Current mood: GETTING TIRED...
Category: GETTING TIRED... Music
Prom 66 wasn't amplified...
No boss, The Proms are a quiet and classical British institution...
'Founded in 1895, each Prom season consists of over 70 concerts in the Albert Hall, a series of eight chamber concerts and four Saturday matinees at Cadogan Hall, additional Proms in the Park, events across the United Kingdom on the last night, and associated educational and children's events.
Prom Season is the biggest classical music festival in the world.'
Well, despite my sister forever being involved in orchestral music, and my young ass being continually dragged along to orchestral concerts, I've never before seen a Prom - at least, not as far as I can remember - and from what I'd seen of the them on the TV, I'd had no desire to run along and see one until John said he'd got a spare ticket...
No boss, the first image I have in mind with the proms, is of a load of Hooray Henrys waving flags and singing 'Land Of Hope & Glory'
And to be frank, that kind of caper isn't quite my bag...
That being so, I don't boycott the football World Cup because it's plagued with flag waving simpletons, so there was certainly no need to engage with a similarly reasoned boycott of The Proms
So, the program for the 66th night of the summer was as follows:
Grace Williams Sea Sketches
Elgar Sea Pictures
Tchaikovsky Symphony No.6, 'Pathetique'
Now, I've known John and his dearly beloved Heloise for over 10 years and it's probably accurate to say we cemented our friendship with weekends at my old caravan by the sea...
Perhaps this was why he chose that particular sea based Prom??
If not, such a coincidence was a joy.
Whichever (and I didn't think to ask) we settled ourselves into someone else's seats (they were better than ours) and had a good catch up...
With seconds to go before lift off - we were then moved back to our own seats by teacher..
Yes boss, you can't rock the boat in the RAH and though we almost managed the unofficial upgrade, it didn't quite come off...
So, after being ticked off and repositioned, the ritual of tuning up, the lead violinist coming out (to polite applause), then the conductor coming out (to polite applause) took shape..
There was more polite applause
And the hushed silence....
And then, off we went...
The Grace Williams was strings only, and I found it to be beautifully peaceful and very evocative of the sea..
Elgar was a little less remarkable, but was again, nothing to sniff at..
And next was the interval...
As we sat and put our feet up, I was telling John that all the ingrained ritual of my childhood classical concerts had come flooding back..
The only new thing I noticed, was the coughing orgies in between movements..
Yes boss, either that hall was rammed full of very ill people - or else it's become fashionable to cough - because there was a veritable and MASSIVE chorus of COUGHS AND SPLUTTERS during each pause...
So prominent and engaging was this, that by the third or 4th episode, I was one step off joining in, so as to catch up with the zeitgeist...!
Anyway...
Interval over.
Next up - THE BOSS!!!
Yes boss, Pyotr Tchaikovsky is a Giovanni kind of composer..
Always apparently on the verge of some glorious and frantic OUTBURST OF FIRE HELL FUCKING RAGE BRIMSTONE!!! Mr T is probably my favourite old school composer of them all...
Symphony No.6, 'Pathetique' was only completed days before his death.
He's reported to have said, that it's strains, stresses and efforts finished him off...
And it sounded that way..
There was one heavy-ish though (by his standards) slightly unconvincing outburst to finish (I think) the third movement, and then as did Pyotrs life, the music slowly petered out to nothing...
So, all this was F.I.N.E. fine...
A GOOD GIG INDEED!!!
But though I loved the music, perhaps the greatest thrill, was the final silence..
Yes boss, the RAH creates wonderful reverbed silences
Music be damned!
When you get 5000 people in a room and all you can hear is everyone waiting in absolute silence for the conductor to drop his baton to signify the end of the end - you have one gloriously magical human moment...
 | Currently listening : Tchaikovsky: The Complete Symphonies Release date: 2003-05-12  |
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