Prom 26: 4.08.16 - BBC Symphony Orchestra and Oliver Knussen

[Falcon]

Oliver Knussen came up with an intriguing programme for his prom. Not a big audience, but for me that did mean a free transfer from the circle to the stalls: a good view and close to the stage.

Reinbert de Leeuw’s Der nächtliche Wanderer is the most interesting premiere of this proms season. It’s well suited for performance in the RAH with its large orchestra, off stage orchestra (from the gallery) and the atmospheric recorded sounds/narration. Each element has its own creative interest, together they form something extraordinary. The narration is just two stanzas long, given in English in the programme (and I hope, on R3). This is the German poem which inspired the piece; the narration is part of the music and it should remain as the composer intended – that is, in German!
The a niente ending was nearly wrecked by a proms saboteur sitting 3 rows behind, who started clapping thirty seconds before the end. (I glared, so he won’t do that again…) The conductor successfully restrained the happy-clappers to achieve a long silent pause after the last sound. The orchestra seemed to enjoy playing this varied and distinctive piece.
At least twenty members of the audience walked out at various points during this performance. Had they come to the wrong concert? Certainly it must have been distracting to the performers, as it was to those of us still listening. And was it necessary for anyone to cough during the quiet ending? We had barking dogs, woodblock and aleatoric coughing…. !

Sorry to say the Brahms was, I thought, less successful in the hall, even though the broadcast is highly praised in posts above. Peter Serkin did his utmost, but the detail and subtlety were lost by the time the sound travelled over the arena to row 6. This larger-than-life hall needs a larger-than-life piano – how about trying the over-size Bösendorfer ?! Applause blighted the start of the second movement: perhaps the performers imagined that by moving swiftly on, the audience would just listen. It was a good try but doomed to fail! Superb chamber music with the wonderfully played cello solo in the Andante.

This post has got a bit long – sorry for that!

[jayne lee wilson]

A bit long, Falcon? You should see some of mine... Very pleased to read your account, but I'm afraid the Englished Holderlin didn't find it's way onto the Proms webpages... if anyone does find a link to one, please post.... in the meantime I'm fumbling around with a German-English dictionary...

Your point about the German textural/musical essence is well taken, but personally I would still put communicative immediacy above that. Years ago I set out to record Korndorf's spiritual-minimalist Hymn III from its live R3/BBCSO premiere. I was stunned when near the end, Catherine Bott began to intone the "And I saw a new heaven and a new earth..." passage from The Revelation of St. John. It made a terrific emotional impact and almost defined the piece, really.

Recently I discovered the CD of the performance & eagerly snapped it up but - imagine my dismay to find the recitation was in Greek. In fact, the composer specified that it should be given in the native language of wherever it was performed live, but in the biblical Greek for the recording.

It did spoil the impact for me. I don't think I played the CD more than twice....

[Falcon]

From the programme:

Ah! The owl! How it screeches,
how its fearful shriek fills the air.
Slaughtering - ha! you crave butchered carion,
killer, I know you are nearby, come, come.

See! it's listening hard, sniffing out death -
all around is a grunting mass,
a mass of carnage, it hears it, it hears it, in its dreams it hears it,
I walk the streets - sleep, you killer, sleep.

Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843) trans. Susannah Howe

"The theme of a Night Wanderer experiencing the horrors of death and murder is a profoundly Romantic one. De Leeuw has translated the poem's dark, nightmarish atmosphere into a haunting score of over 50 minutes." (programme)

Hope that throws a little light on the music...

[jayne lee wilson]

Dankeschön Falke...!

[EdgeleyRob]

That saw-like sound was from the "lion's roar" or membranophone, or quica.... more of a lion's moan, tonight... (which, since it supposedly mimics the lioness's call seems not inapt...)

Thanks Jayne

[jayne lee wilson]

Prom 26 reinbert de leeuw - der nächtliche wanderer/bbcso/knussen/r3hds@320kbps

Three hearings of Nachtliche Wanderer didn’t seem to reveal hidden structural depths or melodic memorability (or inspire any great affection, I’m afraid), just made the overall shape a bit clearer: by design or not, it falls into three 14 or 15 minute sections, with 3 climaxes to landmark the wild terrain. “Two crescendos and a Finale”, perhaps.

The first two panels start with the evocative nocturnal elements of, in the first - repeated notes on solo viola, murmuring, ascending/descending string/wind phrases, cut across with lashing whips and gong strokes, melancholic fragments of melody in the strings; in the second - quiet solemn brass, long, soft wind chords very redolent of late Stravinsky (eg Requiem Canticles), again the constant forest-murmurs and distant rumblings of strings and timpani, a more extended & melodic viola solo.
Each time, the up-and-down strings/wind phrases gather pace and tension, staccato rhythmic figures develop, brass and percussion outbursts prepare for a climax as the figurations get louder. The energy soon dissipates in the first, followed by the Mahler 10-style drama of hefty separate drum strokes against silence; but the second extends into a frantic, bigger crescendo, with wailing winds, stabbing, violent brass, and a much longer, stormier climax.

This pattern changes in the third night-sound-tapestry, with alien shrieks and whisperings, a recorded human “whistling-in-the-dark” before the viola (the poet’s voice?), wistful solo piano and then the taped, Vincent Price-ish recitation of the Holderlin Poem itself. The big climax builds earlier this time, cutting off suddenly as winds/strings/piano scurry around again. But to me it feels like a “main” climax which doesn’t quite go on long or loudly enough, so the cor anglais' solo lament after it doesn’t quite feel “earned” or mood-contrasted enough.
After this, the conclusion returns to the night-calls and rustlings similar to the opening of each part - shivering or murmuring strings, soft bells, distant trumpets, isolated shrieks, and a “lion’s roar” membranophone - a moaning sound which felt a bit out-of-place in this atmosphere, more akin to a mournful cow than any kind of owl or forest-creature (although - the image of a lion, moaning across the city in a zoo closed for the night, came to mind). I did feel that this fade-out, with all its familiar elements, took too long on its own terms, and a little relieved when the dog returned for its final bark.

***

I found the quiet evocations - viola, bells, gong, gravely melodious chambermusical strings - much more compelling than the rather plain, ordinary material which generated the scurrying crescendi and the climaxes; and so far, the contrast between them not terribly meaningful.
The work evidently isn’t aiming at any grand synthesis, but whilst welcoming new music of unusual scope and ambition, I couldn’t, finally, shake a sense of musical and expressive diffuseness which perhaps wasn’t vividly atmospheric enough in musical or sonic terms of "night" or "fear" to offset the rather functional motivic material, even speculating whether it would work better as live "performance art", with more mixed media of video or other visual elements included.

[Stanfordian]

Oh it goes way back beyond that. Indeed, it's not appluading between movemnts which is the modern trend.

Here we go again. I wondered when the forum's self appointed know-all might say that.

I don't like clapping between movements and that's my opinion. If others are ok with it and maybe even do it then fair enough.

[Bryn]

Here we go again. I wondered when the forum's self appointed know-all might say that.

I don't like clapping between movements and that's my opinion. If others are ok with it and maybe even do it then fair enough.

I'm a modernist where this is concerned, except when specifically encouraged by the likes of RN and similarly audience-friendly musicians. However, I see no good reason to disparage the traditionalists.

[jayne lee wilson]

Following #16, #21 etc., coupla other views on Brahms and de Leeuw....

http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_prom_review.php?id=13846

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2016/aug/07/bbcso-knussen-proms-2016-review-nachtliche-wanderer-de-leeuw-brahms

One notes that in-hall reviewers, like Falcon in this thread, felt somewhat equivocal about the Brahms.... at home it was terrifically exciting so engineering credits redoubled for that one. I've often found that broadcast/webcast concerts sound better if the hall is half-empty (so, usually with more recondite repertoire), which also makes it a shame that no online mags seem to want radio concert reviews, the USP is always being there. There was a fine tradition of press and magazine comment on R3 concerts in the glory days of FM, you often hear more at home, and comparing the two is always fascinating & fun. HiFiNews does at least offer occasional comment (usually very positive) on the R3 HDs 320 kbps stream.