Prom 63: Sir András Schiff plays 'The Well-Tempered Clavier' (Book 2) 29/30.08.18

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

So you don't have the recital in RAH!! QED.

Yeeeeaahh - but then you deprive the thousands of people who want to hear Schiff of taking part in (this part of) the Proms "Festival". And you limit the audience for the harpsichord performance of the pieces to the smaller venue (unless you ask the performer to give three or four performances, which might be asking a bit much - unless you get three or four different harpsichordists to perform ...)

'Fessing up (to provide fuel for the "teeth on edge" Thread) - I didn't listen to this Prom for two reasons - I've never "meshed" with Schiff's Music-making (to my sorrow); and I don't want to hear the whole of either/both books of "The 48" in one sitting (i'm not sure that Bach intended this, either) - I prefer to concentrate on 6 or 7 at a time. But for a Festival such as the Proms, I can see that there is space to showcase an artist of Schiff's calibre and his/her current thinking about these essential pieces. Just not for me.

[Bryn]

Writing as one who is coming around to the harpsichord for Bach, I have much sympathy for this view. But wonder whether a harpsichord would work in the RAH? Has it been tried?

I'm sure the RAH and Beeb (with whichever engineers they have outsourced to, this year) could provide some 'sound reinforcement'. They did it for Bernstein, so why not for Bach?

[teamsaint]

This occurred to me, too - but there have been performances of, for one example, Brandenburg 5 with its extended solo harpsichord passages: were there any complaints from the audience that these were inaudible in the Hall? (I would have had doubts about a solo 'cello or violin in that venue, but Ma and Ibragimova dispelled them pretty quickly!)

I can't remember what the reports from the hall were like for those, though the Ibragimova was indeed fabulous on the radio. I heard Isabelle Faust playing one of the Mozart Concertos from the arena last year, and it was definitely a struggle for both player and listener. But maybe the orchestral balance wasn't quite "right", and the Bach solo works would come over more clearly .

I agree with your sentiments down thread about the RAH as a venue that, despite its limitations, allows people who might not otherwise experience various aspects of music, to do so. It is one of the great redeeming features of the series.

[Darkbloom]

Doubts about the instrument aside, I wonder how many people really appreciated hearing all of Book 2 in one sitting? Occasions like this seem more 'events' than anything else. I was at the RAH for the Goldbergs and that was enough for me, particularly given Schiff's distinctive way with this music. If you stood in the Arena for the whole thing I take my hat off to you.

[DracoM]

Precisely: 'event' writ large here.

[gurnemanz]

I love Bach keyboard works on both harpsichord and piano and have several recordings of the 48 on each. I also firmly believe that Bach himself would not have been as dogmatic as some on here in this respect. Beethoven, Mozart, Schumann, and Shostakovich seemed to be able to derive inspiration from playing them on instruments of their own time. My wife is from Leipzig and grew up with Bach at the Thomaskirche and we decided at the last minute yesterday afternoon to book online and head down the M4. We had last seen Schiff at our local Cricklade Festival about 30 years ago and it seemed too good an opportunity to miss. And I shall be for ever glad that we did not miss it. We arrived in the foyer to glimpse Steven Isserlis as a a fellow audience member whom, appropriately, we had a while ago seen on two nights do the Bach cello suites in a local church. There was a great sense of occasion in the Hall. I don't think I have ever listened to the whole 24 of Book 2 at one go. I have now, and it was an immense experience. I was riveted for the two and a half hours and back home in bed by 2 am.

[Stanfordian]

Doubts about the instrument aside, I wonder how many people really appreciated hearing all of Book 2 in one sitting? Occasions like this seem more 'events' than anything else. I was at the RAH for the Goldbergs and that was enough for me, particularly given Schiff's distinctive way with this music. If you stood in the Arena for the whole thing I take my hat off to you.

The music soon faded into the background and it didn't hold my attention becoming more of an ordeal than pleasure. Although I love the music I'm too am not sure this music is best heard in this way, at one sitting.

[silvestrione]

I love Bach on the piano (and the harpsichord), and Schiff is a cultivated Bach player, and I imagine it must have been wonderful to be there, part of the occasion. I tried on the radio, following the score to keep me awake (!), but ultimately it was rather wearing. Definitely not a single work to be heard in a single sitting, except in these circumstances in the hall, as people have said. Did Schiff play from memory? He seemed completely on top of, within, the music all the way through. What a feat. Of energy and concentration. Understandably, I thought there was a lack of excitement and real bursts of energy and cumulation in some of the more naturally energetic pieces, such as the G minor fugue, and F sharp minor. Some lovely playing right up to the end, though.

[underthecountertenor]

Yeeeeaahh - but then you deprive the thousands of people who want to hear Schiff of taking part in (this part of) the Proms "Festival". And you limit the audience for the harpsichord performance of the pieces to the smaller venue (unless you ask the performer to give three or four performances, which might be asking a bit much - unless you get three or four different harpsichordists to perform ...)

'Fessing up (to provide fuel for the "teeth on edge" Thread) - I didn't listen to this Prom for two reasons - I've never "meshed" with Schiff's Music-making (to my sorrow); and I don't want to hear the whole of either/both books of "The 48" in one sitting (i'm not sure that Bach intended this, either) - I prefer to concentrate on 6 or 7 at a time. But for a Festival such as the Proms, I can see that there is space to showcase an artist of Schiff's calibre and his/her current thinking about these essential pieces. Just not for me.

A very fair and balanced response to the 'event' complaint, if I may say so ferney. There have been, and will be, plenty of opportunities for those who like their 48 on the harpsichord, in venues more suitable than the RAH. But this is a Festival, Schiff is well-known and highly (though not, of course, universally) acclaimed for his Bach, he was willing and available, and there is evidently a large audience prepared to sacrifice a very late night to hear Schiff do Book 2, so it makes sense that the BBC would have booked him. He is also part of a long and distinguished tradition of Bach performance on the piano, which continues to thrive to this day (Charles Owen being one who immediately springs to mind amongst the younger generation). So I really can't see any force in the objections. Why is this 'event' objectionable to DracoM, who raved so enthusiastically about the Brandenburg Project 'event' (which featured a harpsichord but was in other ways a long way from what Bach would have had in mind: modern horns ironing out the temperament intended by Bach - whilst still incidentally managing to make quite a pig's ear of many of their lines)? I don't get it. And I REALLY don't get the 'arrogance' jibe.

For myself, I haven't yet tried last night's concert, and haven't decided whether I will or not. If I do, it may well be that, like others, I won't last the course, even with score in hand, and I am not by any means a wholehearted Schiff fan (my favourite set of the 48 is probably Colin Tilney's on clavichord and harpsichord). But, as is sometimes said around these parts, quot homines tot sententiae, ja?

[Richard Tarleton]

An amateur writes : I can't see that it's been mentioned - apologies if it has - that this will be on BBC4 tomorrow, Friday, at 23.00 hours. I for one shall be recording it and watching/listening at leisure (as I did for his Bk.1 performance), as it's well past my bedtime. I've been getting to know the 48 better this past year, assisted by Ms Hewitt's discs (her first set), her exemplary detailed notes**, and a live performance by her of Bk 1 in intimate surroundings earlier in the year. Book 1, I learn, was completed while Bach was at Anhalt-Cöthen - title page dated 1722, the period that produced his greatest instumental music - while Bk 2 was from a very different period of his life, in Leipzig roughly from 1739-42. As someone who played the Prelude to the 1st cello suite on the guitar in his first public performance nearly 50 years ago I think I picked sides in the "wrong instrument" debate a long time ago

** as a plucker I'm not capable of getting full benefit from the score, as I struggle to follow more than one clef at a time, tho' I do my best with my score to the Goldbergs

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It may have been a great piano performance but to me, Bach on the piano is now a definite NO. I can’t understand why the BBC didn’t programme this work on the harpsichord. There are many great harpsichordist within the UK alone. It would have been an excellent opportunity for many people to hear Bach’s work on the instrument Bach wrote it for. To me, this performance emphasised what the piano doesn’t do when it comes to Bach’s major works. Don’t ask me what it doesn’t. It’s not something I can put in words.

Be careful what you wish for. Bach's favourite keyboard instrument was the clavichord, and this would be barely audible in any venue.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Doubts about the instrument aside, I wonder how many people really appreciated hearing all of Book 2 in one sitting? Occasions like this seem more 'events' than anything else. I was at the RAH for the Goldbergs and that was enough for me, particularly given Schiff's distinctive way with this music. If you stood in the Arena for the whole thing I take my hat off to you.

That's a fair point. It's another example of saturation programming, though to be fair, this year's Proms have been less guilty of tis than in recent years.

[ardcarp]

I love Bach on the piano (and the harpsichord), and Schiff is a cultivated Bach player, and I imagine it must have been wonderful to be there, part of the occasion. I tried on the radio, following the score to keep me awake (!), but ultimately it was rather wearing. Definitely not a single work to be heard in a single sitting, except in these circumstances in the hall, as people have said. Did Schiff play from memory? He seemed completely on top of, within, the music all the way through. What a feat. Of energy and concentration. Understandably, I thought there was a lack of excitement and real bursts of energy and cumulation in some of the more naturally energetic pieces, such as the G minor fugue, and F sharp minor. Some lovely playing right up to the end, though.

With you 100% silvertone. As for piano versus harpsichord, there's really no need for polemics. Bach's amazing genius makes his works transferable. There is phrasing and line capable of realisation on the piano but not on the harpsichord. It depends what you want. The clavichord (not a public performance instrument) has much more in common with the piano than with the harpsichord. Personally I wouldn't want to be without either Angela Hewitt (piano) or Kenneth Gilbert (harpsichord).

[David-G]

Alpie has it right. Bach might very well have played this on the clavichord, and a clavichord recital in the RAH would definitely be interesting…


Seriously though, I am astonished at the negativity in many of the comments. The hall was respectably full, it was amazing that perhaps a couple of thousand people had come to spend two and a half hours listening to solo Bach. I stood in the Arena for the whole thing, and I think to appreciate this concert to the full you had to be there. The audience concentration in the hall was intense. In the hall, with concentration and great effort I could apply my mind to serious listening to the music for the entire duration. On the radio, without the focus of visual interest, I think this would have been very difficult. Hearing the whole WTC Book 2 in one go, I could not help being stunned by Bach’s achievement. And I also could not help being stunned by Schiff’s achievement, in playing the whole of this complex music entirely from memory, and with only the shortest break. The ovation at the end was well deserved.

[David-G]

I love Bach keyboard works on both harpsichord and piano and have several recordings of the 48 on each. I also firmly believe that Bach himself would not have been as dogmatic as some on here in this respect. Beethoven, Mozart, Schumann, and Shostakovich seemed to be able to derive inspiration from playing them on instruments of their own time. My wife is from Leipzig and grew up with Bach at the Thomaskirche and we decided at the last minute yesterday afternoon to book online and head down the M4. We had last seen Schiff at our local Cricklade Festival about 30 years ago and it seemed too good an opportunity to miss. And I shall be for ever glad that we did not miss it. We arrived in the foyer to glimpse Steven Isserlis as a a fellow audience member whom, appropriately, we had a while ago seen on two nights do the Bach cello suites in a local church. There was a great sense of occasion in the Hall. I don't think I have ever listened to the whole 24 of Book 2 at one go. I have now, and it was an immense experience. I was riveted for the two and a half hours and back home in bed by 2 am.

Yes, a great sense of occasion, and an immense experience, indeed. Incidentally, last week I spotted Steven Isserlis in the audience for "Saul" at Glyndebourne.