Prom 1: First Night of the Proms (17.07.15)

[Tony Halstead]

I have:-

271,450,451,453,456,459 Ashkenazy
466,488,491,537,595 Curzon(Beautiful playing)
467,503 Bishop(As he then was)

"Wot, no"
Barenboim
Perahia
Uchida
or
Bilson
Levin
?

[Nick Armstrong]

KD in metallic trouser outfit and glistening decolletage

Just watched the very start of my recording... La Derham must have been spitting feathers if she heard it too: the BBC2 continuity announcer said that the concert was to be presented by

Kate Durham



Brand Derham hasn't quite got the reach she might have hoped!

[peterkin]

"Wot, no"
Barenboim
Perahia
Uchida
or
Bilson
Levin
?

Sorry, I am a bit long in the tooth and although I have heard many examples of those,I still get greatest satisfaction from the ones listed

[waldo]

Caliban and Roehre: I share your view that something strange has happened to WAM by K595, and for me this also applies to the clarinet concerto. These works are somehow too perfect, marmoreal; WAM has lost his free-flowing spontaneity and fantasy.

For me this applies to other late 'masterpieces' too - I've never been that thrilled by the last str. 5tet, and much prefer the 6 'Haydn' 4tets to the 'Prussians'.

But Caliban, keep trying with K503, one of my favourites

I agree about the final quartets, but surely you mean to exclude the Magic Flute and the Requiem?

As for the piano concertos, there is a very definite change in style - a deliberate move away from complexity towards something a bit more "romantic". But I would have said this happens after the 25th, which clearly belongs with the great ones which went before it. For those who aren't too fussed by the 25th, it might be worth revisting the last movement, which may be the greatest he wrote - non-stop "fantasy" and invention; also a heart-stopping gear-change about three minutes in, to a gorgeous slow melody with a descending cello passage. For me, among the most magical moments in all music.......

[french frank]

Brand Derham hasn't quite got the reach she might have hoped!

Bit like Radio 4 calling RW 'Robin Wright' when he left Still, that's history - we've got that Albert Davey now.

[wenotsoira]

Who is Albert Davey? Never heard of him. Must be some god awful conductor.

[Barbirollians]

Sorry, I am a bit long in the tooth and although I have heard many examples of those,I still get greatest satisfaction from the ones listed

The SBK/LSO/Davis record of nos 21 & 25 is Superb
!

[LeMartinPecheur]

I agree about the final quartets, but surely you mean to exclude the Magic Flute and the Requiem?

As for the piano concertos, there is a very definite change in style - a deliberate move away from complexity towards something a bit more "romantic".

waldo: yep, duly excluded

I don't hear the change in style in K595 and 622 as being "towards something a bit more romantic" at all: the opposite, towards a much tighter, more limited (pseudo-?) classicism.

[waldo]

waldo: yep, duly excluded

I don't hear the change in style in K595 and 622 as being "towards something a bit more romantic" at all: the opposite, towards a much tighter, more limited (pseudo-?) classicism.

Well, I'm not sure these labels - classical, romantic - are all that useful, but it may be that what you see as "lighter" etc, might be seen as "romantic" by others. This is certainly Charle's Rosen's view. I was just looking through his comment on these concertos in "The Classical Style". No 26 he calles "the most progressive of all Mozart's works, the closest to the early or proto-Romantic style of Hummel and Weber." His reason for this seems to boil down to the fact that in this concerto - and in No.27 - Mozart "shifts the balance between harmonic and melodic aspects so that the structure now depends largely on melodic succession." He goes on to claim that, "It was not Beethoven but Mozart who showed how the classical style might be destroyed" - specifically referring to these two concertos.

That kind of analysis is a bit beyond my pay grade, but for me the "romantic" aspect seems most apparent not just in overall feel, but in the lyricism and the use of chromaticism. Rosen (again) claims that the development section of first movement of No.27 "pushes classical tonality as far as it will go."

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Indisputedly 'great', IMV, are:
K271
K449
K453
K459
K466
K467
K482
K488
K491
K503
K595

I couldn't agree more.

[David-G]

So I would have done. To paraphrase Mary - it's Mozart, and therefore worth doing something else instead

What I don't understand is why the Mozart-dislikers on this board feel the need to restate this dislike so frequently, indeed seem so proud of it.

There are various composers whose music does nothing for me, but I don't make a point of saying so in threads where people are discussing their enjoyment of these composers.

Other people seem to like Debussy and Vaughan Williams (to give two examples); and so I attribute my boredom with their music to a lack in me, rather than a problem with them.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

"Wot, no"
Barenboim
Perahia
Uchida
or
Bilson
Levin
?

I only have Brendel & Haebler and I'm more than happy.

[bluestateprommer]

Here in the US, the public radio program Symphony Cast chose this year's First Night as their first offering in selected Proms for broadcast this summer last week, so I gave it another listen, with the advantage this time of not having to listen at work on earbuds. The one black mark on the presentation for Americans was that the Symphony Cast people severely truncated the chat between GC and Petroc after Dadaville, leaving barely the congratulations intact. Major dumbing down by, and for, Americans, sad to say. Another apparent reason was that the producers evidently felt the need to make room for an excerpt at the very end from one of Slatkin's Last Nights, that featured the "Rule Britannia" part of Henry Wood's Fantasia on British Sea Songs, to let us know that another choice for Proms for Symphony Cast this summer will be the Last Night. Speaking of which, I thought that Dadaville would actually make a great piece for the Last Night, should it ever get another airing.

Great concert. Balanced programme. No gimmicks.

BTW, general question/observation: would people here say that the BBC SO has really been on a roll lately? That comes from the overall strong work that I've heard from them on iPlayer in the past year (e.g. the Nielsen cycle with Oramo), and the general praise for their particular Proms so far this season.

[Alison]

Big improvement in the BBCSO in recent times. A much fuller, more accurate and committed sound these days. The forum used to be full of adverse comment in Proms seasons gone by.