Prom 19: 29.07.16 - David Bowie Prom

[underthecountertenor]

Pots and kettles.

No. I expressed a personal opinion. BBM appeared, repeatedly, to purport to state a fact. Do you not get the difference? By highlighting your personal selection of what I wrote, you ignore the context. I acknowledged subjectivity. BBM appears to lay a claim to objectivity.

[underthecountertenor]

[QUOTE=Serial_Apologist;573145]I don't think Weill would have been particularly sympathetic towards ideas of "reverence" at the time he composed "Alabama Song

You're probably right about Weill. How is that relevant to what I said?

[Beef Oven!]

After the Mahler 3, I got in the queue for the Bowie Prom. I wasn’t sure what to expect as there are so many possible approaches to a concert like this. Then it started to pour with rain and I was defeated. I consoled myself with a large shish kebab from Dalston’s finest (fellow sufferers will know it’s the best cure for night-starvation) and found myself at home in time for the beginning of the gig on TV.

I thought it was a most wonderful concert and I wish I’d braved-out the rain.

The best cover of ‘The Man Who Sold The world’ ever?

Laura Mvula’s rendition of ‘Fame’ astounded me - she’s an amazing artist. Paul Buchanan’s ‘I Can’t Give Everything Away” was so intense I got shivers down my spine. Lady Grinning Soul? What a performance! Marc Almond’s contributions were a valid acknowledgement of Bowie’s massive influence on the musical youth of the early seventies, if nothing else!

I knew John Cale would be good, but I never thought we’d witness such an empyrean performance - I’m not even going to try to put into words. Who else could have produced such an arrangement and performance of ‘Space Oddity’? Amazing. It sent me searching out all my JC CDs and playing them ’til 3.00 am! Wales’ finest?

Stargaze were having the time of their lives and this was palpable even over the telly!

I’ve loved Bowie and his art since my sister came home with the ‘Starman’ single in 1972, and this love is what drew me to this concert. I was not disappointed.

A truly great Prom and a wonderful addition to the routine type of Prom. I just wish I’d braved the rain and not been tempted by a kebab.

[muzzer]

I'm a big Bowie fan. I wasn't expecting this Prom to be anything other than patchy overall. On balance it was IMHO better than that, with several great performances and only a couple of howlers, and I think that's the most you can hope for in the circs. Stargaze were superb throughout.

[underthecountertenor]

So much for my simplistic binary categorisation, muzzer and Beef Oven!! You have put me to shame. Glad you both enjoyed it, (very much) more or less.

[Serial_Apologist]

No. I expressed a personal opinion. BBM appeared, repeatedly, to purport to state a fact. Do you not get the difference? By highlighting your personal selection of what I wrote, you ignore the context. I acknowledged subjectivity. BBM appears to lay a claim to objectivity.

You decided that with one or two exceptions the arrangements were terrific, BBM that they were not good. Ergo you were both giving subjective opinions, whether one of you recognised the fact or not. That's why I don't get the difference. The only way one can deduce whether or not your opinion is less subjective than BBM's is if the two of you come up with backing arguments in defense of your respective cases.

[Serial_Apologist]

I don't think Weill would have been particularly sympathetic towards ideas of "reverence" at the time he composed "Alabama Song

You're probably right about Weill. How is that relevant to what I said?

Your referencing of Bowie's interpretation of Weill's "Alabama Song" in the context of a tribute concert to Bowie is what makes it relevant to what you said.

(Apologies for putting your quote inside mine!)

[underthecountertenor]

Your referencing of Bowie's interpretation of Weill's "Alabama Song" in the context of a tribute concert to Bowie is what makes it relevant to what you said.

(Apologies for putting your quote inside mine!)

Apologies for being unclear. The point I was trying to make was that re-interpretation need not involve reverence, and that Bowie understood that. Your (entirely reasonable) speculation that Weill would have had no time for the reverential does not undermine that point.

[Serial_Apologist]

Apologies for being unclear. The point I was trying to make was that re-interpretation need not involve reverence, and that Bowie understood that. Your (entirely reasonable) speculation that Weill would have had no time for the reverential does not undermine that point.

Fair comments.

[underthecountertenor]

Fair comments.

[Exonian]

Apart from the honourable exception of John Cale - who was superb I thought - this was in my undiscerning view - pretty awful. Was it just me or did I feel that the rest of the musicians just did not seem to have any emotional or indeed musical connection with the Thin White Duke or the music selected. The arrangements dull beyond despair. I understand perhaps the link between the Berlin ensemble and Bowie's 'Low' and 'Heroes' 1977-1979 recordings at the Hansa in Berlin but little else for me really worked. The MWSTW cover and Marc Almond? Nul points.

I will not bore anyone further but Bowie's work between The Man Who Sold The World in 1971 and Lodger in 1979 as thrilling, challenging and sheerly enjoyable as anything else produced in pop music at the time made the idea of a late prom potentially inspired. Sadly for me the execution was very disappointing. But as I said at the beginning, thankfully John Cale got it.

[techniquest]

This sort of Prom doesn't interest me in the slightest - and I do have much respect for Bowie. In my mind, this would have been far more appropriate for Glastonbury than The Proms.