Nimble Tread

The Old Song and Dance

Big day for the kid yesterday: I caught the Royal Opera's charming new production of Le Nozze di Figaro in the morning, and the Royal Ballet's wonderful old production of Giselle in the evening.  The former got off to a slow start, but found its stage legs by the middle of the first act; the latter, on the other hand, had no such problems, and was resplendent from beginning to end.  Kobborg and Cojocaru were phenomenal, both à deux and apart, moving with incredible finesse and power throughout the entire ballet.  Kobborg's Act II leaps (excerpts of which can be found here)  literally drew gasps from the audience, though how he mustered the energy to get through it all I'll never know.  The pair is off to the States tomorrow to wow a new set of people in Costa Mesa and New York, with a mixed bag of mixed bills.  They'll be back here in March, though, dancing in the RB's Romeo and Juliet.  I'd pen that one in, if you're into that sort of thing.

Violinus Maximus

Last night, Maxim Vengerov treated a grateful – though perhaps overly so  – Barbican audience to his rendition of Shostakovich’s first violin concerto in A minor.  As has been well-documented, Vengerov’s been on sabbatical this past year, and has played only forty concerts instead of his usual ninety, devoting his free time to brushing up on his improvisational skills – musical, not comedic – and learning to tango.  He’s also gone so far as to commission a concerto in which he’ll play classical violin for a spell before switching to jazz and rock violins in a build up to the finale, which will be delivered to the audience via a touch of dirty dancing. 

I say great.  Why not?  People are constantly kvetching about how classical superstars don’t play enough new music, and this concerto may well give them a modicum of comfort.  I also think that Vengerov’s style of play is better suited to more contemporary pieces.  He’s a fine violinist, to be sure, but his attempts at the Classical and Romantic repertoires, though well-played, have never entirely done it for me.  His fierce attack works well with the old showpieces – Csárdás, Perpetuum Mobile, La Ronde des Lutins – but when it comes to more lyrical tunes, he has a tendency to flirt with bathos, which can make even the most leathery skin crawl.

Shostakovich’s concerto was a good match for Vengerov, but there were times during the third movement that didn’t quite work.  Also, and this is my last gripe, the cadenza, which seems right up his alley, was choppier than it should have been, especially in the development leading up to the final crescendo.  To be fair, the only other version of the concerto with which I’m well acquainted is the one David Oistrakh recorded in 1956, and while Vengerov is many things, Oistrakh he ain’t.  Still, it was a pleasure to see him in action, and I may well stop in to hear his annual Beethoven VC at the Barbican on March 3rd.

Someone who I will definitely pay to see again is Mstislav Rostropovich, who conducted the LSO last night, and led them through a wonderful version of Shostakovich’s Symphony
#10 in E minor.  It’s a long piece, and is made so by the first movement, which usually clocks in at thirty minutes or so.  It’s not the most technically challenging piece, but it’s certainly difficult to maintain the patina of tension that gives the symphony its amazing colour. 

Rostropovich is a graceful conductor, and his movements are more emotional than ornamental.  As with his cello playing, his band leading makes you feel that he’s in command of a hidden power that can be unleashed at a moment’s notice.  I was able to follow the ebbs and flows of his musicality from the audience, so I can only imagine what it must have been like for the players in the orchestra, who played wonderfully, and sounded enormous, producing huge fffs that were about as good as it gets. 

Listening to a double serving of Shotakovich made my night, and my pleasure was only enhanced by seeing the 79-year-old, bandy-legged Rostropovich give a hearty salute to the orchestra before bounding down the stage steps with the aplomb of a twenty-two year-old.  He’ll be back, alright, and I’ll be there to see it. 

Wednesday on Monday

Last night's concert at the Wigmore – Ruth Palmer playing Bach's Ciaccona from Partita no. 2 in D minor, Mendelssohn's Violin Sonata Op. 4, and Shostakovich's Violin Sonata Op. 134 – was the violin recital of the year.  To be fair, it’s only January 24th, and I’m fairly confident that her record won’t stand long, but still, it was a hell of a show, and it was made so by the felicitous combination of one part each violin and violinist.  Miss Palmer was playing a 1725/30 Montagnana (on loan from Florian Leonhard, whose shop is down the street from me, and, like so many of these rare violin dealerships, is as nondescript as a piece of melba toast), which sounded infinitely resonant, almost amplified.  It was at its best with the Bach – pure and dignified in tone – but probably served Palmer most effectively with the Mendelssohn, which would certainly have come off a bit flat were it not for the instrument’s intervention. 

Be that as it may, and though Bach’s Ciaccona was a pleasure to hear, Shostakovich’s Op. 134 stole the show.  Palmer’s almost recklessly vigorous playing set all of us a-tingle, especially Mr. Leonhard, who was doubtless keeping a close eye on the Montagnana.  The girlish persona she had initially projected was supplanted by a considerably more impish substitute, and as she stood there mischievously smiling while ferociously bowing double stops, she reminded me for all the world of Wednesday Addams all grown up.  She’s willowy yet ferocious, sweet yet diabolical.  When she’s engaged in the music, she’s intriguing to watch; when she’s not, she has the air of a child forced to practice a loathed tune.  I expect this will pass in time, which in a way is too bad, at least as far as live performances are concerned, because it’s exciting to see her ebbs and flows play themselves out on-stage.  It’s unlikely she’ll ever be a superstar, but she has all the makings of a violinist’s violinist: ensconced in relative euphonic seclusion, but bewitching to those in a position to be bewitched.  Of course, I could be wrong.  Her début album, which will include the Shostakovich 1st Violin Concerto, should emerge later this year, and we’ll see what happens. 

Fiddling With Sapete

Spent the last half-hour violining my way through Voi che sapete, a fine tune to be sure, and one that managed to make itself the soundtrack to my adventures this afternoon.  It's haunting was doubtless done in order to remind me of the upcoming Le Nozze di Figaro at the ROH, which I have every intention of seeing this Saturday.  I only hope they manage it somewhat better than I did. 
Prior to getting my needle stuck in the Mozart groove, I enjoyed some quality time with Reynaldo Hahn's Venezia: chansons en dialect vénitien, which I heard yesterday, and for the first time, thanks to Joyce DiDonato.  My initiation came at the Wigmore, but the world's came in a slightly more dramatic fashion, and I quote:

The first performance of Reynaldo Hahn's Venezia: chansons en dialect vénitien was given on a gondola at a place in Venice where, he recalled, 'three canals met three charming bridges [...] Gradually passers-by gathered on the bridges, an audience of ordinary people pressing forward to listen.' Naturally, they were delighted by what they heard, partly because Hahn was so expert in accompanying himself at the piano, but mainly, one imagines, because in setting these dialect poems he had so accurately and so affectionately mimicked the Venetian idiom.

I'd have enjoyed seeing that.  Not the affectionate mimicry of the Venetian dialect -- I could get that at home; I'm talking about seeing Hahn play the piano on a gondola.  That's just impressive.

(As I know you're all wondering, the apocalyptic-ish picture above if entitled Venezia senz'acqua, and was painted by Fabrizio Clerici way back in 1980.)

Opera in the Morning

I caught a sneak peak at the ROH’s 2006 staging of La Traviata this morning.  Not that much has changed since last year: back are Richard Eyre‘s production, Eddie Wade’s Baron Douphol, and American tenor Charles Castronovo beautifully singing the role of Alfredo, which he delivers with the same filial vulnerability as last season.  Unfortunately, whereas his performance a year ago was buttressed by Maurizio Benini‘s conducting and Norah Amsellem‘s wonderful Violetta, he was nearly set adrift this time ‘round, tethered to port only by a lone strand of cord in the form of Zeljko Lucic singing Giorgio Germont.   

Amsellem‘s replacement, Ana Maria Martinez, is in possession of a beautiful, though somewhat trapped, voice.  She’s at her best as she creeps toward a high G (G5), but has some trouble in the neighbourhood of middle C, where she can sound as though she’s swallowed a cotton ball.  Her acting is more or less believable, but would be better suited to a role with slightly more attitude and a touch less pathos.  She was fine as Violetta-the-Party-Girl, but was mostly unconvincing as Violetta-the-Flickering-Candle, relying on a woe-is-me facial expression and the occasional unsteady footstep to convey the tragedy of her predicament.  She and Castronovo seemed to sing past each other, and though they shared the same physical space, there was precious little in their interactions that might make us think they were psychically linked in any way. 

AMM wasn’t helped any by Philippe Auguin’s conducting, which was dry at best at bathetic at worst.  Far from providing an unseen guiding hand, Auguin seemed intent on carving out a character for himself, which he managed to do by fiddling with the tempo in order to wring every bit of sentiment from the score.  Amami, Alfredo is dramatic enough without having to be played twenty percent slower. 

Martinez might have fallen short of the mark where chemistry with Castronovo is concerned, but Lucic certainly didn’t.  His Giorgio was blustery and magisterial, and when he started upbraiding Alfredo in Act II, I thought he might whip off his belt and give his son five of the Germont best in front of their friends.  Interesting as that might have been, I’d have vastly preferred my attention to have been focussed on Alfredo and belle rather than Alfredo and père.  And I’m sure Verdi would have preferred it too.

All told, the 2006 reincarnation of La Traviata is far from a complete loss; it’s just not as good as it was last year.  That said, if you didn’t see last year’s, and if you don’t mind a little schmaltz, it might be just the thing to fill a few evening hours. 

Incidentally...

Mezzo Joyce DiDonato, who's in the middle of an impressive run as Rosina in the ROH's Il Barbiere di Siviglia, will be breaking glasses at the Wigmore on Monday, when, with the help of pianist Julius Drake, she'll be singing an assortment of Rossini, Hahn, Fauré, and Head tunes.  Not one to miss.    

Flying Saucers

A few weeks ago, I was in a magazine office and heard what has to be the snobbiest expression yet to emerge from the English mind.  I’m not embarrassed to admit that I was at a bit of a loss where its etymology was concerned, but have since done some detective work, and believe I’ve come up with a wholly suitable explanation.  The phrase in question is “milk-first,” as in: “he’s a milk-first sort of fellow,” and, like many such slurs, suggests that the person in question comes from paltry stock.  There was once a time, you see, when only wealthy people could afford porcelain that wouldn’t crack when it came in contact with hot tea.  Accordingly, the riff-raff would lead the way with milk in order to temper the concoction and prevent the cup from cracking.  Fascinating as this may seem, I’m far more interested in something I came across while seeking out an explanation to “milk first” on the net.  Sixty years ago today, the Evening Standard published a monograph by George Orwell in which the writer – who was hardly known for his epicurean prowess – set out the proper way to brew a pot of tea.  The piece was entitled A Nice Cup of Tea and began as follows:

If you look up 'tea' in the first cookery book that comes to hand you will probably find that it is unmentioned; or at most you will find a few lines of sketchy instructions which give no ruling on several of the most important points.
This is curious, not only because tea is one of the main stays of civilization in this country, as well as in Eire, Australia and New Zealand, but because the best manner of making it is the subject of violent disputes.
When I look through my own recipe for the perfect cup of tea, I find no fewer than eleven outstanding points. On perhaps two of them there would be pretty general agreement, but at least four others are acutely controversial. Here are my own eleven rules, every one of which I regard as golden:

Orwell was far from a milk-first kind of guy, and used rule number ten to prove it.  Choosing to address the pragmatic rather the sociological, however, he claimed that adding milk to the tea, as opposed to the other way around, allowed the pourer complete control over the mix, thereby preventing an overly-milky beverage.  While the eleven rules comprise the meat of the piece, Orwell wrapped things up by calling to mind some tea-related topics – like the subsidiary uses of tealeaves: fortune telling, carpet sweeping, rabbit feeding – but unfortunately, and to my everlasting dismay, left their probing and codification to future generations of tea enthusiasts.  If anyone would like to mark the 60th anniversary of Orwell’s auspicious piece by brewing the perfect cup of tea, have a look at this.

You Think That's Strange...

This is certainly one of Bloom's finer points of recent days:

Barfield says: "It must be a strangeness of meaning," and then makes a fine distinction:

It is not correlative with wonder; for wonder is our reaction to things which we are conscious of not quiete understanding, or at any rate of understanding less than we had thought.  The element of strangeness in beauty has the contrary effect.  It arises from contact with a different kind of consciousness from our own, different, yet not so remote that we cannot partly share it, as indeed, in such a connection, the mere word "contact" implies.  Strangeness, in fact, arouses wonder when we do not understand: aesthetic imagination when we do.

Consciousness is the central term here.  As Barfield intimates, consciousness is to poetry what marble is to sculpture: the material that is being worked.  Words are figurations of consciousness: metaphorical of consciousness, the poet's words invite us to share in a strangeness.  "A felt change in consciousness" is one of Barfield's definitions of the poetic effect, and I relate this to what fascinates me most in the greatest Shakespearean characters -- Falstaff, Hamlet, Iago, Lear, Cleopatra -- the extraordinary changes that come about when they overhear themselves.  As James Wood remarks, actually they become conscious of listening to Shakespeare, because in overhearing themselves, what they are hearing is Shakespeare.  They become themselves more truly and more strange , because they are "free artists of themselves" (Hegel's tribute to them).
  The work of great poetry is to aid us to become free artists of ourselves.  Even Shakespeare cannot make me into Falstaff of Hamlet, but all great poetry asks us to be possessed by it.  To possess it by memory is a start, and to augment our consciousness is the goal.  The art of reading poetry is an authentic training in the augmentation of consciousness, perhaps the most authentic of healthy modes.

Bloom obviously had poetry on the mind when he wrote this, but the point he raises is hardly limited to the poetic idiom.  In fact, the relationship between creator, creation, executor, and audience enjoys considerably greater freedom in non-linguistic affairs, of which I'd place music at the top of the list.  Where language is restricted by its dependence upon the compound meaning of a chain of precisely definable terms, music is somewhat more ethereal in character: its terms are familiar, but never fully known.  Bloom writes about the benefit of augmenting one's consciousness, but mentions Barfield's opinion that the pleasure comes from making contact with different kinds of consciousness.  I'm happiest with the last sentence of the Barfield quote, as I think it elegantly describes the responsive difference between music/poetry and prose: "Strangeness, in fact, arouses wonder when we do not understand: aesthetic imagination when we do."

Boom

Nice little fireworks display we had here.  It reminded me of Turner's paintings of the burning of the Houses of Parliament.  Have a look: