Prom 52 (22.8.12): Prokofiev – Cinderella

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Wednesday 22 August at 7.00 p.m.
Royal Albert Hall

Prokofiev: Cinderella (105 min.)

London Symphony Orchestra
Valery Gergiev conductor

Valery Gergiev and the London Symphony Orchestra perform the complete score to Prokofiev's ballet Cinderella which contains some of the composer's most popular and melodious music.

This is a rare opportunity to hear Prokofiev's generously melodic fairy-tale ballet score in its full glory under the baton of a conductor steeped in the Russian ballet repertoire. It tells the famous fairytale of poor Cinderella who lives with her wicked stepsisters and goes to the ball after a make-over from a fairy and falls in love with the prince. Able to stay only till midnight when the spell wears off, she loses her slipper which the prince uses to find her again.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Wasn't it this combination of performers that gave us a magnificent Sleeping Beauty in a recent Proms season, then shattered the illusion by giving us a tampered-with (Drigo) Swan Lake?

No such complaints this time with Prokofiev's Cinderella.

[bluestateprommer]

Wasn't it this combination of performers that gave us a magnificent Sleeping Beauty in a recent Proms season, then shattered the illusion by giving us a tampered-with (Drigo) Swan Lake? No such complaints this time with Prokofiev's Cinderella.

No, it was VG and the Kirov/Mariinsky Orchestra last year with "The Complete Swan Lake (abridged)". We are definitely owed a truly complete performance of the complete Swan Lake, as PT wrote it. But back to the main topic: I caught most of this Cinderella, and it sounded pretty good. I have to say, however, that the interval break was very awkwardly placed, to make for a very long 1st half. I once saw a complete production in Amsterdam, and the break was much more appropriate for balanced running times, after Act I.

[Simon B]

Seemed like great care (and the LSO on reasonable form) lavished on something that isn't quite worth it. An instance where the/a suite is an improvement in concert on the complete thing - for example what Jurowski and LPO did in their Prokofiev festival in Jan. The best bits are vintage Prokofiev, but too much indistinguished padding seems to be present.

Saying all that, I may have been unreceptive due to fairly severe audience Hell on all sides.

[edashtav]

Seemed like great care (and the LSO on reasonable form) lavished on something that isn't quite worth it. An instance where the/a suite is an improvement in concert on the complete thing - for example what Jurowski and LPO did in their Prokofiev festival in Jan. The best bits are vintage Prokofiev, but too much indistinguished padding seems to be present.

Saying all that, I may have been unreceptive due to fairly severe audience Hell on all sides.

Spot on, Simon. Great to dance to, to do many things to, to hear but not TO LISTEN TO. The juicy tunes -e.g. the Waltz before the interval- grab you, but the prolix padding encourages housework.

[Flosshilde]

I rather feel that in this, & the music for Romeo & Juliet, Prokofiev concentrates on the tragedy. The music seems so ponderous & heavy. Of course, R&J is a tragedy, but it's also about two young people deliriously in love, which doesn't seem to be reflected in the music. As for Cinderella, perhaps he's thinking of the original 'Ashenpussy' version, with the ugly sisters forced to wear red-hot iron shoes?

[Ferretfancy]

It sounded splendid in the Arena, with a particularly exciting moment for the very large offstage band which rang around the hall. I like Cinderella, and have a couple of recordings, notably that by Rozhdestvensky, but I have to agree with comments about its success as a concert work. There is a great deal of music early in the first act which serves to advance the onstage plot but doesn't really feel satisfactory. The LSO were on very good form following Mr Flutterfingers and his toothpick though. Perhaps it would be better if somebody had devised a shorter version lasting about an hour containing the very best of the score for concert use. Prokofiev did devise three suites, after all.

[amac4165]

I rather feel that in this, & the music for Romeo & Juliet, he's thinking of the original 'Ashenpussy' version, with the ugly sisters forced to wear red-hot iron shoes?

In one version I think they cut their toes off to try and fit the shoes - who needs toes when as a Princess you will be carried everywhere ! says the mother

[jayne lee wilson]

Back too late for the start of this, too tired (and drained of response after the Leningrad...) to really get involved but the LSO had a real Rolls-Royce sound, slick, smooth, polished and very powerful...

The Happy Few have the "Audiophile Classics" sbm Gold cd of the Rozh recording, a marvellously improved remaster compared to the last Melodiya one. But yes, it's probably best not to eat it all at once...

[Nick Armstrong]

Spot on, Simon. Great to dance to, to do many things to, to hear but not TO LISTEN TO. The juicy tunes -e.g. the Waltz before the interval- grab you, but the prolix padding encourages housework.

I agree! Housework... or homework: I just posted this on the 'Stormy' thread in response to a question there, but it is even more relevant here:

There are note-spinning longueurs, perfectly pleasant but not enough for me to focus on all the time. It was good, as I am 'on call' this week for clients, and (being happily in a box) was able to sit back and do some work, with the music most agreeably filling the air - looking up to concentrate on the "good bits". (I did a lot of my A level revision with his "Romeo & Juliet" ballet on the gramophone - the full version by Previn. I like working to Prokofiev ballets).

I agree with Ferret: it did sound splendid (the LSO brass )

[bluestateprommer]

Having gone back to catch the bits that I missed before, I'm happy to confirm my first impression of a very fine performance from the LSO and VG of the complete Cinderella, one or two dodgy moments aside (par for a performance). However, as terrific as the tunes are, the catch is that SP repeats them too often in various orchestral guises, which one doesn't notice in a good staging (which was the case with the Assepoester that I saw in Amsterdam last century). The Amsterdam staging quite sensibly had the intermission at the end of Act I, with a bit of stage sparkle to send Cinders off to the ball with panache. This stage magic was matched by moment just after the 12 chimes at the end of Act II, where I still don't know how the staging managed to slip Cinderella out of her gown instantaneously into her old rags. Still, now at least The Proms can say that they've featured it complete.