BBCSO/Josep Pons/Barbican live/19:30/04/12/13- Schreker, Busoni, Ravel, Schoenberg

[jayne lee wilson]

Fascinating programme which the conductor surely means to be heard as a sequence in all its early 20thC, sensuous, colouristic intoxications...

Schreker overture, Die Gezeichneten
Busoni Berceuse Elegiaque
Ravel Sheherazade
***
Ravel Pavane pour une infante defunte
Schoenberg Chamber Symphony No.1

Perhaps it would be even better if the Schreker Kammersinfonie had bookended the evening, but a compelling prospect nonetheless...
Cast a connoisseur's ear here live tonight if you can...

[Serial_Apologist]

Perhaps it would be even better if the Schreker Kammersinfonie had bookended the evening, but a compelling prospect nonetheless...
Cast a connoisseur's ear here live tonight if you can...

Pleasant enough, but rather put in its place by Schoenberg's, imo. I don't know the Schreker overture at all.

(Has there ever been a richer era musically than the first 15 years of the 20th century, he often asked himself wistfully?)

[teamsaint]

Pleasant enough, but rather put in its place by Schoenberg's, imo. I don't know the Schreker overture at all.

(Has there ever been a richer era musically than the first 15 years of the 20th century, he often asked himself wistfully?)

back in 1913, were people saying " has there.......than the first 15 years of the C19? " in 2113 will they be saying"........first 15 years C21?"

Perhaps the greatest musical brains are always running 50/100 years ahead of the fashion/tastes of the day?
Perhaps history plays funny tricks.
perhaps there is just more (surviving) music around from a hundred years ago than from 200 years ago.

perhaps I should get on with some work.

Why wistful, S_A?

[Serial_Apologist]

back in 1913, were people saying " has there.......than the first 15 years of the C19? " in 2113 will they be saying"........first 15 years C21?"

Perhaps the greatest musical brains are always running 50/100 years ahead of the fashion/tastes of the day?
Perhaps history plays funny tricks.
perhaps there is just more (surviving) music around from a hundred years ago than from 200 years ago.

perhaps I should get on with some work.

Why wistful, S_A?

It spread right across the arts, discoveries in the sciences etc, compared with today's atomisation. But back then there wasn't universal franchise; art was for an elite, today not the case - less excuse is behind the wist. Middle class culture being the confection it was, much of the steam understandably went out with the horrors of WW1.

[jayne lee wilson]

I just hope someone apart from me & the cat has a listen... even the Bournemouth Horn seems to have given up...

[EdgeleyRob]

I just hope someone apart from me & the cat has a listen... even the Bournemouth Horn seems to have given up...

But Jayne,there's football on telly tonight,and I've got to do results bulletin later
Can I be excused this one live if I promise to catch up on i player?.

[jayne lee wilson]

This is remarkable playing from the BBCSO tonight - I've rarely heard them - or anyone - play with such refinement, delicacy and beauty... if Josep Pons was indisposed and Celibidache's ghost had materialised upon the podium I would be only mildly abashed... such sounds as these are scarcely worthy of the real world...

[edashtav]

This is remarkable playing from the BBCSO tonight - I've rarely heard them - or anyone - play with such refinement, delicacy and beauty... if Josep Pons was indisposed and Celibidache's ghost had materialised upon the podium I would be only mildly abashed... such sounds as these are scarcely worthy of the real world...

You're a fine and persistent advocate, Jayne, and I'll make sure that I join E-R when he tunes to iPlayer. I liked the look of the Concert and the last time that I heard the BBC SO in a French music concert they were full of, in your words, refinement,delicacy and beauty. That's what brings second-rate music alive - that's what'll turn me on.

[edashtav]

I insinuated Schoenberg’s masterly Chamber Symphony live into a busy night. It gave me great pleasure – pellucid lines, tremendous drive, weight of tone and cogency in the faster sections; the whole shaped with knowledge, affection and understanding by Josep Pons, with the BBC SO on top of its game. Pons must be persuaded to return to perform this work at the Proms. He’s capable of taking Schoenberg out of the closet labelled “Respect” into the establishment emblazoned with“I’m Loving it!”

[edashtav]

Just one more thought before the washing up. Radio 3 has been much criticised on For3 in recent months for the dullness of its programming. This concert, staged in the Barbican, was put together with flair and discrimination.
It could not have been bettered as a concept in any era since the Third Programme was born, and, if the quality of playing and interpretation that I heard in the Schoenberg was sustained throughout this evening, it set new standards in the delivery of challenging early 20th century music.

[jayne lee wilson]

In part two, the sheer familiarity of Ravel's Pavane left me with a slight sense of disappointment, lovingly played as it was, but scarcely a transition to the evening's finale...

"Velvet gloves off!" Josep Pons seemed to say as we launched into an explosively volatile account of Schoenberg's 1st Chamber Symphony, heard here in the later 1935 full-orchestral version, the rapid mood swings of the piece daringly realised in vivid changes of pace and colour, wind solos colourfully individual yet disciplined and those extreme gradations of dynamics we heard throughout part one of the concert. Perhaps there were a pair of bookends after all, since the stormy and passionate account of this Schoenberg, painted in the harsher colours of Dix and Schiele, were a counterweight to the Klimtian Glitter of Schreker's almost equally substantial Prelude to a Drama (the more familiar title than the one given) with which we began. The BBCSO's flutes and piccolos were wonderfully and wildly off the leash as they shrieked their hysterical joy in the final climax!

A special mention too for the soprano in the Ravel Scheherazade tonight, Nora Grubisch. Some wonderfully dark and rich colours in her powerfully projected tone, but above all she sung the words so meaningfully, with such phrase-by-phrase care, she might have written the poems herself. And as I intimated earlier, the beauty and sensitivity of Pons' orchestral accompaniment was exceptional in its variety of attack, transparency of texture and layered blend of instrumental colour; in its warmth and brilliance, so different to the sombre, reflective hesitancies of Busoni's Berceuse. This was creative conducting of a high order.

The applause tonight seemed to indicate a rather meagre attendance; never mind; in the Home Concert Hall, you could sequester yourself away for a while and bask in this orchestral gorgeousness in quiet contemplation. Until Schoenberg brings daylight back to illuminate the magic...

[Roehre]

.....Schreker's almost equally substantial Prelude to a Drama (the more familiar title than the one given) ...

Not quite I'm afraid. The Vorspiel zu einem Drama uses the themes of the overture to Die Gezeichneten, but is nearly twice as long.

[edashtav]

"Velvet gloves off!" Josep Pons seemed to say as we launched into an explosively volatile account of Schoenberg's 1st Chamber Symphony,

Full marks for acute characterisation, Jayne, I wish I'd had the wits to write that.

[jayne lee wilson]

Not quite I'm afraid. The Vorspiel zu einem Drama uses the themes of the overture to Die Gezeichneten, but is nearly twice as long.

I did wonder about this (which is why I said "the [title] given"), but The Barbican website had "Overture:Die Gezeichneten", the BBCSO one says "Vorspiel zu einem drama: Die Gezeichneten"...and refers to it as an Overture for Large orchestra, hence my confusion, having never heard the Overture itself presented separately. Martin Handley's otherwise excellent presentation didn't seem to clarify this I'm afraid...

[teamsaint]

I think this concert is a partial cure for the common cold.

Its certainly making me feel better.......