Prom 31: Minnesota Orchestra & Osmo Vänskä - 6.08.18

[mrbouffant]

I was in Choir East - a few rows back and the sound was largely good - the pianist was a bit obscured at times, but other than that all was well.
I was rather put off by an older lady sat two seats to my right who insisted on tapping her hand up and down out of time with all of the music. This was just in my peripheral vision and was quite distracting!
Wasn't the orchestra's encore a lot of fun?
I didn't see an awful lot of kids at this concert, which was a shame. Unless of course they were hiding upstairs in the circle in the slightly cheaper seats.

[Nick Armstrong]

I was in Choir East

I envy you! How did your young'uns like it?

Mine was a bit bored and I didn't blame him....

[mrbouffant]

I envy you! How did your young'uns like it?

Mine was a bit bored and I didn't blame him....

In the end, only one (12) came along but he enjoyed it. As he said himself, he doesn't really "get" the music but he enjoys seeing the orchestra working together and, of course, the sheer sonic experience and theatricality of the percussion.

[jayne lee wilson]

This thread is truly fascinating, as the sound-balance here at home on 320 aac/HDs was glorious, with just a slight sense of edginess or fierceness occasionally, deep in the richly textured chorus of strings... (perhaps not quite acoustically adjusted but a very small webcast blemish)....

Years ago, there was a great tradition of Proms reviewing/commentary via FM Radio, often placed in newspapers, music or hifi magazines. Very often, the critic would note that the balance was often better at home. In between times, that technical presentation has often suffered due to - DRC (dynamic range compression, still all-too-obviously and inescapably the case on FM, which can still sound tantalisingly lovely otherwise), lower and reduced bitrates on DAB or iplayer, and microphone placement of various types.

But this year, with one or two exceptions (a Mahler 8 is never going to be easy) the balance has been almost uniformly excellent, so it is a shame most of the online day-to-day Proms online magazines/press reviews continue to turn their noses up at radio or iplayer offerings (as the did even with lossless FLAC last year - they all insist on on-the-spot reviewers - don't worry I've asked them) with very few conscientious enough to check their live -in-the-flesh impressions later.

***

Anyway, here are my further Ives 2 comments....(via live HDs R3 as ever)

For much of its length, the Ives 2 is - gravely beautiful, or perks along with fiddler’s folk-tunes and swings into its stride with powerful earthy chorales; languishes indulgently in Brahmsian and Wagnerian yearnings - or perhaps, just likes to play at that, to pretend to be carried away by passion, as it recalls a fondness for its European Masters; but returns softly to the friendly, provincial world of the down-home each time
All very lovely, but the coda arrives and the whole work is transformed into something quite hysterically joyful: a US Military salute performed by majorettes for an aircraft-carrier float (with YMCA Kings and Queens in peaked caps and leotards) at the Mardi Gras, dressed in Navy Whites and tossing their batons high into the dazzling sun….
It sounds like two endings played simultaneously, a homage and a send-up, as we abandon all attempts to comprehend or judge and give ourselves up to the wildest musical euphoria.

Of all the layers of finesse with which the MSO created their performance, it was the remarkable weight and density of their strings that was the foundation of their effortless transitioning between moods and styles, the smooth tempo changes like the gears of a luxury car, opening the throttle with easy panache when brazen power was required, easing down into utter sweetness and delicacy.
Never too folksy or too grand, equally at home with idiomatically-blended hymns or folksongs, enacting grandeur and mock-grandeur as easily as the instant, flick-of-the-wrist throwaway of the 2nd movement’s end. I loved how Vanska really emphasised Columbia Gem of the Ocean in the coda, as too often this doesn't quite come through with all the delirious letting-go that it should.

Ives 2 is an astonishing achievement, so richly varied and eclectic in its sources, yet so seamlessly made, and experienced, as the completed work of art.
There’s nothing else quite like it, and this performance seemed the perfect expression of all it has to say about - music, musical joy and sorrow, music history and America.
I think we need its richly-allusive cultural generosity more than ever today.

(Scrolldown here for a fascinating insight into its sources, with plenty of musical examples..

https://www.houstonsymphony.org/ives-symphony-2/

[Bryn]

I emailed the Orchestra immediately following the Ives, thus:

"Just a quick note to thank the Orchestra and Vanska for what was the finest performance of Ives's Second Symphony I have yet to hear (and I have heard a good many). Great Prom, all round. Huge congratulations and thanks!"

Just had back an grateful acknowledgment. I have listened to the whole concert, plus an additional audition of the Ives again today. I just reinforced my admiration for this team's musicianship. This one is definitely a 'keeper'. Re. the Gershwin, the trumpeting may have shown signs of stress, but not, by engineers' usage of the terms, much strain, i.e. negligible deformation.

[bluestateprommer]

I emailed the Orchestra immediately following the Ives, thus:

"Just a quick note to thank the Orchestra and Vanska for what was the finest performance of Ives's Second Symphony I have yet to hear (and I have heard a good many). Great Prom, all round. Huge congratulations and thanks!"

Just had back an grateful acknowledgment. I have listened to the whole concert, plus an additional audition of the Ives again today. I just reinforced my admiration for this team's musicianship. This one is definitely a 'keeper'. Re. the Gershwin, the trumpeting may have shown signs of stress, but not, by engineers' usage of the terms, much strain, i.e. negligible deformation.

The Minnesota Orchestra has a blog post on this Prom, wherein is a possible explanation for the trumpet sound during the Gershwin, in terms of what Manny Laureano used for a mute:

https://www.minnesotaorchestra.org/showcase/350-bbc-proms-2018

The interval discussion was very enlightening, where I didn't know the details about the final chord in the Ives, how it's written vs. how others have done it (...). Vanska did lean more to playing that last chord as written, rather than going for the "raspberry" OTT approach.

PS: For anyone who wants to catch the music from this Prom still (or listen if you missed it the 1st time), SymphonyCast from this side of the pond has the concert available, with some of the surrounding blah-blah trimmed down.

https://www.yourclassical.org/programs/symphonycast/episodes/2018/08/27