Britten's 3rd String Quartet

[ardcarp]

I really enjoyed the Belcea's performance of this from Monday's (live from the Wigmore) lunchtime concert.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000367k

(Begins about halfway through after the Haydn)

I've always been struck by the final movement Serenissima. It's clearly valedictory; so incredibly calm and meditative, and the work of a great craftsman. It almost foreshadows minimalism so spare is his material. A wonderful piece, played with such tendresse.

[Richard Tarleton]

I really enjoyed the Belcea's performance of this from Monday's (live from the Wigmore) lunchtime concert.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000367k

(Begins about halfway through after the Haydn)

I've always been struck by the final movement Serenissima. It's clearly valedictory; so incredibly calm and meditative, and the work of a great craftsman. It almost foreshadows minimalism so spare is his material. A wonderful piece, played with such tendresse.

It is indeed, I enjoyed their performance (likewise of the Haydn). Their recording of the 3 Britten quartets is very fine, IMV. Britten died in the early hours of 4 December 1976, the first performance by the Amadeus (which I was at) was on 19th December, in The Maltings. They'd worked on it with him in The Red House at the end of September. Norbert Brainin announced a 2 minute silence before they started.

So the Belcea now play from tablets

[Edgy 2]

I really enjoyed the Belcea's performance of this from Monday's (live from the Wigmore) lunchtime concert.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000367k

(Begins about halfway through after the Haydn)

I've always been struck by the final movement Serenissima. It's clearly valedictory; so incredibly calm and meditative, and the work of a great craftsman. It almost foreshadows minimalism so spare is his material. A wonderful piece, played with such tendresse.

An absolute masterpiece IMVHO.
I can sense a failing heartbeat in the rhythm of the music towards the end of the last movement and almost hear the words ‘I’m dying’ in the 3 note falling phrases

[LMcD]

I share the enthusiasm of others for this work - and for yesterday's performance, although I'm very happy with my Naxos recording with the Maggini Quartet.

[DracoM]

I really enjoyed the Belcea's performance of this from Monday's (live from the Wigmore) lunchtime concert.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000367k

(Begins about halfway through after the Haydn)

I've always been struck by the final movement Serenissima. It's clearly valedictory; so incredibly calm and meditative, and the work of a great craftsman. It almost foreshadows minimalism so spare is his material. A wonderful piece, played with such tendresse.

[jayne lee wilson]

I really enjoyed the Belcea's performance of this from Monday's (live from the Wigmore) lunchtime concert.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000367k

(Begins about halfway through after the Haydn)

I've always been struck by the final movement Serenissima. It's clearly valedictory; so incredibly calm and meditative, and the work of a great craftsman. It almost foreshadows minimalism so spare is his material. A wonderful piece, played with such tendresse.

Britten's 3rd Quartet dates from 1975, so do bear in mind that Terry Riley's In C dates from 1964, and Steve Reich had written several works we would now call something like "classical minimalism" before 1970, including Violin Phase, Piano Phase, etc...

[LeMartinPecheur]

IIRC from something said before a performance of this work, this quartet, presumably in the final movement La Serenissima, quotes one particular Venice bell-tune that BB heard when staying there during its composition. What is odd and treasurable is that this tune is only heard one day a year, in commemoration of a particular Venetian escape from plague, and it just happened that he got lucky with this serendipitous link to his Death in Venice. He may not even have known of it himself.

Would the church be Santa Maria della Salute which hosts such a festival each 21 November, commemorating the end of the plague of 1630-31?

PS The link to Santa Maria looks plausible: according to Humphrey Carpenter (pp 574-5), Britten wrote the last movement while on holiday in Venice in late November 1975. But I can't find any mention online of its having a one-day-a-year bell And I guess another Venice church might commemorate the same event, even though Santa Maria was built specifically to mark it?

[ardcarp]

So the Belcea now play from tablets

I've seen a couple of Musicals where the MD conducts from a tablet. One can only assume that they know their stuff so well that they could carry on if the Gremlins struck. Personally, it would scare me ****less. Do they have an assistant offstage who does the cyber equivalent of page turning? Or do they whisper 'Alexa' every so often?

[Richard Tarleton]

I've seen a couple of Musicals where the MD conducts from a tablet. One can only assume that they know their stuff so well that they could carry on if the Gremlins struck. Personally, it would scare me ****less. Do they have an assistant offstage who does the cyber equivalent of page turning? Or do they whisper 'Alexa' every so often?

I sat just behind Angela Hewitt playing Bk1 of the 48 with a tablet - she evidently turned the page with a pedal device on the floor next to her left foot.... She probably knows it by heart, perhaps just a prompt....

[Edgy 2]

I saw Louis Lortie play Saint-Seans 3rd Piano Concerto at the BBC Philharmonic studio a few weeks ago.
He was reading the music from an I pad and his ‘page turner’ was using the pedal.

[Richard Tarleton]

Indeed - it being Bach, the Blessed Angela would not have needed her pedalling foot for the piano, so could operate it for herself. She did have a roadie to set it up.