with some fine singing.
Stravinsky: Symphony in Three Movements, ok.
Ravel: Daphnis and Chloe Suite , now this was excellent and seemed to me to be very well played.

Thanks for that ER. I recorded it but was about to delete until your review gave me a bit of hope. I'll try to listen later.

[salymap]

ER largely agree with you; first work boring, Berlioz - I love it but DiDonato had a lotof vibrato. Sorry.

Will liaten to second half another time as musr get cooking.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The weakest of the week's broadcast concerts, I thought. The Adès glittered half-heartedly without either doing anything or making doing "nothing" worth listening to. I can appreciate his not wanting to repeat himself, but as a "new direction", this seemed to me to be facing a brick wall. The Berlioz was very well sung and well played, but didn't "burn" as a performance (was this the fault of the i-Player? The whole concert had a very dull "sheen" to it.) The Stravinsky was a dull performance: too slow; the episodes chugging along after each other without the surge of inevitability that the best performances of this work demonstrate. Passionless. The Ravel was better done, but, like the Berlioz, a bit of a routine run-through rather than a performance. (Again, this might be the fault of the i-Player: there is a more enthusiastic comment on the "When was your last concert?"* Thread, and Rob enjoyed it, too.)

EDIT: * = Ferretfancy described the D & C performance as "radiant" and he was in the Hall. Just the quality I missed from the I-Player!

[jayne lee wilson]

I enjoyed the Ades rather more than fhg, it seemed to be built around three climactic waves, with a highly attractive long-note-value against short-note-value motion to its main developments; reminiscent of some of John Adams' motoric devices. It drew me, as Schoenberg said of a Mahler symphony (the 7th was it?), "calmly and pleasingly into its orbit, without simply upsetting my centre of gravity", and then concluded quite dramatically with a change of rhythmic emphasis and darker orchestral colours.

I found the Stravinsky almost too polished and refined, perhaps overplayed and over-rehearsed on tour? It certainly lacked snarl and bite, with many passages left to drift along aimlessly for all their note-perfect execution. The Ravel was indeed the best realised item, more sensuously engaging in its colours and with a surer sense of direction; though I still found myself reflecting on its over-familiarity within a relatively enterprising programme.

Footnote to the Dohnanyi Brahms Requiem: I've just posted a review of the new JEG/ORR recording on the "what are you listening to now" thread, so...q.v.

[EdgeleyRob]

Marvellous recital this evening by Alexandre Tharaud, a pianist new to me I have to say. Magisterial, idiosyncratic Scarlatti sonatas - bringing out voices you don't normally hear. Fascinating K380.

I listened this morning and totally agree, a wonderful recital.
The Scarlatti pieces were very interesting, a lot different to how we normally hear them.
I think this review is a bit harsh though.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/classicalmusic/9088612/Alexandre-Tharaud-Wigmore-Hall-review.html

[cloughie]

ER largely agree with you; first work boring, Berlioz - I love it but DiDonato had a lotof vibrato. Sorry.

Will liaten to second half another time as musr get cooking.

Yes vibrato, which i'm no real fan of, but in DiD's case was not overpoweringly destructive - I thought OK! I've heard it much less tuneful and more v laden!

[french frank]

I think this review is a bit harsh though.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/m...ll-review.html

It's Hewett in the T'graph v. Clements in the Guardian, then (Clements on the CD, not the recital).

[salymap]

R3 7.30 tonight from the Barbican....LSO Gergiev ...Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet, Prokofiev PC no 3 with Denis Matsuev, DSCH symphony no 5. Introduced by Petroc Trelawny.

[Pianorak]

It's Hewett in the T'graph v. Clements in the Guardian, then (Clements on the CD, not the recital).

Martin Kettle in the Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012...tharaud-review

[Bryn]

On the whole I rather enjoyed tonight's effort form Gergiev and the LSO. I did find Gergiev's comments re. the DSCH 5th a bit strange. What's wrong with drawing implication from DSCH's quoting of his own setting of Pushkin's "Rebirth", for instance. I think that helps empathise more closely with the music's emotional landscape. Still, I knew nothing of such matters when I first heard and came to love the work (via the Czech Philharmonic/Ancerl recording on a Supraphon LP).

[Hornspieler]

On the whole I rather enjoyed tonight's effort form Gergiev and the LSO. I did find Gergiev's comments re. the DSCH 5th a bit strange. What's wrong with drawing implication from DSCH's quoting of his own setting of Pushkin's "Rebirth", for instance. I think that helps empathise more closely with the music's emotional landscape. Still, I knew nothing of such matters when I first heard and came to love the work (via the Czech Philharmonic/Ancerl recording on a Supraphon LP).

"On the whole" sums it up for me, too. Everybody knows that I am not a Gergiev fan, but I enjoyed this concert and, in particular the Prokofiev Piano concerto.

I say, "on the whole" because I think I did discern a few places where even the LSO; experienced as they are in the mysteries of Gergiev's finger twiddling, got a bit out of sync a couple of times.

I was listening on FM last night and had a very annoying crackling in the second half, so I switched my receiver over to mono; which immediately cured the fault

I shall listen again today to the whole concert on iPlayer, in stereo and without the crackling (which will please my dietician)

HS

[salymap]

I could only hear the timps on my usual radio, all else a blur in the Romeo and Juliet, but recorded the Prokofiev concerto on my TV, which seems to get through my tinnitus, and shall listen again later.

Didn't hear the symphony.

PS never eaten 'crackling'. Have I missed something good? Glad it wasn't TV, can't watch Gergiev.

[Ferretfancy]

It was a rather odd evening at the Barbican, I'm not sure how it came across on R3. I was surprised at the rather matter of fact performance of Romeo and Juliet. I know that it isn't always necessary to pile on the emotion in this piece, but this verged on the routine to me. The fast dramatic sections worked well, but it was as if a dimension was missing, particularly in that slow introduction, which should surely have had more of anticipation and tension than it got in this performance.
Denis Matsuev is a player with a fine technique, but the performance of Prokofiev's third was brash in the extreme, with impossibly hectic speeds and coarse orchestral accompaniment which drowned him out at times. The woodwind in this concerto is very astringent, but need it have been quite so loud? Maybe the broadcast sound gave a better balance. That said, the audience went wild, but then, they would wouldn't they? In case it was not broadcast, I should say that Matsuev played Liadov's Musical Snuff Box as an encore.

After the interval the orchestra seemed transformed in a marvellous performance of Shostakovich 5, which certainly deserved its enthusiastic reception. Gergiev had conducted part one with the scores, but not the Shostakovich, which must be in his blood. There was extraordinarily refined playing in the quieter parts of the score, particularly in the slow movement, with wonderfully hushed strings. I wonder if RVW knew this symphony?

All in all, a mixed event, but more than compensated by the playing in the symphony. Perhaps it was one of Gergiev's " just flown in from Moscow" jobs!

[Osborn]

PS never eaten 'crackling'. Have I missed something good?

If you're a dentist, yes. It's very good for business.