Dream of Gerontius
We went along to Symphony Hall last night for the final time this season, to hear Elgar's Dream of Gerontius, one of my all-time favourites. The massed choirs of the West Midlands were joined by the Chandos Symphony Orchestra of Malvern and three young, professional soloists, so there was a good deal of local support. Even so, the Symphony Hall was barely two-thirds full.
The performance was really enjoyable. Perhaps some of the precision of a professional orchestra was missing, but the overall effect was good and brought back fond memories of the performance in Ryde, Isle of Wight, in 1978 or thereabouts. The soloist due to sing Gerontius was indisposed, so the part was sung by Geraint Dodd. Though he was more than capable of taking on this demanding role, sadly on this occasion his voice was inadequate to fill the reaches of this large venue and this was emphasised all the more when firstly
Jonathan Lemalu stepped foward to sing and subsequently Christine Rice. She, in particular, impressed us with her totally committed stage presence, allowing us to enjoy the richness of her voice without distraction from awkward or fussy mannerisms.
Our main criticism remains with our fellow audience members, many of whom chose to bring along their aged scores to the performance, and those who didn't, but decided to try to follow the libretto printed in the programme. How distracting it was to have pages turning here and there, to have vague muttering to my right, when a place was lost and several pages had to be turned to catch up again. As for the wave of page-turning when a particular point in the libretto was reached and half the audience needed to manipulate the rather over-sized A4 programme - well, I suppose the breeze created by the flapping paper was welcome on a warm evening...
The question remains, why? If the score is needed to enjoy or understand the music, why not stay at home and follow along a CD? If the copy of the score is so old and loved, how come it's not so familiar that it can be left at home, or at the very least, cuddled closely (and firmly closed) as a comfort blanket? If there has to be a libretto printed to enable the audience to understand the work, why print it on such a large format that manoeuvring the programme in the limited space available is impossible to manage quietly? Anyway, how on earth could they see to read in the dimmed lights?
There's the answer. Dim the audience lights completely! (Or will that mean they will bring reading lights along as well?)
(Originally posted by Gill)
The performance was really enjoyable. Perhaps some of the precision of a professional orchestra was missing, but the overall effect was good and brought back fond memories of the performance in Ryde, Isle of Wight, in 1978 or thereabouts. The soloist due to sing Gerontius was indisposed, so the part was sung by Geraint Dodd. Though he was more than capable of taking on this demanding role, sadly on this occasion his voice was inadequate to fill the reaches of this large venue and this was emphasised all the more when firstly
Jonathan Lemalu stepped foward to sing and subsequently Christine Rice. She, in particular, impressed us with her totally committed stage presence, allowing us to enjoy the richness of her voice without distraction from awkward or fussy mannerisms.Our main criticism remains with our fellow audience members, many of whom chose to bring along their aged scores to the performance, and those who didn't, but decided to try to follow the libretto printed in the programme. How distracting it was to have pages turning here and there, to have vague muttering to my right, when a place was lost and several pages had to be turned to catch up again. As for the wave of page-turning when a particular point in the libretto was reached and half the audience needed to manipulate the rather over-sized A4 programme - well, I suppose the breeze created by the flapping paper was welcome on a warm evening...
The question remains, why? If the score is needed to enjoy or understand the music, why not stay at home and follow along a CD? If the copy of the score is so old and loved, how come it's not so familiar that it can be left at home, or at the very least, cuddled closely (and firmly closed) as a comfort blanket? If there has to be a libretto printed to enable the audience to understand the work, why print it on such a large format that manoeuvring the programme in the limited space available is impossible to manage quietly? Anyway, how on earth could they see to read in the dimmed lights?
There's the answer. Dim the audience lights completely! (Or will that mean they will bring reading lights along as well?)
(Originally posted by Gill)
posted by Mark at
2:29 pm
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