Bruckner 6

[Barbirollians]

I am afraid I cannot abide Stephen Johnson's delivery in this - let alone his frequently oleaginous compliments to the orchestra.

I cannot remember which programme it was but a few months back he fawned over some of the sourest oboe playing I had heard in ages.

[french frank]

Sorry Frankie, I can get a bit waspish, especially on Mondays.

Alison, I can't even work out what my cryptic comment meant.

On Barbirollians' point about delivery: what really struck me was what a bad idea it is - from the radio listener's point of view - to have a live audience. The whole commentary becomes a performance - a more declamatory delivery because there's a hallful of people (there's a video of one programme on the website, SJ perched up on a stool, on the podium beside the orchestra, talking out to the audience). And, yes, with the audience and the orchestra there the presenter also becomes a Raffertian host, politely thanking the orchestra on behalf of the audience. The overall feeling is that he's talking to the live audience, not to the listener at home for whom the more intimate one-to-one style is preferred.

Question: for the radio listener, wouldn't the Discovering Music bit be just as good (better?) with a studio recorded programme and recorded extracts, as previously? The whole work can be a 'live' performance (it isn't as if the programme goes out live, so we only get an 'as live' recording anyway).

[rank_and_file]

ff

You pose a very good question.

I dare say many of us were very used to the “Talking about Music” narrated by Antony Hopkins that ran for many years.

My recollection was that there was no live audience and the examples played were by Hopkins on the piano with illustrative excerpts from records. Thus the communication was directly from Hopkins to the individual listener at home. I do not think the whole work was played at the end - thus giving far more time for erudite analysis and musical examples.

Now, I do stand to be corrected on my recollections - getting into the age when I am allowed the odd “senior moment.”

Presupposing my memory is correct, I much prefer the lack of a live audience and orchestra, to SJ or whosoever having certain musical extracts played and, in essence, having conversations with the audience and orchestra leaving the radio listener as some sort of audio voyeur.

I want SJ (or whoever) to speak to me and to draw me in. The present format does not allow this, and it is yet another programme to which I very rarely listen.

[Petrushka]

ff

You pose a very good question.

I dare say many of us were very used to the “Talking about Music” narrated by Antony Hopkins that ran for many years.

My recollection was that there was no live audience and the examples played were by Hopkins on the piano with illustrative excerpts from records. Thus the communication was directly from Hopkins to the individual listener at home. I do not think the whole work was played at the end - thus giving far more time for erudite analysis and musical examples.

Now, I do stand to be corrected on my recollections - getting into the age when I am allowed the odd “senior moment.”

Presupposing my memory is correct, I much prefer the lack of a live audience and orchestra, to SJ or whosoever having certain musical extracts played and, in essence, having conversations with the audience and orchestra leaving the radio listener as some sort of audio voyeur.

I want SJ (or whoever) to speak to me and to draw me in. The present format does not allow this, and it is yet another programme to which I very rarely listen.

Your memory is correct re Talking about Music. The only thing I would add is that the work discussed usually appeared on R3 at some point during the week.

[french frank]

It just struck me that they've got it the wrong way round: Discovering Music should be studio-based and the evening concert should have 'live presentation'.

[Petrushka]

It just struck me that they've got it the wrong way round: Discovering Music should be studio-based and the evening concert should have 'live presentation'.

[3rd Viennese School]

I found the programme interesting but it did sound like Bruckner tried something different in Symphony no.6 but got it all wrong.
This is one of my least favourite Bruckner symphonies and Stephen Johnson tried to explain why it’s so bad. Double speeds, the wrong dominants- it makes you think, you know. Well, no!
Symphony no.5 was barely mentioned –that symphony is different to no.3. So he did change his symphonic ideas BEFORE the composition of no.6.

No.5 is my favourite Bruckner symphony IMO so I was always wondering why no.6 ,right next door to it, was so bad.

A few things that are good. The main theme of mvt 1,and the coda of mvt 2 which was mentioned.
The scherzo is quite weak compared to his others (including no.1!). The finale is another one of those tune after tune after tune, all different speeds, do talk among yourselves during this ,etc etc.

Despite all this, still an interesting and enjoyable programme. However, a little bit of fantasy got in the way here, I think.

3VS

[Master Jacques]

Bruckner 6; "sassy" (says Katie)

... or so that fount of wisdom Katie Derham informed us in her sunny introduction to the BBC Philharmonic's performance this afternoon under Juanjo Mena.

She was also at pains to point out that it was really amazingly short and snappy ... but leaving that aside, I would love to know what Bruckner REALLY said about his 6th Symphony, and whether "sassy" is close enough not to get Katie prosecuted under the Trades Description Act.

Any Brucknerites out there with an answer?

(I felt the performance itself warmed up nicely, after a shaky first movement on auto-pilot.)

[french frank]

It's one of those words I keep having to look up to remind myself what it means. Not having done so atm I'm in some doubt. Is it the same as 'saucy'?

[Flosshilde]

According to the Oxford on-line dictionary it means "lively, bold, and full of spirit; cheeky". I don't know Bruckner's 6th (nor his 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc) so can't say if it fits that description. As for "short & snappy", those aren't words I'd associate with B's symphonies. Perhaps she said comparitively short & snappy, or short & snappy for Bruckner?

[ostuni]

'Die sechste ist die keckste' was apparently Bruckner's own verdict, but I haven't got chapter and verse at hand.

[Richard Barrett]

Bruckner described his 6th as his "keckste Symphonie", his "cheekiest symphony", although he was clearly making a play on words with "sechste" ("sixth") so it isn't at all clear whether he actually thought it was in any way cheeky, which (naturally) it isn't, so I doubt it, I think he was having a little joke, even composers do that sometimes. So the announcement is dumbing-down by omission more than by commission.

[ahinton]

For some unaccountable reason, such an assertion sounds to me rather more akin to the kind that one might expect to be made by Katie Derham than to the sort of assessment that one might have expected to hear from the composer himself - and the question inevitably arises as to the word that Bruckner actually used in his remark (if indeed he made it) of which "sassy" is supposedly an English translation. "Symphony No. 6 in A major: The Sassy". Hmmm. Something a little rotten in the state of Austria, one might be tempted to suspect...

[Anna]

I've just fast fowarded to 32.22 on iplayer, she did say Bruckner thought it sassy but she also said "It's quite fast for Bruckner" rather than "short and snappy" (unless it's been edited)

[ahinton]

Bruckner described his 6th as his "keckste Symphonie", his "cheekiest symphony", although he was clearly making a play on words with "sechste" ("sixth") so it isn't at all clear whether he actually thought it was in any way cheeky, which (naturally) it isn't, so I doubt it, I think he was having a little joke, even composers do that sometimes. So the announcement is dumbing-down by omission more than by commission.

Ah, yes - thanks for that! The announcement is certainly commensurate with a general sense of dumbing-down - at the practical promotion of which certain R3 announcers / presenters seem to be somewhat more obviously adept than others...