BBC PO Strauss season

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

There were 127 in the main orchestra, plus 16 in the Alpine off-stage band, and 6 off-stage trumpets in the Festival Prelude.

[mercia]

thank you for the clarification. I did listen to the interval talk (at the time) but was rather confused by what was said ;blush;

[Flay]

The concert was dedicated to the memory of Andy Jones who died last August aged 64. He was local man who worked as a freelance horn player: "the first on-call horn player for most of the orchestras around the country."

There was a delightful (if that's the right word in this situation) obituary in the programme.

I wonder if Hornspieler knew him?

[Flay]

There were 127 in the main orchestra, plus 16 in the Alpine off-stage band, and 6 off-stage trumpets in the Festival Prelude.

Did you do a head-count, or was it that we are told that EA was scored for 127 players? It felt like there were more than 127 on stage.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

A head-count would have been difficult from the stalls. I just counted the names in the programme.

[Stanfordian]

A head-count would have been difficult from the stalls. I just counted the names in the programme.

Mena told me there would be around 140 players.

[Flay]

Mena told me there were around 140 payers.

127 in the main orchestra plus 16 in the Alpine off-stage band = 140 (because three (IIRC) horn players crept back onstage).

[LaurieWatt]

[QUOTE=Eine Alpensinfonie;372140]Well, I'm clearly outvoted on this,
Well, not by me. I am with you all the way save that I had not been quite so irritated by the slight ensemble lapses that you quote, but Karajan's view of it does not do it for me and the recording is completely intolerable. For me Jarvi and RSNO, Thielemann and VPO and I just love the performance by Jansons with the BBC NOW from the earliest days of the BBC Music magazine! I have listened to part only so far of Mena's extraordinary performance and cannot wait to hear it properly!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

One tiny niggle about Thursday night's concert: the Bridgewater Hall's bathroom acoustic gives a very hard edge to fortissimi at any time, but when two orchestras are playing, it can sometimes be quite uncomfortable. This was particularly noticeable in the Festival Prelude.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Only disappointment - what on earth happened to the wind machines? With 3 thundersheets there was clearly no skimping going on, plus we had 3 wind machines for Don Quixote a few days before, but last night no sign of them and not even a mild breeze to be heard. To leave them out for artistic reasons would seem a perverse conductorial decision, so surely not that? Otherwise a very fine performance.

I've just been listening out for the wind machine on iPlayer. I suspect there is none, though in a couple of places I thought it just might be there, but maybe I was hearing what I wanted to hear. I agree about the relative oddity of the prominence of the thundersheets, which only get 4 short bars of rattling in the whole work (though it was good actually to hear them for once - they often add nothing to the kettledrums).

The hardness of the hall's sound is as evident on iPlayer as it was live. A great pity, but I'm sure it could be softened by skilled acousticians.

[Flay]

Wasn't a brilliant sight when 4 pairs of cymbals were crashed simultaneously at the summit?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I was grinning from ear to ear at that moment.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I haven't seen a performance of the Strauss, but the multi-cymbal crash Flay mentions is a great moment in the Berlioz Te Deum, too (preceded by a couple of pianissimo multi-cymbal swishes) - great acoustics in Durham Cathedral.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Moving on, I'm quite tempted by the next Strauss's Voice concert on 1st Feb, with Tod und Verklarung and the Brentano Songs, with Shostakovitch 10 after the interval.

[Stanfordian]

Moving on, I'm quite tempted by the next Strauss's Voice concert on 1st Feb, with Tod und Verklarung and the Brentano Songs, with Shostakovitch 10 after the interval.

Yes, the programme is a mouth watering prospect. God willing I shall be there at the Bridgewater. I have seen Günther Herbig conduct the BBC Phil a number of times. He was one of the conductors in the old East Germany and I believe a much underrated conductor.