Clarinet Collins

This year's Dorking Halls season has started, with a concert given by Michael Collins with the Philharmonia Orchestra, with the provincial setting giving the concert an oddly provincial feel. One did not forget that the same hall had probably seen a lot more Saturday night dances, complete with a bit of fisticuffs afterwards, the sort of thing that was just about dying out when I was of an age to go to such things, than concerts.

That apart, much the same sort of event as the corresponding event least year noticed at reference 1. But I offer a few additional thoughts.

Grand Hall pretty much full, including some people of working age and a sprinkling of children. Good that they can still fill the place. There is life yet!

It remains odd for me to be listening to an orchestra; altogether too much going on really. Prokofiev pleasant enough, but a bit banal. Mozart very good. Beethoven good, but oddly, nothing like it had sounded on the gramophone the day before. Not a work I know, despite the lady behind announcing that it was her favourite because it was jolly. After the event, not very sure what she might have meant, other than there being an absence of solemnity; jolly by negation.

While his sparkly tie was OK, I was not keen on Collins conducting from the clarinet, which I found a bit distracting. Furthermore his clarinet seemed to be very long and looked rather heavy for a clarinet heavy work like the Mozart concerto. According to the programme, a Basset clarinet from Yamaha, an instrument which google suggests he might have paid £5,000 for (assuming that is, that Yamaha don't lend or give it to him gratis). A far cry from the £25 for the instrument which I once tried to play on.

Leadership tie apart the dress of the musicians was rather mixed, with one member of the audience spotting the odd frock coat. But all dark & decent enough en-masse.

Thinking of the striking capitals at Smith Square, we had striking ceiling bosses at Dorking, picked out in a blue light, at the distance not unlike the ultraviolet of dance floors in pubs and discos of my day.

Next stop the Heath Quartet, first heard a bit more than a year ago in town. See reference 2.

Reference 1: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/dorking-time-again.html.

Reference 2: http://psmv2.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/op131.html.