Thomasina’s last waltz

Fantasy Subscription 2011

Last week I was giving pre-concert talks here in Sydney, and I began by saying that the concert in question was one I’d been looking forward to all year – partly because it gave me a chance to hear in the concert hall two pieces I hadn’t heard live before (Tchaikovsky’s Voyevoda, Op.78 and Prokofiev’s Symphony-Concerto), partly because I’m an admirer of Osmo Vänskä’s work and of his Beethoven in particular. It also happened to be the final subscription program of the year and yes, when you’re feeling tired “final” has a very attractive ring to it.

This is one of the traps of working in music. Attending lots of concerts is a fabulous thing, enviable even, but it’s very easy to feel jaded after a while. So it’s helpful to imagine myself a “civilian” and think about the local orchestra concerts I would have attended if I were choosing to attend just nine – much in the same way that some people devise fantasy football teams. 

And so, my fantasy subscription for 2011:

Ashkenazy/de Lancie et al (Grieg’s Peer Gynt with narration)
The world needs more orchestral concerts that are conceived and presented as “shows”, as entertainments, without compromising artistic quality or programming integrity in any way. This was one of them. 

De Waart/Sydney Philharmonia Choirs (Beethoven, Barber, Adams)
Beethoven Seven. Best Beethoven symphony of the lot. ’Nuff said.
And Edo conducting Adams. 

Carter (Kerry, Grainger, Bartók)
The premiere of a new work by a composer I admire – of course I was looking forward to it. Topped off, on the night, by especially brilliant introductions by Andrew Ford. Grainger; the Australian guy in his shed. I won’t be forgetting this image in a hurry. 

Lang Lang in Recital (Beethoven, Albéniz, Prokofiev)
Every bit as astonishing as I’d expected. It was heartening to see he’d abandoned the satin polka dot suit and the unbearable OTT-ness I remembered from Blossom 2005.

Morlot/Pahud (Bach, Jarrell, Holst)
This was always going to be about the Jarrell flute concerto. Sue me. 

Evgeny Kissin in Recital (Liszt)
Fascinating, intriguing, jaw-droppingly impressive. There is nothing he can’t do. When I’m an old lady I will bore my sisters’ grandchildren with stories about hearing Kissin. Four times now. 

Strobel (Metropolis, restored with Huppertz score)
I had never seen Metropolis before. People I know who had seen it, told me that, with this new restoration, the whole movie made sense to them for the first time. The score lacked originality but what was so interesting about it was its sophistication and effectiveness as a film score given that this was a nascent genre in 1927.

Nott/Zimmermann (Brahms, Dean, Schubert)
It was the Dean I wanted to hear most of all, but my interest was further stimulated by the things Jonathan Nott had told me concerning his approach to the programming of the concert as a whole. 

Vänskä/Weilerstein (Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Beethoven)
See earlier comments. 

Inevitably there’s a concert you leave out of your fantasy subscription which turns out to be one of the highlights. This year that was the program with Nigel Westlake’s Missa Solis. I was aware from the beginning of the very personal significance of the piece and the terrible story behind it. But somehow that doesn’t prepare you for the experience of hearing the music, in the concert hall, with the composer conducting, and knowing that every musician on the stage is heart and soul behind this moving performance.

Classic 100 Twentieth Century: a personal response

The ABC’s Classic 100 Twentieth Century is over and it was every bit as frustrating as I expected it to be. Let me count the ways.

1. Frustration. Is “20th Century” a period or a state of mind?

Choosing a whole century as a category, especially one as stylistically diverse as the 20th, was always going to problematic. For some – including me – “20th century” means “modern” on some level, and by extension a lot of musical works written after 1900 are throwbacks or 20th-century only by a technicality. 

In the past, apart from the classic “general” polls, Classic 100 has polled for a genre, a composer or an instrument a clearly defined stylistic period. [Correction: there has never been a poll for a stylistic period.] Not this time. And if anything, it made the result less focused, less meaningful and, I suspect, less satisfying for nearly everybody. (See point 3)

2. Frustration. The unfair advantage of old age. 

Aka, the Gerontius effect. Acquiring favourite status inevitably takes time, especially in a deeply canonical art form such as classical music. For the repertoire that’s more than a hundred years old, age is immaterial. But when you’re comparing music that’s, say, 111 years old, with a piece that might have premiered last year, the newer piece is at a disadvantage.

The situation can be influenced by programming and promotion – I’m thinking of the clever way the Christopher Lawrence/Felix Hayman “Swoon” spot used to sneak in, with audience approval, all sorts of works that would normally have met with resistance on the grounds of youth and unfamiliarity. 

But mostly, the older a 20th-century work is, even if it approaches the “nasty modern music” end of the spectrum, the more fans it will have acquired. That’s one reason why the scattergraph for this poll shows a downward linear trend. That’s why the confronting (in character, not necessarily in style) Rite of Spring made it into the top ten, while other less-confronting but much newer works were ranked lower. Or perhaps The Rite of Spring is just better music… 

3. Frustration. (Or Amusement?) A polarised audience.

It was to be expected there would be parties throwing up their hands in disgust at the “dreadful noise” of Messiæn and others equally disgusted by the presence of backward-looking romantics such as Elgar. That’s the 20th century for you.

I could have treated it as a frustration, but the crux of the matter can be found in point 1 and this was really just the inevitable side effect. So I followed along via the social media and laughed.

4. Frustration. The vagaries of the Long Tail.

What didn’t make me laugh were some of the bizarre rankings at the bottom end of the list. (And towards the top too.) Given the very small polling sample (7,000 I believe, which must be barely 1 per cent of ABC Classic FM’s national reach) this is also not very surprising. I had to keep telling myself: “Small sample. Popularity contest. Small sample. Popularity contest.”

But despite the affirmations, I swore a bit when the Warsaw Concerto outranked Lieutenant Kijé; when ALW’s Requiem ranked higher than both Britten’s Serenade for tenor, horn and strings and Elgar’s Violin Concerto; when a folksong arrangement by Grainger came in three places ahead of Daphnis et Chloé (!!!!).

Of course, you see what’s happening here: I’m taking a poll that was unashamedly about “favourites” (and for which I myself was quite careful to choose my favourites) and I’m assessing the results against values of relative quality, importance and greatness. “Small sample. Popularity contest…”

5. Frustration. Insidious Albion.

This last frustration is purely a matter of personal taste. There are great works by English composers; I even shortlisted some. I just found it disheartening to see English music dominate the top 100. Especially so much English music of the pleasantly modal, folk-music inspired, stirringly hymn-like variety. But that’s just me. I have a serious bias towards the Russians and the French. And if there’s going to be folk inspiration I want wicked rhythms and wonky harmonies à la Bartók.

Postscript…

ABC Classic FM has shared the 100 runners up.

Classic 100 Twentieth Century: a personal list

The voting called for our “ten favourite works written since 1900”.

I took this literally: favourites. Not necessarily the greatest or the most seminal or the most famous or the most representatively “20th century”, whatever that might mean. Just favourites. For me this is music that I’m always happy to listen to, music which has given me inspiration or delight, music that has special significance for me.

The original shortlist was long (nearly 40 works) and, inevitably for the 20th century, stylistically diverse. More so than in any previous poll, it broke my heart to bring it down to ten. At this point it was necessary to invent some “rules” – each composer could be represented only once, for example, and I aimed for some representation across genres: orchestral, concerto, theatre, small ensemble…

My positive biases are evident: orchestral sound, music for dance, dramatic inspiration. Please don’t jump to conclusions about my negative biases, although the initials of one are DSCH. And I happily endorse the presence of musical theatre. Twice. Bite me, as they say.

In the end, four of my choices were in the 100, one of these scraped into the top 10 (Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet). Two of my composers made it in but with other works. The countdown isn’t over, but for the other four I’m resigned to being part of the invisible long tail.

And so my ten, annotated…

BARTÓK Bluebeard’s Castle
Thought about the Concerto for Orchestra (42 in the poll), which I've loved ever since we studied it at high school. But Bluebeard is so much more astonishing and powerful. (And I figured, correctly, that the Concerto would get plenty of votes without my help – this is a recurring theme.) 

(13) BERNSTEIN West Side Story
This is is far and away the best thing he ever wrote. And it’s cool.

KERRY This Insubstantial Pageant
This was a fond choice: I played my part in bringing this piece about. But I knew it wouldn’t make the 100, as it’s not available in a commercial recording. It should be. (Meanwhile, a reference recording can be borrowed from the AMC, and there’s an excerpt online including the quotation from Vivaldi’s “La tempesta di mare” flute concerto, which made me smile.)

LUTOSŁAWSKI Concerto for Orchestra
There’s a story here: heading off to a concert as a flute-playing teenager in order to hear Rampal play Mozart and coming away with my head buzzing with excitement about this piece by a composer I’d never heard of before. This choice is symbolic of what I strive for in my programming and ceaselessly hope for in my concert-going: come for one thing, go away thrilled by a discovery of some kind. (See Vasks.)

(10) PROKOFIEV Romeo and Juliet
Everything I love about Prokofiev’s music, plus heart in abundance.   

(62) RAVEL Piano Concerto in G
Another story. I first heard this exhilarating piece at the age of eight-and-eleven-months. It was in the theatre not as concert music, and as a result the movements now always sound as if they’re being played out of order – thank you very much, Mr Murphy.

SONDHEIM Sweeney Todd
«Have a little fop, Finest in the shop, Or some shepherd's pie peppered with actual shepherd on top…» This was the first Sondheim musical I saw. I considered others, but this one’s the closest in many respects to whatever it is that we define as “classical”, so it seemed right.  

(35) STRAVINSKY The Firebird
Oh, how I struggled in choosing between this, The Rite of Spring (9 in the poll) and Petrushka. How to decide between voluptuous beauty, pounding exhilaration and the slightly bleak but moving tale of a puppet come to life?   

WESTLAKE Omphalo Centric Lecture
There’s a reason this music for percussion ensemble is one of Nigel Westlake’s most frequently performed works (I believe). It’s just so damn addictive! Encore please. (Westlake has been represented by his Antarctica music (29); the Penguin Ballet number is kind of adorable.) 

VASKS Cello Concerto
When you program the Australian premiere of something unfamiliar, it’s not often the letters flood in, all with some variant of “I wasn’t expecting to like this piece at all and it turned out to be a highlight of the season.” (Yess!)

As a final note… I discovered after I finished that, quite without realising it, I hadn’t chosen any works that were technically 20th century but which spiritually (to my ears) belonged in the 19th. So no Rachmaninoff, no Mahler, no Elgar, no Richard Strauss. I guess that tells you something about the effect the label “20th century” has on my brain.

Postscript…

I send my regrets to Messrs Adès, Berg, Britten, Debussy, Edwards, Gershwin, Hindemith, Janáček, Meale, Messiæn, Nancarrow, Poulenc, Schoenberg, Schultz, Sculthorpe, Weill and Who-Killed-Cock-Robin, as well as the Misses Panufnik and Kats-Chernin. Some of you did just fine without me, I’m glad to see.