Prom 34: Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (10.08.15)

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

19:30
Royal Albert Hall

Nicola Benedetti and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, live at the BBC Proms, with music by Britten and Prokofiev and Korngold's Violin Concerto


Britten: Four Sea Interludes from 'Peter Grimes'
Korngold: Violin Concerto
Prokofiev: Symphony No. 5 in B flat major

Nicola Benedetti (violin)
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Kirill Karabits (conductor)

A musical snapshot of 1945 - a world emerging from the haze of war into the neon glow of Hollywood and new-found hope. Three contrasting works sum up the spirit of this charged year: Britten's Peter Grimes, reinventing English opera; Prokofiev's Fifth Symphony, striving after the 'grandeur of the human spirit'; and Korngold's Violin Concerto. Hailed in his youth as a 'genius' and a 'miracle' by no lesser figures than Mahler and Puccini respectively, Korngold's reputation still rests mainly on his luscious film music. The Violin Concerto combines his instinct for melody (themes are borrowed from four of his finest film scores) with classical virtuosity and structural elegance. The soloist here is Proms regular Nicola Benedetti, a passionate champion of this unaccountably neglected work.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

An interesting idea for a concert.

[Serial_Apologist]

Indeed - but can it really be said any longer that the Korngold VC is a neglected work? It seems to have been getting quite a number of broadcasts for some time now.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Tonight's concert. I'm just "bumping" it to the top of the pile.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

An interesting idea for a concert.

Pity it doesn't start a quarter-of-an-hour later, though.

[antongould]

Pity it doesn't start a quarter-of-an-hour later, though.

Indeed missed a trick .......

[bluestateprommer]

Good solid start from the Bournemouth SO and KK with the "Four Sea Interludes" from 'Grimey Pete' (to quote Leonard Bernstein's nickname for the work), with perhaps a slight near slip of phrasing in the 2nd interlude (no actual wrong notes, but some odd placement thereof). I have unfortunately not yet seen KK live in concert, as he doesn't seem to make many guest-conducting appearances in the US that I can tell. His new post in Weimar will no doubt take up yet more of his time, and it will be interesting to see how he balances this post with Bournemouth.

[pastoralguy]

Wow! Young Nicola took no prisoners in the last movement of the Korngold! The orchestra sounded like it was struggling to keep up with her.


Super performance!

[bluestateprommer]

Wow! Young Nicola took no prisoners in the last movement of the Korngold! The orchestra sounded like it was struggling to keep up with her.

Super performance!

Yup, NB really went to town in the finale :) , as PG noted. But in fairness to the Bournemouth SO, they did fine keeping up with her ;) . Applause after the 1st movement, but very forgivable in this instance. Interesting to hear that she's working on learning a new violin concerto by Wynton Marsalis (!). Encore just started: an arrangement of "Marietta's Lied" from EWK's Die Tote Stadt.

[LeMartinPecheur]

Encore just started: an arrangement of "Marietta's Lied" from EWK's Die Tote Stadt.

Came in in the middle of it and it sounded very Elgarian. Knew it wasn't, but even so...

[pastoralguy]

Sorry. Didn't mean to imply BSO couldn't keep up with Nicky. Just that they sounded a bit caught on the hop.

[Tony Halstead]

Hmmm... if a very fine orchestra such as the BSO 'can't keep up with the soloist' then the only blameworthy person has to be the CONDUCTOR, surely?

[pastoralguy]

Oh dear. What have I started?

Look, the first couple of bars were a bit of a shambles. (Not that that matters!) It just sounded as if orchestra and CONDUCTOR were caught unawares.

[bluestateprommer]

Solid Prokofiev 5 from the Bournemouth SO and KK, maybe a bit glibly fast at the start of the finale, but otherwise well paced. Interesting how KK took on the issue of applause between movements, when the audience applaused after the slam-bang ending of the 1st movement. He just dived into the scherzo headlong, so that the audience had to stop their applause fairly quickly. They seem to have caught on, as there was no applause after the 2nd movement. KK also just went pretty quickly into the finale.

[Petrushka]

Karabits seemed to want to make the Prokofiev into a one movement whole without any breaks. Not sure if Sergei Sergeyevich would have approved but it was a fine performance nonetheless, heard lots of detail I've not noticed before.