Not the most committed of balletomanes, I often take greatest pleasure at performances, not from the goings-on on stage, but from the music itself, especially when played by a good live orchestra. Not that many ballets have first-rate music – it’s only Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Ravel and Stravinsky that for me can be relied upon in that department.
However, I looked forward with great anticipation to the new ballet The Red Shoes, based on the classic Pressburger and Powell film of 1948, partly, perhaps principally, because it was to feature Bernard Herrmann’s outstanding music from a wide range of fine movies, many of them directed by Hitchcock.
Imagine my disappointment, arriving at the Hippodrome in Birmingham, in discovering that the orchestra pit was empty. We were to be served up a pre-recorded soundtrack by the New Adventures Orchestra – pre-recorded, according to the programme, only in January. So the new ballet’s première and subsequent run in December at Sadler’s Wells had taken place with full orchestra and conductor in attendance, as had its early performances on tour.
But by the time it reached the Second City, the pit was a dark hole, the loudspeakers blaring Herrmann’s music stridently.
Did choreographer-impresario Sir Matthew Bourne assume that Brummies would not notice, or would not care, or would not know the difference? Did the members of the orchestra prefer to spend more time with their families? Was the Musicians Union asleep?
Perhaps in future we might look forward to fully recorded opera at Covent Garden with the singers miming their roles, or indeed Sir Simon Rattle conducting one of his own recordings of Beethoven’s Choral Symphony at the Barbican, the singers and musicians kindly given the evening off?
However, I looked forward with great anticipation to the new ballet The Red Shoes, based on the classic Pressburger and Powell film of 1948, partly, perhaps principally, because it was to feature Bernard Herrmann’s outstanding music from a wide range of fine movies, many of them directed by Hitchcock.
Imagine my disappointment, arriving at the Hippodrome in Birmingham, in discovering that the orchestra pit was empty. We were to be served up a pre-recorded soundtrack by the New Adventures Orchestra – pre-recorded, according to the programme, only in January. So the new ballet’s première and subsequent run in December at Sadler’s Wells had taken place with full orchestra and conductor in attendance, as had its early performances on tour.
But by the time it reached the Second City, the pit was a dark hole, the loudspeakers blaring Herrmann’s music stridently.
Did choreographer-impresario Sir Matthew Bourne assume that Brummies would not notice, or would not care, or would not know the difference? Did the members of the orchestra prefer to spend more time with their families? Was the Musicians Union asleep?
Perhaps in future we might look forward to fully recorded opera at Covent Garden with the singers miming their roles, or indeed Sir Simon Rattle conducting one of his own recordings of Beethoven’s Choral Symphony at the Barbican, the singers and musicians kindly given the evening off?
The most effective action though was from a principal player in the BBC Philharmonic who took his children to the Manchester pantomime and then took the production company to court under the Trades Description Act. The court found for the plaintiff against the production company.
So ???
Comment