Prom 39: Ligeti / Bartók / Beethoven, Budapest Festival Orch., Sun. 13 Aug. 2023

[bluestateprommer]

Sunday 13 August 2023
19:30
Royal Albert Hall

Ligeti: Mysteries of the Macabre (first performance at The Proms)
Bartók: Piano Concerto No. 3
[Encore: Bartók: Three Rondos on Slovak Folk Tunes - Rondo No. 1)]

interval

Beethoven: Symphony No. 3 in Eb, op. 55 ('Eroica')
[Encore: Fanny Mendelssohn: "Schnell fliehen die Schatten" (first performance at The Proms)]

Anna-Lena Elbert, soprano (Proms debut artist)
Sir András Schiff, piano

Budapest Festival Orchestra
Iván Fischer, conductor

https://www.bbc.co.uk/events/ewb84f

https://www.royalalberthall.com/tickets/proms/bbc-proms-2023/prom-39-ligeti-bartok-and-beethoven/

[french frank]

Next Sunday's evening concert (Aug 13th) at 19:30

"Iván Fischer, his Budapest Festival Orchestra and soprano Anna-Lena Elbert mark the 100th anniversary of one of the 20th century’s great originals with Mysteries of the Macabre – three arias from Ligeti’s opera Le Grand Macabre that explode in a cartoonish riot of irony and remarkable technique.

Meanwhile Sir András Schiff is the soloist in Bartók’s Third Piano Concerto, an exquisite, elegiac musical farewell. Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ Symphony ends the programme: a passionate, provocative statement of musical and human possibility." [RAH website]

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[Bryn]

Let's not forget Elgar's major role in the Ligeti.

[Ein Heldenleben]

That Ligeti must be one of the most demanding vocal pieces ever written. The orchestra and Ivan Fischer have put in some sterling work today. I hope they are laying on some Tokaji back stage . Bravi tutti …

[oddoneout]

That Ligeti must be one of the most demanding vocal pieces ever written. The orchestra and Ivan Fischer have put in some sterling work today. I hope they are laying on some Tokaji back stage . Bravi tutti …

I came in partway through the Ligeti and was quite astonished at what I heard - will have to look out for the repeat.
Afraid I wasn't too gripped by Schiff's Bartok, but listening again might change my immediate impression.
As you say the orchestra has been busy. I heard most of the afternoon audience choice concert, and it sounded great fun. Who(or possibly what)ever wrote up the post-concert music list for the R3 schedule has not made a very good job of it though.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I came in partway through the Ligeti and was quite astonished at what I heard - will have to look out for the repeat.
Afraid I wasn't too gripped by Schiff's Bartok, but listening again might change my immediate impression.
As you say the orchestra has been busy. I heard most of the afternoon audience choice concert, and it sounded great fun. Who(or possibly what)ever wrote up the post-concert music list for the R3 schedule has not made a very good job of it though.

Yes the one thing that struck me was that sorting out what the audience wanted seemed to take longer than it took their hyper efficient librarian Tibor (?) to find the scores amongst the row of 257 separate parts in a row there and distribute them.

[Maclintick]

After such an eloquent & vibrant performance of the Eroica, I am reminded of Hans Keller's observation that had Beethoven died after composing this symphony he would still have been admitted to the pantheon of truly great composers, and that this work would have ranked as highly as any, before or since.

[edashtav]

That Ligeti must be one of the most demanding vocal pieces ever written. The orchestra and Ivan Fischer have put in some sterling work today. I hope they are laying on some Tokaji back stage . Bravi tutti …

Seconded! What fun!

Fischer and Schiff have been playing Bartok’s final piano concerto seemingly from the year dot. They know it inside out but neither’s passion for digging for truffles never dims. I lost count how many times I thought, ‘ooh, I’ve not noticed that before!’. They search for a perfection beyond the reach of mere mortals. I loved their partnership.

[gradus]

I thought the Eroica was terrific especially the first movement with tremendous drive through the closing bars, so exciting.

[Pulcinella]

Seconded! What fun!

Fischer and Schiff have been playing Bartok’s final piano concerto seemingly from the year dot. They know it inside out but neither’s passion for digging for truffles never dims. I lost count how many times I thought, ‘ooh, I’ve not noticed that before!’. They search for a perfection beyond the reach of mere mortals. I loved their partnership.

I did too, but had it been the first time I'd heard the piece I'm not sure how taken with it I would have been.
It seemed to lack some sparkle.

[Bryn]

I did too, but had it been the first time I'd heard the piece I'm not sure how taken with it I would have been.
It seemed to lack some sparkle.

I have only now got around to listening to this Prom and for me, it was very much like hearing the Bartok for the first time. Both Schiff and Fischer brought out aspects of dynamics and phrasing which pricked up my ears. I will have to listen again, this time with the score in from of me to try and follow just what they were up to. It was good to hear Elgar Howarth's role in the creation of Mysteries of the Macabre reference, if all too briefly, following the performance. I have not yet got to the Beethoven. Just one very minor niggle with Petroc's presentation; the 3rd Piano Concerto was not the last work Bartok completed. He did not quite complete it. That task fell to Tibor Serly who sorted out the final 17 bars.

[LHC]

I did too, but had it been the first time I'd heard the piece I'm not sure how taken with it I would have been.
It seemed to lack some sparkle.

I was there with friends on Sunday. One of our party had not heard the Bartok before and was a bit apprehensive beforehand as she had not always liked the Bartok pieces she had heard. However, she was very taken with the Piano Concerto and thought it was wonderful.

[Pulcinella]

I was there with friends on Sunday. One of our party had not heard the Bartok before and was a bit apprehensive beforehand as she had not always liked the Bartok pieces she had heard. However, she was very taken with the Piano Concerto and thought it was wonderful.

That's good to know!
Previous knowledge and expectations can be a curse sometimes.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I was there with friends on Sunday. One of our party had not heard the Bartok before and was a bit apprehensive beforehand as she had not always liked the Bartok pieces she had heard. However, she was very taken with the Piano Concerto and thought it was wonderful.

It’s a good deal more “approachable” than the much louder, virtuosic and more percussive 2nd. Really pared down esp the second movement where the simple piano chord voicings and abrupt modulations always remind of jazz pianists like Bill Evans.

[Bryn]

It’s a good deal more “approachable” than the much louder, virtuosic and more percussive 2nd. Really pared down esp the second movement where the simple piano chord voicings and abrupt modulations always remind of jazz pianists like Bill Evans.

When, around the time of my 15th birthday, we moved to Bracknell, I had to drop music from my 'O' level studies and restart Biology, due to curriculum clashes (singing was not accepted as a valid performance medium at Windsor Grammar). However, I got to know a fellow pupil who was considered a good enough pianist to be permitted to use the school hall's grand during lunch times. He was fond of Book 6 of Bartok's Mikrocosmos, particularly Diary of a Fly. I raised the question of the Bartok piano concertos with him, of which, at the time, I had only heard the 3rd. He advised me that the first two were pretty much unplayable. Fortunately, I soon discovered how wrong he was, thanks to the Sandor recordings on the Vox Turnabout label.