Prom 22: A London Symphony – 31.07.18

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I'm only aware of 2: an original version, which I have not heard, and the one he considered the official one - would I be right?

The original 1914 version is the one recorded by LSO/Hickox.
The 1920 revision has been recorded at least three times.
The one performed nowadays is the 1933 final revision.

[LMcD]

There is also the 1920 version, recorded a couple of years ago by Dutton, IIRC.

RSNO under Martin Yates, coupled with the Double Piano Concerto
The Hickox/NOW Proms performance of the 1914 version is available via the BBC iPlayer (and probably also on Youtube)

[Bryn]

The original 1914 version is the one recorded by LSO/Hickox.
The 1920 revision has been recorded at least three times.
The one performed nowadays is the 1933 final revision.

I know of the Godfrey (acoustic) recording of the 1920 version, but who else besides he and Yates have recorded it?

[Ah, Brabbins. {probably well worth getting).

[BBMmk2]

Sir Andrew Davis has recorded the double piano concerto for Chandos, c/w Sinfonia Antartica.

So far the prom is very good. AM knows his Haydn alright.

[bluestateprommer]

So far the prom is very good. AM knows his Haydn alright.

Agreed; good high spirits, lots of fun in the playing. Big-band sound, but with period touches like trimmed vibrato. Crowd sounds very enthusiastic (and didn't applaud between movements!), and Kate Molleson commented that the hall looks very full.

[jayne lee wilson]

Yes - good, crisp, regular-sized MOR Haydn from Manze and the Scots....I guess most orchestras and conductors have got this far by now. Still, nicely tender, drawn-out delicacies in the trio, a truly inspiriting finale...not so keen on those end-of-para slowings though, as in the minuet ("this is en-ding....right.......now!") - which was quite leisurely if very danceable.

All very charming, nothing much more to write here about...
Am I alone in sometimes wishing for (well, ardently desiring of) a degree of... wilful individuality in such familiar music? (Harnoncourt gets up to all sorts in this one...)

[bluestateprommer]

Splendid RVW 2 from AM and the BBC SSO just now, with practically all the elements in place, not least a wonderfully attentive audience (no applause between movements, no mobile phones going off). This performance deserves to be a BBC Music Magazine CD. The only modest quibble is that I wish that Kate Molleson identified the sections or individuals in the orchestra who seemed to get special roars from the audience. No quibbles about concert running time with music-making of such high quality here. Given that RVW 2 is my own favorite orchestral work of all, I need to listen again at home on speakers, to get more than the earbud experience.

[Goon525]

Yes - good, crisp, regular-sized MOR Haydn from Manze and the Scots....I guess most orchestras and conductors have got this far by now. Still, nicely tender, drawn-out delicacies in the trio, a truly inspiriting finale...not so keen on those end-of-para slowings though, as in the minuet ("this is en-ding....right.......now!") - which was quite leisurely if very danceable.

All very charming, nothing much more to write here about...
Am I alone in sometimes wishing for (well, ardently desiring of) a degree of... wilful individuality in such familiar music? (Harnoncourt gets up to all sorts in this one...)

Almost exactly how I felt. Maybe I was a bit less positive than Jayne. I found it pleasant, but a bit routine. Rather longed for some of the drive and excitement that Marc Minkowski brought to his recording of all 12.

[Goon525]

Splendid RVW 2 from AM and the BBC SSO just now, with practically all the elements in place, not least a wonderfully attentive audience (no applause between movements, no mobile phones going off). The only modest quibble is that I wish that Kate Molleson identified the sections or individuals in the orchestra who seemed to get special roars from the audience. No quibbles about concert running time with music-making of such high quality here. Given that RVW 2 is my own favorite orchestral work of all, I need to listen again at home on speakers, to get more than the earbud experience.

Hmmm. There may have been no mobiles or applause when one doesn't want it - but loads of coughing was audible. It’s July, for heaven's sake, not November! This may be something to do with the balance between direct orchestra and hall sound - I did like the overall balance but wonder if it’s making coughs more audible than they should be.

[jonfan]

Wow, what a performance and the atmosphere of concentration beautifully caught by the engineering. I know there’s no Concert Sound this year but the clarity and presence of that system seem to be in many of the excellent sonic experiences we’ve had this season.

[Goon525]

Wow, what a performance and the atmosphere of concentration beautifully caught by the engineering. I know there’s no Concert Sound this year but the clarity and presence of that system seem to be in many of the excellent sonic experiences we’ve had this season.

I do agree with this. The balance and dynamic range are far better than they used to be. I do just feel some loss of resolution compared with last year's FLAC stream. Although individual instruments come across very well, the string sound is a bit of a 'wodge'. Still hugely enjoyable.

[jayne lee wilson]

Well, wasn’t that gorgeous?

I’m not really close to this folk-musical strand of English Music, let alone a VW connoisseur, but I don’t think you needed to be, to hear how wonderfully well-played this London Symphony was.

Such a sharply-defined orchestral profile, effortless articulation-at-speed, a concerto-for-orchestra brilliance in its French-coloristic textures; tonal warmth and subtlety (really beautiful string-playing), an expressive, never excessive, cradling of the phrase. It had the right English accent; at first feeling a little distanced from the idiom, by the time we reached the climax of the lento, this performance had completely won me over.
The finale evoked a sense of tragedy, the loss of that pre-war world; and Manze held the hall in a rapt, long hush after the last note faded.

I’ll probably never draw Vaughn Williams’ music from the shelves very often; but to hear an orchestra play anything this well is a profound pleasure in itself, and the HDs sound was, as usual, immaculate. How grateful I am to have experienced this tonight.

[Nick Armstrong]

How grateful I am to have experienced this tonight.

Echoed wholeheartedly, just back from the Hall.... What a tremendous concert!

First impactful element: sitting up in the choir.... Why have I waited so long to try this?! IDEAL listening experience for me, everything in the orchestra crystal clear, huskiest solos perfectly heard, climaxes rivetingly full and detailed. The whole thing heard as if an acoustic veil had been removed, compared with other places from which I've listened in the hall. I shall definitely go up there again! (plus my seat was at the top of a flight of steps: about 30 feet of leg room, perfect for the taller gentleman ). Musical but relatively 'newbie' French teenager held spellbound just by the sound kaleidoscope alone...

And I'm pleased to read that the euphoria of the acoustic experience wasn't solely responsible for finding both performances superlative, the playing of the orchestra top flight (too many felicitous moments and solos to mention). The RVW, which I love anyway, came across with a variety and vividness I'd never heard before (but I've never heard it live before).

One of the best Proms experiences I've ever had

PS up in the choir, no coughing was troublesome or, really, audible

[edashtav]

My colleagues who have gone before opened the innings stylishly very, s#51 and scored well off the bowling of Haydn and RVW:
BBM in # 49 averred, as he climbed onto his rostrum, that AM “ knows his Haydn”; indeed he does bbm: he balances foreground and background with a sure touch, and I love the way he allows the music to breathe;
Bsp in Post 50 declared of the Haydn “lots of fun in the playing” ; right, their smiles made me chuckle;
Jayne in # 52 was a tad superior as she declared the Haydn, “all very charming”; but her cockles and mussels were far more engaged when she declared the RVW to be “ gorgeous” in a subsequent post;
I thought Goon 525 was right to mention Marc Minkowski in # 53: his London symphonies remain my yardstick, too;
He later mentioned coughing his subsequent post. I shall return to that, later;
Jonfan greeted the London Symphony with “Wow” and, in terms of playing and interpretation, I was WowED!

To sum up: we loved this Prom for its wonderful playing, and insightful interpretation that confirmed Haydn’s final symphony as as the perfect example of the classical symphony, and in the case of RVW’s prolix symphony, projected the work’s fine pages and mitigated its weaker passages.

To return to the coughing that I mentioned after the earlier Brabbins performance of RVW’s Pastoral Symphony that shared many of his earlier score’s issues: lack of a taut structure plus English rambles caused by the employment of folksong-like themes that are too long to be developed successfully within a symphonic format. Midsommer coughing is often a sign of boredom, or incomprehension. The BBC Proms attract an international audience to the RAH. My own observations made over the last decade suggestdcthat the proportion of the audience that is non-British has risen from 20% to nearer 25%. These folk may well accept the nostrum that “ the symphony” was dead by 1914. They may also feel, as I do, that the first three RVW sumphonies do not successfully combat the notion that “ the symphony is dead”. They come, somewhat regardless of the programme, because attending the Proms is on their bucket list, and this is the night on their itinerary that they are free and in London.

[Lat-Literal]

Have just got home.

My first ever Prom - and some 35 years after hearing RVW2 for the first time on cassette, the first time I had ever seen it performed.