Ustvolskaya - Symphony no 3
An uncompromising scream for help, Not Waving But Drowning stripped of humour, just unrelieved pain. The piece is monolithic and mainly loud. Perhaps, Gerald Barry has inherited some of Galina’s characteristics. All this makes for uncomfortable listening but hearing the work after recent atrocities in Nice, Turkey and the USA, makes a powerful cathartic experience. Not one I shall want to repeat often, but an emetic or powerful purge is an occasional necessity. Ustvolskaya’s score is antagonistic to ideas of beauty.
TV newscasts wrap us in a comfort blanket, we’re told that the worst images from Nice are too extreme to broadcast: artists such as Goya and composers like Ustvolskaya force us to experience and confront the pain and suffering that surround us. I harbour doubts about Gergiev’s performance with the Munich PO, finding it too lyrical, lacking bite and over-plaintive (there were moments when I heard Max’s Orkney birds) and insufficiently angry and brusque. Full marks, however, go to the stentorian speaker, Alexei Petrenko
What a good choice for the Proms. I was such a stark contrast to the self-indulgent romanticism exhibited by Rachmaninov’s D minor concerto, decently but not superbly played by Behzod Abduraimov from Taskent, which preceded it. The programme started with a “steady as you go” performance of Ravel’s Bolero that came across as a French Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. I’m not competent to discuss Gergiev’s way with the Der Rosenkavalier Suite, a work that has never engaged my attention.
An uncompromising scream for help, Not Waving But Drowning stripped of humour, just unrelieved pain. The piece is monolithic and mainly loud. Perhaps, Gerald Barry has inherited some of Galina’s characteristics. All this makes for uncomfortable listening but hearing the work after recent atrocities in Nice, Turkey and the USA, makes a powerful cathartic experience. Not one I shall want to repeat often, but an emetic or powerful purge is an occasional necessity. Ustvolskaya’s score is antagonistic to ideas of beauty.
TV newscasts wrap us in a comfort blanket, we’re told that the worst images from Nice are too extreme to broadcast: artists such as Goya and composers like Ustvolskaya force us to experience and confront the pain and suffering that surround us. I harbour doubts about Gergiev’s performance with the Munich PO, finding it too lyrical, lacking bite and over-plaintive (there were moments when I heard Max’s Orkney birds) and insufficiently angry and brusque. Full marks, however, go to the stentorian speaker, Alexei Petrenko
What a good choice for the Proms. I was such a stark contrast to the self-indulgent romanticism exhibited by Rachmaninov’s D minor concerto, decently but not superbly played by Behzod Abduraimov from Taskent, which preceded it. The programme started with a “steady as you go” performance of Ravel’s Bolero that came across as a French Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. I’m not competent to discuss Gergiev’s way with the Der Rosenkavalier Suite, a work that has never engaged my attention.
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