5. The Bamberg Symphony Orchestra.

Performances

of

Ligeti - Bach - Mahler - Strauss

Went back to the Usher Hall; this time for the concert. The hall was not so busy although a number of the attendees had decided to dress up for the occasion. A few seemed to have cultivated false aires and appeared quite ludicrous. I had purchased the cheaper tickets and was right at the front, looking up at the performers upon the stage.

LIGETI - Poeme Symphonique.

This was a surprise. I had heard his other piece before but I was totally new to the opening work. Imagine my surprise to see a large collection of metronomes ticking away on the stage. Although I had arrived before the start, the machines had already been set in motion. It made me think of Man Ray.

There were to be 100 metronomes grouped into ten sets but I think that despite the number, they had been grouped into larger clusters. I could not check; I was that close to the stage!

At first it feels like a joke or trick b then you think of it like some sculpture. Slowly you listen to the sequences and you imagine patterns or follow certain beats. The metronomes slowly stop and out of the noise you find yourself listening harder to the remaining ones. There is expectation and suspense. Now it reminded me of Edgar Allen Poe; you know the work I mean. At the end there is only one and it is like your own heart. When that stops you stop breathing.

Later the vibration from the orchestra set one off for a wee bit. If the motif was death - then here was the resurrection! An added bonus was the assorted well dressed Germans who carefully monitored the machines and then carefully packed them up in the intermission. The program notes mentioned that Ligerti was a Jew who survived the war; I thought of the order of the death camps and the casual brutality of men and women doing what - for them - was just a job.

BACH - Komm, susser Tod.

MAHLER - Kindertotenlieder (extracts).

Now the funny thing is that although I have listened to the Bach piece before and I recall listening and watching the cellos; I can't remember if the piece came second or last. The program notes would say second but I thought it came last! I can only posit the answer that the army of metronomes must have hypnotised me; certainly I felt quite a blow and was thinking about mortality with the last tick.

Alice Coote gave a very strong performance of Mahlers "Kindertotenlieder" or songs on the death of children. Certainly the subject matter and the inspiration for these pieces were fueled by the power of her voice. She was a powerfully built woman who was able to bring strength while avoiding being any masculine or disharmonious aspects. I was quite bowled over! The songs were in German and although a translation was available in the programs, I did not refer to them during the performance. At first I felt blasted by the rich operatic voice of Ms Coote who stood but a few feet away from me at most. My ears rang with her words. It was only by the end of the second song had I recovered and drank in the grand waves of music that broke over me.

In the intermission I remained seated. Being in the front meant I was not obliged to get up and let people pass. I had brought with me a bottle of water although my original intention was to get a drink at the bar. Previously I have not availed myself of this facility and was rather curious to see if the service was any good. Certainly there isn't much room and it remained me a little of the old Inya Lake Hotel bar in Yangon, Burma back in the 1980's.

LIGETI - Lontano.

From what I understand is that this bit of music is to expredd distance. Instead for me it felt like a great sense of dread emerging and then subsuming the being. Certainly the fact that it had been used in Kubricks "The shining" must have played some part in my dark imaginings. All I can say was it was fantastic and my pulse raised with pure delight. The music was complex but also simple; a wondrous balance. My senses tightened and my sight focused onto tiny details; a frayed string from one of the violins, the delicate hand of a performer and the scratches to the front of the stage. Words fail to express the emotional and intellectual joy this work inspired.

At the end I would have savored the silence but the audience jumped in too quickly with their clapping.

RICHARD STRAUSS - Tod und Verklarung.

Most people are familiar with the small snippet from his "Thus Spake Zarathustra". I have come relatively late to Strauss as I was not previously attracted by his work. I had bought the Zarathustra CD out of curiosity and found it laborious to listen through. But this performance has made me reappraise this composer and reevaluate my previous dismissal of his work.

The title can be translated as "Death and Transfiguration" and might strike one as curiously religious for a composer who read Schopenhauer, Nietzsche and eastern philosophy. One can hear echoes of Wagner and Liszt with all its rich romanticism. The music presents the death of an artist as his body slowly stops working and his life ebbs away; it is both a decline and a release, a gradual breakdown and a calamitous collapse!

All in all I am very happy that I had the chance to see this performance. Afterwards I made my way home in a kind of stupor - I went into a local pub and found myself in the middle of a country western music kareoki night. I had a quick half pint and made my escape.