Prom 26 - 5.08.14: EUYO / London Voices, Petrenko

[teamsaint]

Just heading home via the tube.
Will try to post a few thoughts when I have a more time, and have calmed down.

A wonderful experience, and a demonstration of how music can lift the spirits with hope for the future.

[Dave2002]

I missed the Berio, but wow - what an orchestra - and loud, really loud, in the Shostakovich.
A huge ensemble, with over 100 players, and I've no idea what it might have sounded like on the radio. i did count around 30 microphones though.

Overall a very good performance I thought, though the last outburst about 5 mins before the end with the mad timpani was not as overwhelming as an earlier Proms performance conducted by Gergiev, which was the first time I heard this work. This time I was much closer to the action, so other parts of this symphony came through well. I'm still trying to figure this piece out.

[Simon B]

is the wrong, er, "word" for this, but again, @ RAH - this was

Coincidentally, that Gergiev performance referred to above was also the first time I heard this piece and nothing has - or could - equalled it.

Petrenko/EUYO's intensely involved and lucid performance was about as good as could reasonably be asked for IMO.

I'm still as baffled by the piece (in a good way) as I was in that astonishing febrile 2002? Kirov Prom.

[Roehre]

Oh yes! The Berio Sinfonia sounds like so much fun! Maybe not so much for the players, but certainly for me as a listener!

GO BERIO! You compose whatever the hell you want to!

[Blotto]

He'd obviously had too much orange squash before going on air tonight - earlier he had a couple of stabs at 'Luciano Berio' and 'phenomenological' and generally he seemed too hyperactive to be in safe charge of a microphone.

Apart from a couple of minor lapses in wind and brass (surely forgivable) this was an excellent concert. Certainly one of the best - in terms of clarity - performances of the Berio I've heard. But what shocking presentation. I dug out a cassette earlier today of a 1984 Proms performance of Sinfonia that I had attended and was struck by the sober, stick-to-the-script announcements. How I miss that. Tom Service is knowledgeable and often engagingly enthusiastic but this was just too much.

I could tell it was Service compering the evening by the gesticulations - even from the very back of the dress circle. For the Berio, I was in the gallery. I have the impression that the Sinfonia is a glass-bright/glass-sharp piece but the hall utterly blunted its points. Are the words intended to be intelligible? Even amplified, only half a dozen reached me. The Shostakovich was a bit of an ordeal. It was an enormous orchestra - I counted 12 double basses - but, at times, the orchestra failed to make an impact. It was a puzzling evening.

[Ferretfancy]

The last time I heard the Berio was at the Royal Festival Hall with the Swingle Singers, each voice on a hand held microphone as was the case tonight. It worked very well at that performance, and every strand of the orchestral contribution could be heard, with the numerous musical quotations in the extraordinary last movement.
Unfortunately this was not really the case in tonight;s performance, due to the cavernous sound of the amplified voices which frequently covered the orchestra. This was a pity, because all those interwoven snatches of Mahler, Strauss, Ravel, Stravinsky etc. are meant to be heard. Better at home maybe?

The Shostakovich was an excellent performance of a stunning work. I confess that I wasn't sure what Petrenko would make of it, because I was very disappointed with his Naxos recording with the RLPO, but all came well tonight. That wonderful coda was for once not played too fast, so that its sense of desolation really made the right impact.Every appearance of this orchestra is an event, and this was no exception.

[Nachtigall]

Every appearance of this orchestra is an event, and this was no exception.

A huge evening, in every way: a vast orchestra, with the biggest percussion section I think I've ever seen, and even the audience, despite a sparsely populated Circle, had filled out, defying earlier expectations of a relatively poorly attended Prom. I think there were many in the audience, especially the Arena, who were friends of the young orchestra members. I sat near the stage end of the third row of the Side Stalls, just behind two of the double bass players, and the young man who came and sat next to to me had flown over for the evening from Madrid, especially to see his girlfriend, a violist in the orchestra.

I confess I didn't enjoy the Berio. He may have amused himself writing the piece, but I found it on the whole unamusing and self-defeating. My Spanish neighbour in the Stalls described it as "musical positivism", whatever that means. Petrenko looked at times as though he'd rather have been conducting echt Mahler than the "recomposition" of Mahler 2 which is the basis of the third movement of Sinfonia. The Shostakovich, on the other hand, was riveting: expertly played (that blisteringly manic fugue for the strings in the first movement coming off superbly, for instance), shattering in its climaxes and mesmerising in its sombre conclusion. An uplifting evening, as someone has already said, particularly so, I think, because of the youthfulness of the players, all of whom, as the applause and enthusiastic roars eventually died down, leapt to their feet and flung their arms round each other as if at an end of term sixth form disco.

(What, one wonders, would happen if we withdrew from the EU? Would we no longer support this orchestra? Would young British musicians no longer qualify for its ranks? If so, that would be another shame to add to the present Government's record. I note that ironically there are several Tories on the Honorary Committee, including the egregious Michael Gove.)

[Dave2002]

A huge evening, in every way: a vast orchestra, with the biggest percussion section I think I've ever seen, and even the audience, despite a sparsely populated Circle, had filled out, defying earlier expectations of a relatively poorly attended Prom. I think there were many in the audience, especially the Arena, who were friends of the young orchestra members. I sat near the stage end of the third row of the Side Stalls, just behind two of the double bass players, and the young man who came and sat next to to me had flown over for the evening from Madrid, especially to see his girlfriend, a violist in the orchestra.

This orchestra was very good indeed. Presumably it is composed of young professionals. I will check. Definitely support and go to hear this orchestra if it comes again. http://www.euyo.org.uk/

The audience at lower levels looked OK, but peering up into the circle there were many more empty seats than occupied ones. Sad!

Was this because of the music played, or the orchestra? The prommers in the arena looked older (on average) than in previous years, too.

[teamsaint]

As FF mentioned, my main problem with the Berio was the inaudubility of too much of the spoken parts. Maybe they got lost in the mix with the audience dampening the acoustic as compared to rehearsal time? That apart it is an extraordinary experience, and pulled off with great skill all round. It must be a difficult work to perform. As for the work itself, one could post many thoughts , but people will have their own opinions. It is so different from so much else that gets to the concert platform that it is striking for this alone. Each performance must certainly be an "occasion". Good, bold programming, and had the audience part intrigued, part gripped.
Don't have much to say about the DSCH other than to reiterate how fabulous it was, really from beginning to end. The energy of the orchestra was a sight to see, and Petrenko was masterly. My first time seeing him, and I sincerely hope not my last. The band must have loved playing for him.
A huge and heartfelt ovation, and a lovely reaction from the players at the very end.

A heart warming,top class , five star evening .

[mlb7171]

I seem to remember that the text was much clearer when Pappano and Santa Caecelia performed it, with the Swingles, in 2007.

[Nachtigall]

Review by David Gutman, with an interesting footnote by David Nice:

http://www.theartsdesk.com/classical-music/prom-26-european-union-youth-orchestra-london-voices-petrenko

[Roehre]

As FF mentioned, my main problem with the Berio was the inaudubility of too much of the spoken parts. Maybe they got lost in the mix with the audience dampening the acoustic as compared to rehearsal time? That apart it is an extraordinary experience, and pulled off with great skill all round. It must be a difficult work to perform. As for the work itself, one could post many thoughts , but people will have their own opinions. It is so different from so much else that gets to the concert platform that it is striking for this alone. Each performance must certainly be an "occasion". Good, bold programming, and had the audience part intrigued, part gripped......

It is not a work more difficult to perform than most of the other Berio orchestral works.
It is however very difficult to balance, because of -as you say- the audibility of the spoken texts.
The soloists have to be miked anyway (as requested by Berio), but where the speakers are placed without interfering with the orchestra is a real problem to solve. The acoustics of the RAH are very tricky.
As Chailly recorded the work with the Concertgebouworkest (Decca, 1990) it took the very experienced Philips sound engineers a whole day to get it right, and the Concertgebouw's acoustics are far less temperamental than RAH's. For comparison: the set-up for the Folk songs with which the Sinfonia is coupled on the Chailly CD required only 15 minutes of probing and testing.

[HighlandDougie]

with an interesting footnote by David Nice:

[

Many thanks, Nachtigall, for the link. I couldn't agree more with David Nice: what a wasted opportunity not to have filmed this concert for television. I can only suppose that the combination of Berio and Shostakovich was deemed "too modern" by the powers that be in the BBC, regardless of the combination of charismatic conductor and young orchestra. Really rather depressing.

[amateur51]

Many thanks, Nachtigall, for the link. I couldn't agree more with David Nice: what a wasted opportunity not to have filmed this concert for television. I can only suppose that the combination of Berio and Shostakovich was deemed "too modern" by the powers that be in the BBC, regardless of the combination of charismatic conductor and young orchestra. Really rather depressing.

Oh dear what a terrible decision.

However the BBC does already have a tremendous film of Rozhdestvensky conducting BBCSO at the Proms '78 in Shostakovich symphony no.4, even if Medici Arts appears to own the title

http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/r/Medici%2BArts/3085278

[Dave2002]

On the way out to the bus stop, I passed someone with a T shirt proclaiming "Havergal Brian Lives."

Anyone here own up to that one?