Oh dear - the lamentations make for rather depressing reading. Fortunately, my ears have been telling me a somewhat different story during the last few weeks.
I don't really agree that this season is disappointing, or lacking in magic. Oddly enough, I was talking to a friend (another long time concertgoer) about this year's Proms and we both felt there had been a good number of very fine concerts - occasions that were well worth attending or watching/hearing on the BBC. I write this as someone who has been going to Proms since 1969. There were extraordinary concerts back then - Boult, Solti, Kempe, Mackerras...so many others - and these were undoubtedly very great musicians who did so much to enrich my musical experiences. But they're no longer with us, and musical life goes on. I should also say that as a season ticket holder during the 1970s, I went to quite a lot of dull and disappointing concerts back then too - there's nothing new about variable standards.
The 2011 season has been one I've mostly enjoyed so far. To take a few things at random: Haitink's two Brahms concerts would have been outstanding in any Prom year, Bychkov's Verdi Requiem was thrilling, the NYO concert with Jurowski is one of the best they've done for years, Jurowski's Faust Symphony concert (sorry, Petrushka) was a definite highlight, and curiosity seekers got to experience the "Gothic" Symphony - the sort of thing that's only ever likely to happen at something like the Proms. We got to hear a fascinating new edition of the Glagolitic Mass on the first night (only done once previously, in Vienna earlier this year), several programmes have been imaginative (the Elgar/Grainger/Strauss concert, for instance, putting choruses beside both familiar and unfamiliar pieces), and so on. Standard repertoire (such as most of what I've just mentioned) has been given fresh life rather than just gone through, and it's been great to have things like "Das klagende Lied", very well conducted and mostly very well sung - likewise the magnificent beast that is "Guillaume Tell". Visiting orchestras from Paris and Stockholm have acquitted themselves well, to say nothing of the COE, so I'm not inclined to grumble about visiting orchestras, especially as we have more to come.
On the whole, then, so far so good - and I'm looking forward to plenty more concerts in the rest of the season.
I don't really agree that this season is disappointing, or lacking in magic. Oddly enough, I was talking to a friend (another long time concertgoer) about this year's Proms and we both felt there had been a good number of very fine concerts - occasions that were well worth attending or watching/hearing on the BBC. I write this as someone who has been going to Proms since 1969. There were extraordinary concerts back then - Boult, Solti, Kempe, Mackerras...so many others - and these were undoubtedly very great musicians who did so much to enrich my musical experiences. But they're no longer with us, and musical life goes on. I should also say that as a season ticket holder during the 1970s, I went to quite a lot of dull and disappointing concerts back then too - there's nothing new about variable standards.
The 2011 season has been one I've mostly enjoyed so far. To take a few things at random: Haitink's two Brahms concerts would have been outstanding in any Prom year, Bychkov's Verdi Requiem was thrilling, the NYO concert with Jurowski is one of the best they've done for years, Jurowski's Faust Symphony concert (sorry, Petrushka) was a definite highlight, and curiosity seekers got to experience the "Gothic" Symphony - the sort of thing that's only ever likely to happen at something like the Proms. We got to hear a fascinating new edition of the Glagolitic Mass on the first night (only done once previously, in Vienna earlier this year), several programmes have been imaginative (the Elgar/Grainger/Strauss concert, for instance, putting choruses beside both familiar and unfamiliar pieces), and so on. Standard repertoire (such as most of what I've just mentioned) has been given fresh life rather than just gone through, and it's been great to have things like "Das klagende Lied", very well conducted and mostly very well sung - likewise the magnificent beast that is "Guillaume Tell". Visiting orchestras from Paris and Stockholm have acquitted themselves well, to say nothing of the COE, so I'm not inclined to grumble about visiting orchestras, especially as we have more to come.
On the whole, then, so far so good - and I'm looking forward to plenty more concerts in the rest of the season.
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