A cold dark evening, which looked set to rain or worse, but I got to the station without needing to unfurl the umbrella. Got to Vauxhall to find, for the first time for a long time, that the eastern exit was open so I was able to stroll up Goding Street before turning left onto the Embankment; the route I used to take to the Home Office and perhaps the first time I have used it since leaving.
A little early, so I took a glass in the basement, where I was able to take stock of the audience. Which included what I thought was a very pushy trio who parked themselves around a table for four, already occupied by two people who were not together. Oddly pushy for people who looked and sounded entirely middle class and whom one might have thought would have known better. Two of the three did not even have the excuse of being young. Which all goes to show that people who go to hear Bach can have bad manners too.
For once in a while, the hall was full. Plus an interesting trick of the lighting which made the shadows on the handsome Corinthian pillars around what used to be the altar seem very green.
I was in row G, about right for me for this sort of thing, only marred by the moving head of a lady in front of me. Although, to be fair, it could have been worse, as more than half the time she was tilted to the left, which left me a reasonably clear view.
I was surprised at how familiar it all sounded, repeats within the suites notwithstanding. Are motifs carried from one suite to another? Did I know the suites better than I had realised? I had, after all, bought Tortelier's version many years ago as a student, at which time I think he was all the thing. The discs were quite battered by the time they were retired, perhaps ten years ago now, so perhaps I had played them a lot.
Doing all six made for quite a long concert, maybe two and a half hours playing time plus half an hour for the two intervals. For both of which the neighbouring Marquis was unusually full - although in the course of the second interval the harassed bar man managed to summon four more pairs of hands, so perhaps the kitchen staff are expected to multi-task. Certainly made sense on this occasion.
But a fine concert. No problems with medleys or having to keep getting to grips with something new. It just rolls on and on. And I thought that Weilerstein did rather well - even managing to look happy some of the time. The rest of the audience thought so too.
I thought the taxi to Vauxhall was rather dear at more than £10 and I also learned what an awkward place Vauxhall is to be dropped off. I should have settled for the end of the bridge rather than trying to get nearer.
Broke the journey at Earlsfield where there was no airstock at all at 2230.
Followed up on the Thursday by getting myself a copy of the score from the Chimes shop at the Barbican, where they had at least three versions: thin, regular and fat. I went for regular, the red Wiener Urtext Edition, which comes with an explanatory booklet. In which I was interested to read that the sixth suite - the start of which is illustrated above - was clearly written for an instrument with five strings - as opposed to the cello's four. Haven't got to the bottom of that one yet. Otherwise it has served to show up my lack of practice at reading scores, with this score not looking like the music at all. At least not yet, but I dare say I will get the hang of it.
Further follow up in the form of a booking to hear it all again at St. Luke's next June, that is to say June 2018, from a chap from Montreal called Jean-Guihen Queyras and who was born about the time that I was a student buying Tortelier (see above). Rather a long range booking, even for me, but booking had opened that day and someone sent me an email about it.
Rather a sniffy review in the Guardian on the Friday, where the opening remark was that just because there are six, doesn't mean that you have to do all six at a sitting. Which is a point, but then there are lots of people who climb Everest for no better reason than that it is there.
PS: note the fold out business in the illustration, for the convenience of the busy cellist. Which the lady in the shop seemed to think that I was - and I have to admit that I failed to put her right.
Reference 1: http://alisaweilerstein.com/.
Reference 2: https://www.jeanguihenqueyras.com/.
Group search key: bsa.
No comments:
Post a Comment