Prom 17 (14.08.21) - Prokofiev, Bach, Mozart & Shostakovich

[Ein Heldenleben]

I watched the concert on BBC 4 last night before reading the carping here, and thoroughly enjoyed it, reinforcing my impression that VO is an absolutely exceptional young pianist. Struggling to believe the negativity here, I can’t resist quoting Richard Morrison’s Times review (and though I can’t access it, I understand Telegraph also very positive).
“
★★★★☆
In the past year only once have I heard the piano played as beautifully as Vikingur Olafsson played it in Mozart’s dark Concerto in C minor, K491. And that was about half an hour earlier, when the Icelandic virtuoso gave an equally transfixing performance of Bach’s Keyboard Concerto in F minor.

The Proms have seen some spellbinding debuts, but I can’t remember anyone achieving such an impact by daring to play so quietly. And not just quietly, but with a touch so exquisitely nuanced that it was an experience akin to watching snowflakes falling gently on a still night.

That magical pianissimo is but one facet of Olafsson’s artistry. Others include his crystalline articulation and willingness to drop in and out of the overall sound, so the orchestra is not just providing a backing-track — as is often the case with concertos — but properly making music on equal terms with the soloist.

Most striking of all, however, is his way of ambushing you with grandeur, solemnity or forcefulness just when you think he has settled for prettiness. He is by no means a maverick, yet he’s never predictable. After the concertos he gave us two ravishing encores, fittingly Bach and Mozart again in romanticised arrangements that showed off his ability to send inner melodies glowing through the texture. I think the audience would have liked two more.

The Philharmonia was scheduled to be conducted in this concert by its new Finnish principal conductor, Santtu-Matias Rouvali, but he withdrew this week apparently due to “scheduling difficulties arising from the pandemic’’. The difficulties must have been severe indeed to miss your debut at the world’s most important classical music festival, and a chance to show London what you can offer with your new orchestra.


In the event the Estonian conductor Paavo Jarvi, for whom the expression “safe pair of hands’’ could have been invented, stepped into the breach. And he did a fine job of steering the Philharmonia through two Russian symphonies with plenty of potential pitfalls: Prokofiev’s First, the “Classical’’, and Shostakovich’s Ninth.

The violins sounded a bit stretched by their high exposed lines in the outer movements of the Prokofiev, but the Shostakovich was played with flair and character. It’s not the easiest symphony to interpret — Shostakovich at his most ambiguous and ironic at a time (1945) when Stalin wanted a grandiose victory celebration — but Jarvi made sense out of its disconcerting mix of bleak tragedy and sardonic glee.”

(Incidentally, through a source close to the orchestra, I understand the reason for Rouvali’s non-appearance does not reflect well upon him.)

Yes I think some on the thread just don’t like piano and orchestra in Bach. As I said he produced some beautiful sounds - and the Mozart was very well done . I do think there’s a danger playing that quietly in the RAH . In parts of the hall he must have been inaudible.

[cloughie]

Welcome back young sir you have been missed …..

Thanks anton.

[kernelbogey]

Welcome back young sir you have been missed …..

Seconded!

[Ein Heldenleben]

Just the Tahiti Trot as an encore!
I wonder if Paavo thought of the Prokofiev and Shostakovich as ‘Symphonies my father taught me’!

I listened to the Bach and Mozart on Sounds via ipad and found them quite satisfactory performances and don’t agree with the slating given on this thread. The Mozart was certainly more acceptable than the massacre of the last three symphonies a couple of weeks ago.

Welcome back. I thought the Mozart was a really good performance . I usually dread an on-the -night -pianist- composed cadenza but this one was excellent - drawing on the themes imaginatively and only just slightly exotically stretching Mozart’s harmonic palette.

[ardcarp]

but I can’t remember anyone achieving such an impact by daring to play so quietly. And not just quietly, but with a touch so exquisitely nuanced that it was an experience akin to watching snowflakes falling gently on a still night.

Indeed there was some quiet playing, especially in his Bach arrangement encore.

However, my TV impression of the Bach Concerto was the same as my R3. It just didn't sound 'right'. This is nothing to do with harpsichord-versus -piano. And it was nothing to do with HIPP either. This clearly wasn't HIPP nor intended to be, so I'm certainly not criticising from that point of view. And there's nothing wrong with using a bit of pedal in Bach (which he did to good effect in the aforementioned encore).

No, my objection was that it came over as 'lumoy', with un-necesary extremes of dynamic, partly due to over-enthusiastic bowing by the strings, encouraged, it has to be said, by Jarvi.. (Strange, since in many moments of the Shostakovitch there was much delicacy in that department.) My only explanation is that, given the last-minute change of conductor and thus probably limited rehearsal time, it was the Bach concerto that was regarded as 'straightforward' and probably received less attention. I wonder how Hewitt, Schiff or Perahia might have influenced things?

[jayne lee wilson]

I’ve never heard a Shostakovich symphony with a tea-break in the middle.

Yeah, OK funny guy - but how often have you heard three played in a single night? You might need more than tea in the middle of that.....

Anyway the break after the 40-andante (usually brandy here, rather than tea) in the 39-41 sequence is only for the Happy Few of us - crazy obsessives like Savall, Harnoncourt etc.......

[cloughie]

Yeah, OK funny guy - but how often have you heard three played in a single night?

Anyway the break after the 40-andante (usually brandy here, rather than tea) in the 39-41 sequence is only for the Happy Few of us - crazy obsessives like Savall, Harnoncourt etc.......

I’ll settle for a pint of Betty Stoggs but would be at the end of 40 and it would be Kertesz 39, C Davis 40 and Jochum 41 - I may even be tempted to add Maag 38 as a starter in which case the beer would be after 39!

Anyone for Shostakovich 1 5 and 10 for a good evening’s listening Paavo”d dad’s are a possibility but many others are available!

[Sir Velo]

Welcome back young sir you have been missed …..

We'll have to take better aim next time...

[jayne lee wilson]

I’ll settle for a pint of Betty Stoggs but would be at the end of 40 and it would be Kertesz 39, C Davis 40 and Jochum 41 - I may even be tempted to add Maag 38 as a starter in which case the beer would be after 39!

Anyone for Shostakovich 1 5 and 10 for a good evening’s listening Paavo”d dad’s are a possibility but many others are available!

You might need at least three intervals...and some people might take refuge in the bar after No.5 and never re-emerge...

[cloughie]

You might need at least three intervals...and some people might take refuge in the bar after No.5 and never re-emerge...

Three for the Mozart and two for the Shost - and I’ll make it halves rather than pints!

[jayne lee wilson]

I watched the concert on BBC 4 last night before reading the carping here, and thoroughly enjoyed it, reinforcing my impression that VO is an absolutely exceptional young pianist. Struggling to believe the negativity here, I can’t resist quoting Richard Morrison’s Times review (and though I can’t access it, I understand Telegraph also very positive).
“
★★★★☆
In the past year only once have I heard the piano played as beautifully as Vikingur Olafsson played it in Mozart’s dark Concerto in C minor, K491. And that was about half an hour earlier, when the Icelandic virtuoso gave an equally transfixing performance of Bach’s Keyboard Concerto in F minor.

The Proms have seen some spellbinding debuts, but I can’t remember anyone achieving such an impact by daring to play so quietly. And not just quietly, but with a touch so exquisitely nuanced that it was an experience akin to watching snowflakes falling gently on a still night.

That magical pianissimo is but one facet of Olafsson’s artistry. Others include his crystalline articulation and willingness to drop in and out of the overall sound, so the orchestra is not just providing a backing-track — as is often the case with concertos — but properly making music on equal terms with the soloist.

Most striking of all, however, is his way of ambushing you with grandeur, solemnity or forcefulness just when you think he has settled for prettiness. He is by no means a maverick, yet he’s never predictable. After the concertos he gave us two ravishing encores, fittingly Bach and Mozart again in romanticised arrangements that showed off his ability to send inner melodies glowing through the texture. I think the audience would have liked two more.

The Philharmonia was scheduled to be conducted in this concert by its new Finnish principal conductor, Santtu-Matias Rouvali, but he withdrew this week apparently due to “scheduling difficulties arising from the pandemic’’. The difficulties must have been severe indeed to miss your debut at the world’s most important classical music festival, and a chance to show London what you can offer with your new orchestra.


In the event the Estonian conductor Paavo Jarvi, for whom the expression “safe pair of hands’’ could have been invented, stepped into the breach. And he did a fine job of steering the Philharmonia through two Russian symphonies with plenty of potential pitfalls: Prokofiev’s First, the “Classical’’, and Shostakovich’s Ninth.

The violins sounded a bit stretched by their high exposed lines in the outer movements of the Prokofiev, but the Shostakovich was played with flair and character. It’s not the easiest symphony to interpret — Shostakovich at his most ambiguous and ironic at a time (1945) when Stalin wanted a grandiose victory celebration — but Jarvi made sense out of its disconcerting mix of bleak tragedy and sardonic glee.”

(Incidentally, through a source close to the orchestra, I understand the reason for Rouvali’s non-appearance does not reflect well upon him.)

If you look closely at the Times/Morrison review, he is emphasising certain pianistic ideas - beauty, exquisite, softness, nuance, romanticised, ravishing, etc….then balances them with: grandeur, solemnity etc…. almost as if this is the perfect, all-encompassing pianist - at least, as Morrison’s clichés describe. Almost….too good to be true?
(As for "daring to play so quietly" - we have heard threshold-of-audibility pps (or...ppps) several times this season, from orchestras and soloists, on the usually dynamically-uncompressed AAC web stream...).

But did Olafsson really “ambush you” with his "grandeur and solemnity" in this Mozart? If you really listen closely, was there anything surprising, moment-to-moment, about this performance?
I honestly don’t think so, even after revisits. So again, what some of us missed was - intensity and tragedy, an sharply idiomatic performance style true to this specific work with interpretive & textural contrasts between the movements, in the orchestral response even more than in the soloist. (I’ve already listed some modern and period examples).

Morrison then emphasises “safe pair of hands” and “a fine job” with the substitute conductor (many of whose recordings I admire, and who can create far more liveliness & individuality than he did here, especially in Frankfurt: his Nielsen set is one of the best). There has to be more to Mozart or DSCH than that.
Morrison’s comments on the DSCH 9th sound a little too generalised to me - mainly describing the music, and adding a brief, critically-clichéd approbation for the performance at the end.

Anyone who tries to write such reviews regularly knows how easily you can fall into such a trap. (Mea Culpa etc).
Because it is hard to write about music - to say, precisely: what made this performance, here before us, distinctive?
Try it and see…..

****
Sorry to be contentious here, G525, but if you say that:

“(Incidentally, through a source close to the orchestra, I understand the reason for Rouvali’s non-appearance does not reflect well upon him.)”

It isn't fair. He isn't here to defend himself, and you just have to give the evidence.
Otherwise all you have is - hearsay - gossip.

[kernelbogey]

Sorry to be contentious here, G525, but if you say that: “(Incidentally, through a source close to the orchestra, I understand the reason for Rouvali’s non-appearance does not reflect well upon him.)”
It isn't fair. He isn't here to defend himself, and you just have to give the evidence.
Otherwise all you have is - hearsay - gossip.

[Goon525]

OK, I somewhat regret sharing tittle-tattle, but can’t do anything about it now. My source is reliable, but I am not in a position to say more about it here. Sorry.
Who wants to see another review of the concert from Alexandra Coghlan (of Gramophone and Spectator) on The Arts Desk?

[richardfinegold]

I have been out of town for several days and haven’t listened to any thing for a bit, but VO is one of my favorite Pianists, with an outstanding Bach disc on my shelves, and Jarvi I conductor that I greatly value, and so the negativity on display in this thread is very surprising. I will make an effort to try listen to this,, although in the past my efforts to listen to Prom links on this side of the pond have usually been limited to very lossy sound

[jonfan]

Josie d'Arby was a terrible anchor for the BBC Four intermission chit chat. We all know that the BBC has diversity boxes to tick, but I'm sure there is no shortage of knowledgeable, articulate black women who have musical training and some knowledge of the repertoire rather than someone who mostly 'does presenting' and relies on the autocue whilst constantly grinning widely. This is not daytime TV. Worse still was that one composer seemed to be a completely new name to her, she kept pronouncing it ShoSH-takovich.

Loads of contentious stuff above but I hadn’t noticed Josie’s skin colour.