Mahler 3 - LSO, Bychkov

[amateur51]

Fingers crossed indeed that LSOlive take the plunge. The two concerts I have heard live with Semyon Bychkov and the BBCSO rank among the most powerful musical experiences of my life. Like Carlos Kleiber he now prefers being a freelance but happily has a much wider repertoire. He teaches at the Royal Academy of Music. He is the double of the late actor Miles Malleson
https://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=e...NuPJ0QXqre27DQ

The likeness is astonishing, isn't it Chris

[HighlandDougie]

Microphone-free, alas, so Miles's rather fine take on Mahler 3 this evening is lost to posterity. And that is a great shame.

[HighlandDougie]

And I should have said that the LSO sounded in fine form. The Barbican's idiosyncratic acoustics didn't bother me at all (maybe it was where I was sitting - middle of Row P in the stalls) - important in a symphony where Bychkov took full advantage of the orchestra's ability to play PPP as well as FFF. Bychkov has an unhysterical way with Mahler which suits this least hysterical of his symphonies well. Christians Stotjin didn't have quite the radiance I remember of Anna Larssen with the Concertgebouw last year but at least her articulation was excellent. I felt suitably elated in thrill-o-meter terms at the end to make it a memorable Mahler 3 for me at least. I now rather fancy going to Munich in July to hear Miles in Walton 1. The one bad point about the concert, though was the coughing - why oh why do people have to wait for the quietest moments to hack away

[Steerpike]

I did spot a set of three microphones suspended from the ceiling behind the baffle boards but I imagine they might be there permanently? They certainly didn't look adequate for a recording - though Toscanini managed with fewer in 8H.

I thought it was a very good performance and certainly the orchestra played mightily but my thrill-o-meter registered just below 'memorable. Perhaps I'm just getting old. I'm with you about the coughing Dougie. My fantasies involved summary execution as one virtuoso lung emptier offered his best gargly sputum noises just as the last movement edged in pianissimo on the strings.

[EnemyoftheStoat]

I did spot a set of three microphones suspended from the ceiling behind the baffle boards but I imagine they might be there permanently? They certainly didn't look adequate for a recording - though Toscanini managed with fewer in 8H.

I thought it was a very good performance and certainly the orchestra played mightily but my thrill-o-meter registered just below 'memorable. Perhaps I'm just getting old. I'm with you about the coughing Dougie. My fantasies involved summary execution as one virtuoso lung emptier offered his best gargly sputum noises just as the last movement edged in pianissimo on the strings.

Summary execution would have been too good for him/her/it. What is it with LSO audiences? Mind you, after that effort, everybody else seemed to admit defeat so perhaps we should be grateful.

[Curalach]

Summary execution would have been too good for him/her/it. What is it with LSO audiences? Mind you, after that effort, everybody else seemed to admit defeat so perhaps we should be grateful.

Sadly, it's not just the LSO audience. It seems to me that many people come to concerts festooned with iPhones and bottles of water but without a decent pocket handkerchief, or the ability to use it.

[Flosshilde]

Unfortunately young (& not so young) people don't use handkerchiefs these days (heaven knows what doting aunts do for Christmas presents - although probably most doting aunts are of an age that is unaware of handkerchiefs & the miriad uses they have )

[Steerpike]

At the Wigmore Hall they have a more-or-less sustained campaign against coughing. They do sometimes lecture the audience before a concert but the results are good, coughing is minimal (a miracle given the average age of the audience) and suitably stifled when it happens. The LSO note on the matter in the programme is very recessive. I do think they need to think about the problem.

[Petrushka]

At the Wigmore Hall they have a more-or-less sustained campaign against coughing. They do sometimes lecture the audience before a concert but the results are good, coughing is minimal (a miracle given the average age of the audience) and suitably stifled when it happens. The LSO note on the matter in the programme is very recessive. I do think they need to think about the problem.

Good for the Wigmore Hall! I think it's past the time when the Barbican, RFH and RAH confronted this problem by making an announcement from the stage just prior to the conductor's/artists entrance and at both halves of the concert (though the second could be as a reminder via the PA system). It's a pity that elements of the concert audience are selfish half-wits leading everyone to be treated as children but that's life!

[EnemyoftheStoat]

What's nice about the Wigmore Hall announcement is that it is done with good humour and doesn't come across as a lecture.

[Flosshilde]

Meanwhile, back to Bychkov (or should that be cough?), the Guardian wasn't terribly impressed - http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012...bychkov-review, although they did give it 3 stars. As it's almost unheard of for anything to get the full five three must count as not at all bad.

[HighlandDougie]

A chacun son gout - was I even at the same performance? While it may not have stormed the heavens, "uninvolving" is not a word I would use. Critics, doncha just luv 'em.

PS Liked the Bychcough

[EnemyoftheStoat]

A chacun son gout - was I even at the same performance? While it may not have stormed the heavens, "uninvolving" is not a word I would use. Critics, doncha just luv 'em.

PS Liked the Bychcough

Ah, I see it was Clements. Probably pissed off at having to stay for the whole concert...

He's very grudging with the stars in any case - http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/andrewclements

[Flosshilde]

A distinct resmblance to Michael Tippett, in my eyes.

http://www.steenslid.com/music/tippett/bilder/tippett01.jpg