Prom 57 - Bach feeds 5000

Wagner: Parsifal – Act 3 Prelude and Good Friday Music

Berg: Violin Concerto

Richard Strauss: Der Rosenkavalier – suite

Ravel: La valse

Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester
Daniele Gatti conductor
Frank Peter Zimmermann violin 

26 August 2012, Royal Albert Hall, London

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The Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra was founded in 1986 by Claudio Abbado and draws its members from the UK to Russia.   With the normal Proms programme, concert-goers were handed a separate programme covering the GMYO's 2012 Summer Tour.  Having two parallel programmes was actually quite instructive.  The GMYO's was a heavily corporate production on the orchestra's 25th anniversary, complete with words from the sponsors, president etc, and even a rather earnest Mission Statement ("Talent with professionalism, Musicianship without borders, Dedication and enthusiasm", in case you were wondering).  There were also some nice clashes: the GMYO was "the leading youth orchestra in the world" in its own brochure, but only "one of the world's leading youth orchestras" in the Proms programme.

Parsifal at Bayreuth in 2010 conducted by Daniele Gatti.  Photo: Enrico Nawrath

Gatti chose Wagner and Parsifal to open the concert.  In 2010 he directed the opera at Bayreuth and is booked to return again to the Wagner mecca. The GMYO sections are impressive units, and Gatti coaxed a nicely blended sound out of the group as a whole, although some on the woodwind were rather under-projecting their solo lines.  The concluding sections of this luminous music were beautifully shaped by conductor and orchestra.

Frank Peter Zimmermann

Alban Berg

With the Berg we were in for a treat with Frank Peter Zimmermann playing the solo part. Even after many listenings, Berg's melancholy and disturbing Violin Concerto has lost none of its mysterious power.  Sub-titled "To The Memory of an Angel", it was composed following the death at 18 of the daughter of close friends. The heart of the work comes as Berg quotes Bach's chorale Es ist genug ("It is enough!") in the woodwind.   And Bach reappeared, unexpectedly, as the highlight of the evening.  Zimmermann delivered an encore, the gently rocking Andante of Bach's A Minor Solo Violin Sonata.  It is music of simple, profound genius, and it was indescribably moving to see the Albert Hall - that 5000 capacity Colosseum - unified and transfixed by Zimmermann's hushed lullaby. 

The second half brought a cavalcade of waltzes.  First up was the pastiche of doubtful authenticity taken from Richard Strauss' opera Der Rosenkavalier.  Here too the competing programme notes diverged.  Did Strauss have no involvement in it and probably would have disliked it (Proms notes) or did he compose it possibly with some assistance from others such as Artur Rodzinski (GMYO notes)?  Personally I prefer the Proms version, as Strauss would surely have loathed the way it does not follow his own poetic conclusion to the opera but instead reprises high spirits from Act 2, and some of the gear changes between contrasted operatic moments are laughably insensitive. 

Things were taken to a whole extra level of sophistication with Ravel's masterwork La valse.  It was conceived as a homage to the great waltzes of Johann Strauss, but the First World War intervened and by its completion in 1920 Ravel had rounded it off with a violent climax which breaks the waltz with a terse, military conclusion.  It is a classic example (along with Bolero) of Ravel setting up a strictly rhythmic musical structure which then goes haywire at the end.  The GMYO brought an impressive, lithe sophistication to the piece with excellent contributions from the brass section, but Gatti rushed his fences at the end which substituted a frenzy for what should be a shocking change of rhythm - a virtual waltz-murder.

Peter O'Byrne

Prom 52 - Cinderella complete at Proms for first (and last?) time

Prokofiev: Cinderella - complete ballet (1945)

London Symphony Orchestra

Valery Gergiev conductor

22 August 2012, Royal Albert Hall, London

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Sergei Prokofiev

A concert performance of an evening-length ballet is normally enough to set you running for the hills.  But if the ballet is by Prokofiev or Tchaikovsky then it is an entirely different matter.  And if Valery Gergiev is conducting then we have grown accustomed to it being a highlight of the festival.

Valery Gergiev

Gergiev brought his London Symphony Orchestra to the summer Proms festival in the middle of a mini-European tour together.  16 - 19 August saw them performing 4 nights at the Edinburgh Festival in a complete Brahms and Szymanowski symphonies cycle that will be repeated in London in the coming Barbican season.  After tonight's Cinderella, they play 3 consecutive nights at Festivals in Salzburg and Lucerne.  The LSO then heads off to play with other conductors while Gergiev continues onto Stockholm direct for 3 more nights, then returns to the Edinburgh Festival with the Mariinsky for several more nights to round off August.  As it happens conducting Cinderella again.

Such are the schedules of the summer festivals, but what of tonight?  Could they pull a Cinderella without dancers off?  In a word, no. Cinderella is a delightful score and contains some of the greatest moments in Prokofiev's output, such as the stunning midnight clock music and the Act 1 waltz.  Prokofiev's enormous melodic gift combined with his edgy modernism provides the alchemy that lifts this ballet out of the ordinary.  But it does not have the long dramatic lines that Romeo or Sleeping Beauty have and the first Act in particular suffers greatly without the visual dimension, much of it full of sardonic humour as Cinderella's two stepsisters Skinny and Dumpy quarrel.

So, with these artists it was never going to be less than a quality performance, but it did not scale the heights.  History would have told them that no one had done this ballet complete in concert at the Proms before.  Gennady Rozhdestvensky did conduct Act 2 complete once - a sounder choice.
 
And I must comment on the toothpick.  I've grown accustomed to Gergiev directing orchestras without a baton; just his famous fluttering fingers.  He does sometimes use a full length baton.  But tonight he was using a thin 10cm long stick in his right hand.  Have the LSO complained they can't follow his beat?  After all which of the fluttering fingers is marking time?  In his toothpick, there was at least a (tiny) point for the players to focus on.

Peter O'Byrne