Hallé/Sir Mark Elder - Thursday 20th September

[Alison]

Surely there's a limit on how often you should look at yourself in the mirror.

So little interest in these evening performances on 3 it seems.

[BBMmk2]

I heard the Brahms PC, but not the Sibelius(another visit to iplayer I think), but although very good tom listen to, I still always turn to Emil Gilels.

[Hornspieler]

Surely there's a limit on how often you should look at yourself in the mirror.

So little interest in these evening performances on 3 it seems.

[Flosshilde]

Surely there's a limit on how often you should look at yourself in the mirror.

Is this a reference to the 'vanity' of Sir Mark?

[jayne lee wilson]

Surely there's a limit on how often you should look at yourself in the mirror.

So little interest in these evening performances on 3 it seems.

- Because of the stunningly mainstream, done to death on too many recordings, repertoire... Tchaikovsky 4, Sibelius 2, Finlandia, Vocalise - oh for heaven's sake, du-uh, could do better... "always someone listening for the first time" just won't do...

R3 Live in Concert is a wasted resource, anyone here could come up with better choices & concert programming...
Oh but the ratings! Oh ****!

Wait a minute, next week, two lights in the gloom... Strauss/Zemlinsky off the beaten on Wednesday, crack chamber orchestral Schumann/Brahms on Friday (as long as Zehetmair remembers that the " most important part of the music is not in the notes").

He probably won't - but I'd love to be proved wrong!

[Hornspieler]

Is this a reference to the 'vanity' of Sir Mark?

I think that vanity is a very strong word, Flossie, but I do think that a conductor must have "self confidence" if he is to gain an orchestra's confidence in him. Of course he must have ability to back it up!

I recall the late Herbert Menges, who conducted the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra. I thought he was a pretty useful conductor - certainly he was good enough to work with the Philharmonia on some occasions, but I believe that his lack of self confidence prevented him from going further in his career.

I have met quite a few young vain conductors (no names, no pack drill) who, despite being lauded to the skies by their agents, succeeded only in touching the very fringes of the profession.

Have a good weekend y'all.

HS

[Pianorak]

. . . Well, I rate tonight's performance up with the best . . .

I agree, Sunwook Kim gave a superb performance. Who would have thought “gossamer lightness” and “Brahms PC No. 2” could appear in the same sentence. I'm glad I listened, especially as I hadn't enjoyed his Beethoven and Schubert recital a few days earlier. I now think I wasn't in a receptive mood. Alas, does happen!

[Stanfordian]

Presented by Tom McKinney

Mark Elder and the Hallé are joined by Sunwook Kim in Brahms' Second Piano Concerto. After the interval: Sibelius' Second Symphony.
In 2006, at the age of just eighteen, Korean pianist Sunwook Kim became the youngest winner of the prestigious Leeds International Piano Competition for forty years. In these concerts he joins Sir Mark Elder and the Hallé for a performance of Brahms's majestic Second Piano Concerto, a work that will showcase both his refined sense of lyricism and immaculate technique. After the interval comes Sibelius's powerful and romantic Second Symphony. Though the composer denied it was his 'Liberation Symphony' - a piece depicting Finnish resistance to Russian imperialism - a sense of epic struggle lies at its core.

Brahms Piano Concerto No.2
8.15: Interval
Sibelius Symphony No.2

Sunwook Kim, piano
Hallé
Sir Mark Elder, conductor

Another chance to make a direct comparison with the recent Proms performances.

HS

I thought Sir Mark and the Hallé were quite superb last night; I've never heard them play better. The interpretation of the Sibelius Symphony No. 2 bowled me over such was the quality of the playing. Bravo!

[Resurrection Man]

.....

R3 Live in Concert is a wasted resource, anyone here could come up with better choices & concert programming...
Oh but the ratings! Oh ****!
....!

But are they not to a certain extent dictated to as to what is being played each evening in UK concert halls? I accept the argument that the BBC orchestras might be persuaded to play a broader repertoire but in these days of cost-cutting etc then perhaps they won't push back too much for fear of upsetting the apple cart and being asked to play one last finale. Then we have to factor in what 'sells' in the concert hall...sad but true.

[kuligin]

But I was discussing this knight of the realm!


An unusual way of "moving on", HS.

FWiW, I have attended many concerts directed by Elder - one of them is the only concert I've ever left during the interval, so unimpressed was I with the performance. But I would never, let us say, disguise my antipathy to his interpretations by claiming that he wasn't a "regular" conductor. (DB couldn't be more regular if he put prunes on his All Bran!)

I attended, last night, the opening Halle concert of the 2012/3 Thursday series conducted by Mark Elder, which brought this thread back to mind

I greatly admire FGL 's contributions to these boards, as he has many times expressed over a wide range of music very clearly opinions that I strongly agree with . So I found his comments about Mark Elder very suprising as they are completely the opposite of what I believe to be the case. Of course as FGL says we all have our personal blind spots, indeed I did not attend the Sibelius concert, I can not get on with Sibelius, particularly that second Symphony!

Last night encapsulated what I believe to be many of the aspects of Elders tenure that I particularly admire. There was a little speech, I personally generally dont like his little speeches, but last night it was totally apposite, welcoming the mayor's of Greater Manchester, thanking the sponsor and most important, introducing and welcolming three groups of children, part of a scheme introducing them via Halle players to music and in this case the piece played last night, the Planets. Elder has been behind the Halle Youth Orchestra and the 2 Youth Choirs, and makes sure each season there is a piece played that needs the choirs.

The other main piece was Shostakovich Cello Concerto 1. Elder is in my view a very good accompanying conductor, he is really commited to this supporting role, I remember him giving a tremendous amount of effort to conducting a popular Sunday night programme including Rakmaninov Piano Concerto 2, and so it was last night, the young American soloist took the applause and was rightly centre of attention, but the accompaniment was tight and fully committed

As for the Planets, a piece of which I am not a terribly great fan, he gave a tremendous performance, I have never heard the final pages done so well

I can understand not liking a particular conductor, I found Noseda generally hard to take,but the one thing that seems to me is Elder's primary commitment to the music, his players, and the Halle and not his own importance

[AjAjAjH]

I attended, last night, the opening Halle concert of the 2012/3 Thursday series conducted by Mark Elder, which brought this thread back to mind

I greatly admire FGL 's contributions to these boards, as he has many times expressed over a wide range of music very clearly opinions that I strongly agree with . So I found his comments about Mark Elder very suprising as they are completely the opposite of what I believe to be the case. Of course as FGL says we all have our personal blind spots, indeed I did not attend the Sibelius concert, I can not get on with Sibelius, particularly that second Symphony!

Last night encapsulated what I believe to be many of the aspects of Elders tenure that I particularly admire. There was a little speech, I personally generally dont like his little speeches, but last night it was totally apposite, welcoming the mayor's of Greater Manchester, thanking the sponsor and most important, introducing and welcolming three groups of children, part of a scheme introducing them via Halle players to music and in this case the piece played last night, the Planets. Elder has been behind the Halle Youth Orchestra and the 2 Youth Choirs, and makes sure each season there is a piece played that needs the choirs.

The other main piece was Shostakovich Cello Concerto 1. Elder is in my view a very good accompanying conductor, he is really commited to this supporting role, I remember him giving a tremendous amount of effort to conducting a popular Sunday night programme including Rakmaninov Piano Concerto 2, and so it was last night, the young American soloist took the applause and was rightly centre of attention, but the accompaniment was tight and fully committed

As for the Planets, a piece of which I am not a terribly great fan, he gave a tremendous performance, I have never heard the final pages done so well

I can understand not liking a particular conductor, I found Noseda generally hard to take,but the one thing that seems to me is Elder's primary commitment to the music, his players, and the Halle and not his own importance

I couldn't have put it better. Though Sibelius 2

[Alison]

I am not doubting Sir Mark's skills as an orchestral builder, his commitment to the orchestra or his willingness to involve youth etc.

It seems, even to an outsider, that the orchestra has rarely been in finer heart.

It's just that when we are playing the game of comparing the top conductors of our time, as is our tendency, I find Sir Mark less than fully
convincing in much of the core repertoire. Probably not much different to how Kuligin feels about the (in my view superior) Giandrea Noseda.

Petrenko and Nelsons interest me a lot more.

The stage manner and speeches, the five minute applause left on a recent Wagner recording: these are perhaps just pointers towards
self awareness.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Well, just for the record, I consider Mark Elder's performance of The Apostles in May of this year to be the finest performance of any music anywhere and at any time since the Big Bang.

[AjAjAjH]

Well, just for the record, I consider Mark Elder's performance of The Apostles in May of this year to be the finest performance of any music anywhere and at any time since the Big Bang.

Again, I couldn't put it better myself but instead of the 'big bang' I would put George Hurst's performance of the Berlioz 'Requiem' at the proms in the 1960s or Brendel's performance of the Brahms Piano Concerto No2 in the Free Trade Hall in the 1980s.

[BBMmk2]

I think that vanity is a very strong word, Flossie, but I do think that a conductor must have "self confidence" if he is to gain an orchestra's confidence in him. Of course he must have ability to back it up!

I recall the late Herbert Menges, who conducted the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra. I thought he was a pretty useful conductor - certainly he was good enough to work with the Philharmonia on some occasions, but I believe that his lack of self confidence prevented him from going further in his career.

I have met quite a few young vain conductors (no names, no pack drill) who, despite being lauded to the skies by their agents, succeeded only in touching the very fringes of the profession.

Have a good weekend y'all.

HS

Hornspieler, did you play with the Brighton PO, under HM? Thats my home orchestra?!