Birtwistle's Minotaur going cheap at ROH

[Sir Velo]

I shall be going with some fear and trepidation...

I shouldn't worry; the Garden's ususually a pretty safe place after dark.

[Dave2002]

Norwegian Blue conductor of choral music ................. 7 letters

7 letters? http://www.norwegianblue.co.uk/northwest_passage.htm

Let's not get onto cheeses? Maybe there is a Norwegian Blue - probably not in stock though.

[MrGongGong]

7 letters? http://www.norwegianblue.co.uk/northwest_passage.htm

Let's not get onto cheeses? Maybe there is a Norwegian Blue - probably not in stock though.

old Jarlsberg ?
surely it's the perfect time of year to get into the baby cheeses in the place in Derbyshire ?

[kernelbogey]

Minotaur going cheap?

Sure that's a Minotaur, Ams?




(Just getting my coat.... )

Perhaps a bullfinch?

[Flosshilde]

I already have a ticket. Though I shall be going with some fear and trepidation...

Just don't get lost on the way home.

[doversoul1]

Just don't get lost on the way home.

a ball of thread ready?

[amateur51]

a ball of thread ready?

[salymap]

Less risk of slipping on a cabbage leaf than in Eliza Doolittle's day or my day, actually.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Less risk of slipping on a cabbage leaf than in Eliza Doolittle's day or my day, actually.

Surely that would be a Savoy opera?

[kernelbogey]

I've just caught bits of the In Tune interview with Ryan Wigglesworth by Suzy Klein (he sounded mildly irritated with some of her questions, but I wasn't listening closely). I think he's someone to watch - and hear : I heard him conduct a terrific Brahms 1 two years ago at St Endellion, and Brahms 2 last August. Minotaur on Thursday is his Covent Garden debut.

[Belgrove]

Thanks for the alert kernelbogey.

I was impressed by The Minotaur the first time around and will be attending a performance of the revival. Pappano was due to conduct but, because of a muscular problem induced by the confluence of Berlioz and Wagner, has been replaced by Wigglesworth. Be good to hear and see a fresh face in the pit.

The cast looks broadly similar to the first run back in 2007. A visceral work with a remarkable percussion section spilling into the boxes either side of the stage. Interesting use of the cymbalom too. I'll report back with second thoughts on the piece in due course.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Wigglesworth made that superb CD of Birtwistle's orchestral works for NMC last year: excellent choice to replace the marvellous Pappano.

[Belgrove]

The ROH premiered three large works in the last decade. With each fresh view and hearing, The Tempest diminishes.The Minotaur has gained in stature. It was heartening to see a near capacity and appreciative audience at Saturday's performance of a musically challenging work, but one which is intensely dramatic.

Birtwistle's prevailing interest has been in the expression and importance of myth, how it impacts upon and shapes a society, and The Minotaur continues this programme. It is not an overtly expressive or emotional work and yet it packs a massive punch. The characters that inhabit it are deliberately emblematic and one-dimensional. This imbues clarity and concision to the dramatic development. The character that reveals a more complex persona and forms the emotional core of the work is, ironically, the bestial and murderous Minotaur, whose tortured inner humanity emerges through soliloquising his dreams (elegantly realised on the stage). When awake, he bellows and destroys.The relationship between Adriadne and Theseus is not the romantic tragedy of Strauss and Monteverdi, but founded on a hard nosed deal - Ariadne will help Theseus escape from the labyrinth provided he then helps her escape from the island. They do not trust each other let alone love each other. The Minotaur is merely the vehicle through which they can achieve their individual and disparate ambitions.

David Harsent's dramatic libretto uses a craggy language that has an austere and effective poetic power. Although this cannot always be heard over Birtwistle's complex music, the magnificent libretto can be appreciated through the surtitles. It is a libretto of the quality of Auden's and Piper's work, words and music are fused - the ideal rarely realised in the operatic form. And what music! Powerful seascapes with an undertow of menace and inexorable tonal pull to the horrors at Knossos, the brutal cacophony that accompanies the ritual slaughter by the Minotaur, the extraordinary scoring of Ariadne's visitation to the epileptic Oracle - a remarkable scene.

The orchestra is large and heavily augmented with an array of exotic percussion, including a bowel loosening tam-tam, temple gongs, bongos, glockenspiel... The cimbalom provides a twangy presence that cuts through ever shifting orchestral textures and louring brass. The alto-saxophone's sultry line exclusively accompanies Ariadne and recalls the vampish Lulu, though Ariadne is no temptress, more an animated caryatid.

The entire cast is exemplary. Christine Rice's Ariadne is on stage for almost the entire 150 minutes and sang the role with astonishing power, cutting through the dense orchestral textures. John Tomlinson's Minotaur is a very impressive performance, suited to the changes that have occurred in his voice. It's a quite an achievement to provoke sympathy for such a horrifying character. But more terrifying are the Kers, a brood of scavenging harpies who feed on the blood of the near and newly dead. These fearsome creatures make The Valkyries seem like genteel guests at a vicar's tea party.

I've no concept of how one conducts a work such as this. Ryan Wigglesworth replaced the indisposed Pappano. It is not music I would call beautiful, comprising of blocks of sound, but it is totally suited to its subject matter and it is spectacular to watch the music being made as well as hearing it. In Birtwistle's bleak and uncompromising realisation of a mythic universe, this is how the world ends - with a bang and a whimper, and a scream.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Superb post, Belgrove; thank you.

[Barbirollians]

They would have to pay me to go I am afraid - HB is one of my biggest musical deaf spots .

Together with Peter Maxwell Davies and the late Elliot carter .