 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-07-28 22:20
Tonight on PBS at 8pm EST - check your local listings.
The program:
Mozart - Symphony #35
Mozart - Piano Concerto #23 in A (2nd mvt only)
Handel - Endless Pleasure, Endless Love, from Semele
O Sleep,Why Dost Thou Leave Me?, from Semele
Let the Bright Seraphim, from Samson
JC Bach - Sinfonia in G minor, Op. 6, No. 6
Movement I: Allegro
Rameau - Selections from Pièces de clavecin
Gigue en rondeau
Tambourin
Sarabande
Mozart - Bella mia fiamma…Resta, o cara, K.528
with guest artists:
Renée Fleming - soprano
Stephen Hough - piano
...GBK
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Author: diz
Date: 2005-07-28 22:27
How wonderful ... GBK - is it being Podcast or real-timed?
Without music, the world would be grey, very grey.
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2005-07-28 22:45
Many TKS, GBK, for us [rite hear in the heartland] at 7PM CDT, PBS. Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: Rivers
Date: 2005-07-29 02:52
Thanks for the heads-up...wasn't that John Manasse as principal clarinet?
Wonderful concert
Rivers
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Author: Bob A
Date: 2005-07-29 02:59
Wonderful program, I thought the Cello drowned out Fleming a touch in the "Endless ...". Was PBS's mike placements or my tin ears?
Bob A?
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-07-29 06:40
Bob A wrote:
> I thought the Cello drowned out Fleming a
> touch in the "Endless ...". Was PBS's mike placements or my tin
> ears?
The balance of the concertante group seemed too loud for the vocalist.
Perhaps it was different in the hall ...GBK
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Author: larryb
Date: 2005-07-29 13:13
Did you see me on TV? I was sitting in the audience behind the orchestra - to the left of the bassoons (orchestra perspective) near the timps about 3 rows back. Had on my light brown sport jacket, blue shirt.
Quite interesting the new set up for Mostly Mozart (orchestra forward; some audience in back and on side, Euro-style). The sound was fine in back, although you definitely felt the timpani's presence where we were - not bad actually, it never occured to me that Mozart was such a great percussion composer. The balance was good from there - Flemming's sound came through gorgeously, although couldn't always understand the words. The piano was surprisingly clear, given that the lid was open - you'd think it would block the sound.
The funny thing is that I almost stood when the conductor came out - old orchestra habit reinforced by sitting behind the wind section.
Mannasse played beautifully on the Hafner and Piano concerto #23, but he sure spent a lot of time just sitting and listening. Amazing that he could stay in great tune and focus with so much down time. I was able to study his fancy new ligature.
For music geeks like us, the set up is a great way to study the orchestra and conductor.
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-07-29 13:17
larryb wrote:
> Mannasse played beautifully on the Hafner and Piano concerto
> #23, but he sure spent a lot of time just sitting and
> listening.
Clarinets only play in the first and last movements of the Haffner.
What was Mozart thinking?? ![[wink]](http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/smileys/smilie3.gif) ...GBK
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 2005-07-29 13:32
TKS to all of the above "learned critic's" comments, I also enjoyed it all very much. Was that interesting program order a "promotional device", back in M's and H's history?? Don
Thanx, Mark, Don
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-07-29 13:49
The concert was programmed as it might have been heard in Mozart's day.
The symphony was performed as separate movements, interspersed with a variety of other works from the Baroque and early Classical.
Encores were usually a repeat of the most popular movement(s). In this concert they repeated the last movement of the Haffner - taken from the recapitulation...GBK
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2005-07-29 14:43
In a bit of luxury casting, Larry Guy played 2nd clarinet. You can't mistake that magnificent mane of white hair.
Blair Tindall was definitely not there on oboe.
It was an excellent concert. Louis Langrée is just what the festival needs and had the orchestra play with considerable nuance. He knows when to give every cue and when to just let them play. There was a fair amount of scrappiness in the strings, particularly in the finale of the Haffner. It may have been due to fatigue, but this has been a recurring problem in the Mostly Mozart Orchestra.
larryb -
How was the sound of the hall? Did the new orchestra position and the new clouds overhead (a la the original Philharmonic Hall) seem to improve the acoustics?
Was anyone there, in the main part of the hall? How did it sound there?
I liked Fleming, and **loved** Hough. I wish they had dropped the J.C. Bach and let him play the finale of the concerto. Even his Rameau was decent (except for the Sarabande, where he didn't have a clue).
Ken Shaw
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Author: GBK
Date: 2005-07-29 19:56
Ken Shaw wrote:
> Even his Rameau was decent (except for the Sarabande, where he
> didn't have a clue).
Funny you should mention that, because I also felt there was something a bit odd about the way he played the Sarabande. Not knowing the work well, it did, however, seem very "Chopinesque", and totally out of character with the rest of the piece.
I see now that I'm not the only one who felt that way ...GBK
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Author: BobD
Date: 2005-07-29 22:55
Our PBS stations didn't cover it....bummer.
Bob Draznik
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2005-07-30 00:34
Hough bothered me, despite his technical prowess. He looks dignified and he doesn't make faces, but he's mannered in other distracting ways, rolling his hand up and splaying his fingers up and out when he plays legato that ends up on his thumb, for instance--and he's got that awful habit of craning back and gazing heavenwards. Though I'm not a purist about instruments (and have been known to play Bach on a bass saxophone), it bothered me that he played Rameau on a 12-foot Steinway even though there was a harpsichord on stage for the Handel. The style bothered me more than the choice of instrument--he loaded up on pedal and angst, and yes, he did play Rameau as if he were Chopin. I'd like to hear him play some of the Romantic-era composers, but I don't care if I never hear him play early music again.
Fleming also struck me as pretty seriously out of period. I don't mind hearing the more dramatic Mozart arias sung as if he were Puccini, but singing Handel that way doesn't work for me.
I thought the orchestra ensemble sounded ragged and under-rehearsed. The first violins were excruciating in places. I also think that orchestras need to establish dress codes for the female performers so that they look as professional and as uniform as the men.
The Viennese salon concept was interesting, but I prefer my symphonies played start to finish--although I have to admit that, just once, I'd enjoy hearing someone play Beethoven's violin concerto the way it was premiered, with the violinist treating the audience to "barnyard imitations" on the fiddle between movements! But hearing the Haffner split up irritated me, even though I wanted to get into the spirit of the thing.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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