Larking at the Proms.
First take a lark, then add music. Nigel Wrench has been listening to noises again and writes:
"Two brilliant men inspired by birdsong. Both among the greatest 20th Century composers. But there the similarities stop.
Olivier Messiaen, the Frenchman who wrote music for prisoners in a Nazi prison camp, and Vaughan Williams, whose most famous work celebrates an ideal of pastoral England, are featured composers at the Proms this year.
If this was a cultural punch-up who would win?
Yann Pascal Tortelier is a Messiaen specialist who conducts the fourth symphony by Vaughan Williams in the Albert Hall this evening.
Here he is after a rehearsal with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra in Manchester, where I met him. To the right is the orchestra leader, the violinist Yuri Torchinsky.
The rehearsal went so well that the orchestra was sent home early. Might be worth tuning in to Radio 3 later to hear the result.
Here's another score, being corrected by its owner after the rehearsal.
This is the rest of Judith Bradshaw, assistant principal cellist for the BBC Philharmonic taking her instrument through a tricky passage. Why are people who play in orchestras always so gentle and friendly? Or is that just an illusion?"
Listen to PM
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~04~RS~)
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Oh dear, Appy's not going to like this!
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Actually, Nigel, I think the oxygen level in Studio 7 gets a bit low by the end of the day. So the "gentle and friendly" orchestra members are probably just about to nod off. Going home early always miraculously revives though. As does the tea break. How unlike the rest of the BBC, I'm sure...
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I've always thought the song of the lark fairly dull in musical terms.
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As long as it's not "Lark Ascending" which Classic FM seems to play as every third piece.
There were two reasons I stopped listening to that station. One was the adverts (adverts of all kinds are a boil on the bum on mankind) and the other was that bloody lark.
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Sid: You may be right. But to walk in a cornfield where larks have been allowed to nest is quite wonderful. It is the soaring quality of their song, combined with their acrobatics, which make them special.
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Big Sister - yes, you're absolutely right. But it was the musicality I was casting aspersions on. In particular, too much repetition with little variation in dynamics.
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I used to be a fan of Classic FM - but when they developed an obsession with "Smooth Classics" or "Relaxing Classics" a few years back I voted with my dial... Advertisers that didn't get the point and used pop music in their ads was also incredibly irritating - as were the constant plugs for their own CDs!
However, I did like the station's jingle, and the birdsong element of its test transmissions (IIRC you can stream a recording of that birdsong from an internet site somewhere).
Now I'm a Radio 4 junkie, and more likely to be frustrated by the narrow frequency range it operates over in this part of the world - or irritated when I retune to another station and get blasted by the high compression they use - than the content of the R4 programming.
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What is a larky sending?
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Nigel W (author of the text),
Caption to picture two should include the term "marked up", not "corrected". String players will work out their bowing and mark it in the score, to ensure it works out (I know, such markings were passed back to me on back desk when I was a string player).
Singers do the same, but for different points, and I'm sure all other musicians will do similar; but they are not "corrections"! - and usually "rubbed out" so as not to incur the financial wrath of the hire companies once the copies are returned.
Apart from Eddie's error in suggesting it was Britten's alleged Forth Symphony being performed at the Proms just before the start of the item, not RVW's... Is it just me in thinking "Ralph" was pronounced "Ral-f" not "Ray-f" in the past? c.f. the Andy Hamilton comedy "Trevor's World of Sport", and their client "Ralph Renshaw" (or Ralf Renshaw", who knows the spelling, it's radio, but was definatly pronounced "Ral-f").
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Sid: But I think it is the soaring, not the song, which VW catches in his piece, don't you?
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"Why are people who play in orchestras always so gentle and friendly?"
Because the ones who have balls stand up for themselves and perform solo.
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Deepthought - I got terribly confused listening to the item, (in the car, horrendous traffic problems, starving after a long rehearsal, so not really giving it my full concentration at the time) but I was trying to work out where Britten's 4th Symphony came in. I didn't know he'd written any! So you've explained it for me, thanks. I also got confused listening to the bits of different pieces of music, and was actually thinking "Gosh the BBC Phil are sounding a bit ropey. What a strange recording", before realising near the end that some of it was an ancient recording of RV-W conducting, presumably many decades ago.
And I noticed the "correcting" term. Never know though - occasionally conductors (or very pedantic players) manage to find a mis-print in a part somewhere, and proudly correct it. Not usually string players though...they mostly do as they are told on orders from the front, I notice!
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Yes, Big Sis. But it's not VW I'm carping about - it's the larks. And only their musicality, not their upliftingness. They just can't carry a tune.
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3,4,5,6,8,10,13.....
.....and....RVW....
...who gives the song of the skylark the soaring lyricism of its flight and the flight of the skylark the beauty of the divine notes of its song, so that flight and song linger in the air for an exquisite eternity.
W.McG.
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Catch me in Borodin and Mussorgsky at the Albert Hall this Saturday.
Both composeurs were a Mighty Handful in themselves.
The latter was regarded as flawed musically, his work edited accordingly posthumously.
As one critic recently put it: We realised we were wrong and have spent the last few decades trying to put his 'mistakes' back into the music.
See you all there, frogs.
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In rehearsal at the Albert Hall now (break time)!
Wading through 2 pages of 'Corrections', from mis-transcribed Russian to quavers re-establishing themselves as NOT CROCHETS!
All musical froggers and even croakers welcome!
Let's have a real frog chorus here tonight!
Nothing beyond the average Sun - reading Don Giovanni - goer or beneath the average skylark hovering tonight, so let's see every lily pad full at the Hall.
Can't promise Nigel a cultural punch-up, just a Black Mass during a Night on Bare Mountain.
Got to go. LOL.
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