Non-native conductors

[cloughie]

Andrew, I think was getting in the way, here. He was, like how some Nritish critics saying, how can foreign orchestras, etc, play British music? You need to be a British outfit to play British music, which s a fallacy. This is what Andrew was, basically, saying.

Turning this question on its end I often wondered why Claudio Abbado as MD of the LSO played little British music.

[Maclintick]

Turning this question on its end I often wondered why Claudio Abbado as MD of the LSO played little British music.

None, IIRC. You might ask the same question of recent incumbents at other UK orchestras...

[RichardB]

It's an interesting question. Can only the Czech Phil play Dvorak, or the VPO Johann Strauss ? For some the answer might be in the affirmative, but Prokofiev, who was widely-travelled in the West & returned to the USSR in the late autumn of 1934 having been denounced along with Stravinsky as a "bourgeois cosmopolitan" by the Soviet authorities, would have been very familiar with the sonorities of European & American orchestras, unlike DSCH, who spent most of his life in the USSR.

I think all of those composers (indeed all composers!) would recognise that there is no one way for their music to be played, according to whatever their national playing style might be, added to which of course any leading professional orchestra these days will contain musicians from many different countries, and, for this reason and others, are much less different from one another than they used to be a hundred or even fifty years ago. As for Shostakovich, my OH is of the opinion that the reason why he always writes for two harps which are almost exclusively in unison was that he was writing for inadequate Soviet harps and that was the only way they could be heard, so that these days there's no reason to have the second harp there at all. Russian or English music sounds Russian or English because of the way it's written much more than because of the way it's played.

[RichardB]

Turning this question on its end I often wondered why Claudio Abbado as MD of the LSO played little British music.

But the LSO did play plenty of British music under other conductors during that period, so he probably felt there was no need for him to wade into unfamiliar repertoire that people had quite fixed ideas about. Look at the way Sinopoli was treated when he conducted Elgar.

[BBMmk2]

But the LSO did play plenty of British music under other conductors during that period, so he probably felt there was no need for him to wade into unfamiliar repertoire that people had quite fixed ideas about. Look at the way Sinopoli was treated when he conducted Elgar.

Plus there’s that old adage that certain people say, only British orchestras can play British music, which of course is total pah!

[cloughie]

But the LSO did play plenty of British music under other conductors during that period, so he probably felt there was no need for him to wade into unfamiliar repertoire that people had quite fixed ideas about. Look at the way Sinopoli was treated when he conducted Elgar.

How was Sinoploli treated - I thought he did a good job! Sinaisky did some Lovely Elgar with the BBC regional orchestras - Rozhdestvensky’s RVW was excellent - the list goes on. My real point was that Abbado’s Mahler may have led to some very good interpretations of Elgar’s Symphonies - but alas this was never to be! I think that Rattle felt it appropriate to play some German music with the BPO….

[RichardB]

How was Sinopoli treated

I remember he was very often given a very hard time by London critics when he was at the Philharmonia. I'm sure you can find plenty of evidence for that if you're interested in looking for it. For now, this is from the Gramophone review of his ELgar 2nd Symphony recording:

I do not believe, as some of my colleagues evidently do, that one can dismiss Sinopoli as a musician of no account. Plainly, he is a highly intelligent conductor who looks at a score and gives us what he finds there, with no pre-conceptions. But he has mistaken Elgar's nobilmente for Bruckner's maestoso. (...) He turns the Larghetto into a dirge, draining it of its noble anguish, and in the first movement all Elgar's indications of vivace, animato, impetuoso are ignored because the basic pulse is too languid. Sinopoli has no conception, it would seem, of the energy in Elgar's music. He sees only the tragedy and brings it into the foreground. (...) the art of interpreting an Elgar symphony is to cohere all those short melodic repetitions and sequences into a spontaneous whole which then sounds like a broadly conceived panoramic canvas. This is what has eluded Sinopoli. From him we get the trees, but not (as yet) the wood.

Which comes across, to me at least, as "bloody Italians, coming over 'ere and misinterpreting our precious English music"! Not that I care much about Elgar; but maybe Abbado thought it wasn't worth the effort.

[cloughie]

I remember he was very often given a very hard time by London critics when he was at the Philharmonia. I'm sure you can find plenty of evidence for that if you're interested in looking for it. For now, this is from the Gramophone review of his ELgar 2nd Symphony recording: Which comes across, to me at least, as "bloody Italians, coming over 'ere and misinterpreting our precious English music"! Not that I care much about Elgar; but maybe Abbado thought it wasn't worth the effort.

I’ll give Sinopoli’s No2 another listen - and No1 too and see what I hear.

[Cockney Sparrow]

Some admirers of Sinopoli on these boards - I recall Beef O in particular. I have listened to his Elgar, and happily, but can't claim it was with a critical mindset. But the received opinion that I recall, is that he was treated unfairly in respect of his performances of British music. Critics can be a partisan bunch in my estimation - and not always so very objective (as in never upset the Ben Britten / Peter Pears axis etc etc).

[Barbirollians]

Some admirers of Sinopoli on these boards - I recall Beef O in particular. I have listened to his Elgar, and happily, but can't claim it was with a critical mindset. But the received opinion that I recall, is that he was treated unfairly in respect of his performances of British music. Critics can be a partisan bunch in my estimation - and not always so very objective (as in never upset the Ben Britten / Peter Pears axis etc etc).

I quite enjoyed his Elgar symphonies - more the First than Second though . His In The South overture is a delight.

[mathias broucek]

I quite enjoyed his Elgar symphonies - more the First than Second though . His In The South overture is a delight.

The First and In The South are both excellent. The Second is interesting but very unorthodox.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I've moved these posts to this new thread, as we're moving off-topic.

[Barbirollians]

Didn’t Klemperer refuse to conduct the Enigma Variations at the Festival of Britain ?

There have of course been other non-native conductors who conducted plenty of British music - Haitink ,Menuhin come to mind , Mitropoulos and Bernstein conducted some VW symphonies , HVK seems to have been a fan of The Planets etc.

[Bryn]

Didn’t Klemperer refuse to conduct the Enigma Variations at the Festival of Britain ?

There have of course been other non-native conductors who conducted plenty of British music - Haitink ,Menuhin come to mind , Mitropoulos and Bernstein conducted some VW symphonies , HVK seems to have been a fan of The Planets etc.

The latter even conducted Walton's 1st, though he did cut it.