Mahler symphony no.10 rlpo/petrenko live r3 19:30 thursday 21/03/13

[jayne lee wilson]

Just to alert everyone to the live broadcast of this much-discussed piece...
Be there, or be square!

If mine hosts wish to fold the Mahler 10 threads together at some point, whatevs...

[BBMmk2]

I wouldm love to hear this one live! I will have to wait till the weekend now!

[Lord Mersey]

I am going tonight and also on Saturday.After a stunning recent Shostakovich 4 both Petrenko and the orchestra are on blistering form.

[Bryn]

Oh dear, what a disappointment so far. Quite the least convincing performance of the work I have encountered. Even the usually heartbreaking flute solo sounds merely matter of fact tonight.

[Nachtigall]

For perhaps the first time I agree with Bryn. To me the orchestra didn't sound at all confident, especially in slow tempi, when there appeared to be problems of intonation and ensemble. Upper strings often sounded thin. How much that is due to the acoustics in Liverpool or the BBC transmission I don't know, but I kept contrasting their performance with my memory of the supremely authoritative performance which Petrenko gave with the National Youth Orchestra a couple of years ago at the RFH. So yes, disappointing, alas.

[Barbirollians]

Yes a disappointment - some rather coarse brass playing too to my ears .

[jayne lee wilson]

How often it happens that the experience of the event in the hall is very different from those listening at home...

Yes, I was there. Where on earth else was I going to be!

Yes, there were moments of imprecision, a couple of late entries and so on; one listens analytically at home, perhaps most especially to halls which don't ever seem to broadcast well - knowing the Phil so well in person, and listening to it via R3 (FM, then DAB, now HD webstream) I don't think I've ever been happy with the sound via microphones. (This often happens - think how long it took R3 to achieve a decent balance from Symphony Hall, Birmingham in the 90s).

But would it surprise you - at all - to hear that those of us in the audience were emotionally devastated by this experience of this music? Of course it wouldn't.
That very flute solo commented on so critically above, seemed to us so heartbreakingly tender, so beautiful, and coming after some terrifying bass-drum thuds - I could see I wasn't alone in my tears. And how beautifully the strings returned to that love-song in those last minutes, draining us of what tears we had left...

Earlier, Petrenko found the greatest contrasts of mood and colour in the first 2 movements, bringing out the fantasy in the first scherzo more vividly than usual, strikingly fresh and bright here, and in the textures of the Adagio, so new and so different from the 9th Symphony, the quotations from which were no more than a last look back - a fear faced and overcome. He turned up both volume and intensity very noticably in the Purgatorio and Scherzo 2, by the end of which, after some huge climaxes, we had little resistance left for the impact of that drum, that sweetly hopeful flute, as the atmosphere briefly brightened.

So the emotional narrative of the work - and its new musical direction after the 9th, those rapid, sudden switches of trajectory, of colour and mood - were vividly and cogently drawn, and experienced live were bound to overwhelm any momentary lapses of ensemble or intonation. If you connect with the piece it can be almost unbearably compelling.

Of course you can understand Mahler's 10th - musically, emotionally - without knowing the back-story; but knowing that, knowing that Mahler, even as he was dying, and aware of Alma's infidelity, could write such music - "to live for you, to die for you, Almschi" scribbled upon it... is to see that this love-song is about a love enduring beyond failure, beyond death, and greater than the love of any individual for another.

[Mary Chambers]

I was listening on Radio 3 and I found it both exciting and moving. It isn't a piece I know well, which may make me less critical than some of you, and I did notice some doubtful brass playing, but overall I thought it was a compelling performance.

[Lord Mersey]

Its another positive vote from somebody who was present in the hall.
Yes there were slips in ensemble on occasion. To me however that was not an orchestra that lacked confidence,far from it.
I have also recorded it and will listen to the broadcast with interest. With regard to the broadcast quality I have never seen so many microphones in the Phil. I thought at one stage there appeared to be more microphones on the platform than players!

[Hornspieler]

How often it happens that the experience of the event in the hall is very different from those listening at home...

Yes, I was there. Where on earth else was I going to be!

Yes, there were moments of imprecision, a couple of late entries and so on; one listens analytically at home, perhaps most especially to halls which don't ever seem to broadcast well - knowing the Phil so well in person, and listening to it via R3 (FM, then DAB, now HD webstream) I don't think I've ever been happy with the sound via microphones. (This often happens - think how long it took R3 to achieve a decent balance from Symphony Hall, Birmingham in the 90s).

But would it surprise you - at all - to hear that those of us in the audience were emotionally devastated by this experience of this music? Of course it wouldn't.
That very flute solo commented on so critically above, seemed to us so heartbreakingly tender, so beautiful, and coming after some terrifying bass-drum thuds - I could see I wasn't alone in my tears. And how beautifully the strings returned to that love-song in those last minutes, draining us of what tears we had left...

Earlier, Petrenko found the greatest contrasts of mood and colour in the first 2 movements, bringing out the fantasy in the first scherzo more vividly than usual, strikingly fresh and bright here, and in the textures of the Adagio, so new and so different from the 9th Symphony, the quotations from which were no more than a last look back - a fear faced and overcome. He turned up both volume and intensity very noticably in the Purgatorio and Scherzo 2, by the end of which, after some huge climaxes, we had little resistance left for the impact of that drum, that sweetly hopeful flute, as the atmosphere briefly brightened.

So the emotional narrative of the work - and its new musical direction after the 9th, those rapid, sudden switches of trajectory, of colour and mood - were vividly and cogently drawn, and experienced live were bound to overwhelm any momentary lapses of ensemble or intonation. If you connect with the piece it can be almost unbearably compelling.

Of course you can understand Mahler's 10th - musically, emotionally - without knowing the back-story; but knowing that, knowing that Mahler, even as he was dying, and aware of Alma's infidelity, could write such music - "to live for you, to die for you, Almschi" scribbled upon it... is to see that this love-song is about a love enduring beyond failure, beyond death, and greater than the love of any individual for another.

Well you found something that I missed then, Jayne.

I thought the whole thing was ghastly and the orchestra, on the night, not fit for purpose. The best movement was the second - one of the ones that GM did not orchestrate.

HS

[Thropplenoggin]

Well you found something that I missed then, Jayne.

I thought the whole thing was ghastly and the orchestra, on the night, not fit for purpose. The best movement was the second - one of the ones that GM did not orchestrate.

HS

I wonder whether, in the same way we know that our palates can be influenced by our perceptions (being told we are drinking a Château Lafite '61, or drinking from a bottle which has been labelled thus but is, in fact, £3.99 vino collapso), or the placebo effect with medicine, I wonder whether there is some kind of psychological self-delusion involved when attending concerts: having paid 'x' amount for it, do we convince ourselves it was better than it was? Or are we confusing those intangibles - a night out, the atmosphere of the concert hall, the anticipation, with a great performance?

[Nick Armstrong]

I have also recorded it and will listen to the broadcast with interest.

Do please report back in detail, Lord M - most interesting thread, this, and your dual perspective should be illuminating!

[Simon B]

Or are we confusing those intangibles - a night out, the atmosphere of the concert hall, the anticipation, with a great performance?

Or are we making a fundamental error in assuming that a comparison between participating in a live performance (whether as a performer or member of the audience) and hearing a synthetic representation of some of the sounds made in that performance isn't fallacious? IMV it's almost a category error - they aren't the same thing any more than are bananas and ectoplasm.

and the orchestra, on the night, not fit for purpose

In translation: Hyperbolic exaggeration along familiar lines of "Only the Upton Dupton Philharmonic conducted by Rasputin in 1916 and recorded on wax cylinder and subsequently relayed electronically over a bit of wet string was ever worth listening to".
Alternative translation: There were some split notes.

[Barbirollians]

A bit of both is possible !

I was disappointed by the performance but as I have never been to a concert at the Philharmonic Hall I am in no position to gainsay what JLW says about how well broadcasts reflect what is heard in the auditorium .

[Thropplenoggin]

Or are we making a fundamental error in assuming that a comparison between participating in a live performance (whether as a performer or member of the audience) and hearing a synthetic representation of some of the sounds made in that performance isn't fallacious? IMV it's almost a category error - they aren't the same thing any more than are bananas and ectoplasm.

I cite Twaddle's Law on this one: if it can made more complicated than it really is, it will be.

1. Where does the performer come into it: the 'participation' being compared is purely by listeners, one at home, the other in the hall.
2. "hearing a synthetic representation of some of the sounds" - every audience member only heard "some of the sounds" due to their position in the hall, their hearing ability, etc.