Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London, SE1 8XX
www.southbankcentre.co.uk
Visited on Wednesday 12 December 2012
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| 12.12.12 |
This evening’s journey required the use of one of my favourite London bus routes, the 76. It runs between Tottenham and Waterloo, taking in some of the best tourist sights the city has to offer and transporting the traveller through the Square Mile – the very oldest part of London. From my start point in Stoke Newington, it goes down Kingsland Road past many of the finest Turkish restaurants and kebab shops in London, on through the chaotic hipster wastelands of Dalston, then does a right along Englefield Road (lots of lovely houses out of my price range round there), over the Old Street roundabout and down Moorgate, through the City past the Bank of England, right again towards and past St Paul’s Cathedral, onto the Strand and past the Royal Courts of Justice and eventually left over Waterloo Bridge. It’s an interesting route to take at night, when the usually hectic area around Bank is deserted and the majestic buildings look a bit forlorn without their suited daytime occupants, and St Paul’s is spectacularly lit up. The short trip over Waterloo Bridge affords one of the best views anywhere in London at night time – to your right you can see the London Eye and the Houses of Parliament, and to your left the Millennium Bridge, the Gherkin and Tower Bridge in the distance. It’s a journey that reminds me why despite all the drawbacks I do love living in this place that has so much life and so much inspiring history to it.
Tonight’s cultural
destination was the Southbank Centre, to see the London Philharmonic Orchestra
performing at the Royal Festival Hall. As it happens, this is the second time
I’ve seen them at that venue in the past month, but my experience of the two
concerts was markedly different. I have noticed since my time off work that
I’ve found it so much easier to relax and enjoy entertainment, and to become
absorbed in what’s going on. The daily commute and the demands of work generate
a seemingly endless, unwanted chatter in my mind, which is hugely distracting as
it simply won’t shut up even when what’s going into my ears is music by Mozart and Bruckner (that was the first concert). I
spent most of that show worrying about a world of things to do with work that
now seem trivial, and probably missed most of what was artistically on offer.
Tonight, however, conductor Vladimir Jurowski and the LPO had my full
attention, even though I was somewhat tired and apparently harbouring some kind
of ear and throat ailment that I hope the doctor (with whom I have finally
registered) shall diagnose and prescribe medication to despatch in the next few
days.
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| Sure takes the seat next to me |
My companions were the
ever-entertaining Brother Neil and Charlie (and Sure of course) and we
commenced the evening in traditional style at Wagamama’s. The prices at the
Southbank branch are hiked to maximise the tourist dollar, but we ordered extra
starters anyway, along with the usual 71s (Chicken Katsu Curry) and a Yaki Soba
(no 40) for me. Thusly fortified we made our way to the RFH for the first half,
which featured a piece none of us had heard before: Grisey’s Quatre Chants pour
franchir le seuil (Four Songs for the crossing of the threshold) (Sure). We
didn’t buy a programme – ok, so £3 is quite reasonable for such an item I
guess, but I wanted to test the theory that you should be able to enjoy music
without it being explained for you. In fact the first thing that happened when
the reduced forces of the LPO came on stage (there were only about 20 of them)
was that maestro Jurowski delivered a speech telling us about the work. It was
actually quite interesting. We learned it had been premiered in 1999, in the
same venue, and that the composer uses a lot of ‘alternative’ compositional
techniques to achieve his soundworld, for example the hiss of a brush run
across the skin of a bass drum, and the use of quarter tones, ie notes that
exist in between the usual 12 notes of the harmonic scale that most of us
recognise in any kind of western music. Jurowski did go on quite a bit about
how we should refer to our programme to read the texts that the soprano soloist
was going to be singing, emphasising that the work is a ‘meditation on the
words, rather than an interpretation of them’. As mentioned, we didn’t have a
programme, so I was interested to see whether we’d be able to ‘get’ what was
being presented without it.
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| View from the cheap seats - actually rather good |
The piece was bleak.
There was no groove or rhythmic hook to get your ears around, and almost no
melodies at all. But its quiet delicacy was somehow compelling anyway. I found
myself drawing parallels between the sounds the musicians were making and
sounds I know from other places: the snare drum at one point sounded like a
frantic steam train approaching at a frightening rate; the double bass and bass
drum sounded like thunder that is near enough to hear but far enough away for
its actual proximity to be ambiguous; and the staccato wind instruments and
tapping on the rim of one of the drums sounded like scurrying creepy-crawlies. There were a couple of moments of unexpected tonality – a chord on the
harp that was ‘normal’ or an inflection in the vocal that seemed fleetingly to
be a tune – but they were gone as soon as they arrived. The soprano soloist was
wearing a rather natty fishtail black frock, which was diverting in the more
esoteric moments, and was an aid to focus when Brother Neil started very
quietly giggling owing to the lyrical content of one part that consisted of the
lady singing lots of numbers in French. I was really hoping she wouldn’t come
out with it but yes, ‘soixante-neuf’ was in there, which I think was the main
culprit in precipitating BN’s temporary loss of composure. The percussionists
had a field day, with multiple marimbas, crotales, tom-toms and other
instruments at their disposal, including a whole rack of Javanese gongs –
massively impressive to look at, though you could hardly hear them when they
were played, which was a bit of a shame. Overall it was an interesting piece,
though more because it was so hard to understand without any informational
pointers. I suppose that’s what your imagination is for though. ‘Bleaker than I
expected’ was Brother Neil’s assessment, while Charlie found it ‘soporific’. I
liked it.
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| I don't have time for this |
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| Zzzzzzz |
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| What the hell IS this microtone nonsense?! |
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| View from balcony towards Somerset House |
A quick wine at the
interval and a little turn about the balcony with its view over the river was
quite restorative, though we all agreed that £12.60 for two glasses of the
house red was outrageously expensive.
The second half
consisted of Austrian composer Gustav Mahler’s 5th Symphony. I’d
only heard it once before, and that was on a record, so this was a new
experience for me. It’s a pretty epic work – over an hour long and split into
five movements (sections). Brother Neil was pleased to inform us that it
received its London premiere in October 1945 by the very same orchestra we were
hearing perform it tonight. Non-classical experts might know a part of it too – the fourth movement – Adagietto – was famously used in the soundtrack to the
1971 Luchino Visconti film Death in Venice. It provided a good contrast to the
first half work, as it’s packed with lush tunes and easy-to-grasp, although
quite tragic, emotional sentiments. It starts off with a proper glory moment
for the principal trumpet, a funereal fanfare idea, that was really well played
by the LPO’s man and which set the tone for what was to come. The whole thing
is a bit like the musical equivalent of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina (which friends
of mine know I have read recently and loved) – long, classic, and kind of
exhausting to experience, but in a good way. We couldn’t work out why Jurowski
had set up the players on the stage in a non-traditional layout – the double
basses were on the left as you look at the stage, rather than the right, and
the second violins and cellos had swapped places. It didn’t seem to make an
awful lot of difference to the sound, but as Charlie pointed out, it was quite
cool because you could properly see the basses going for it in a way that you
can’t when they’re positioned in the usual place.
The performance was
good – lots of life and energy – and the slim, slick-backed-haired Mr Jurowski
jumped and skipped about on the podium with a lot of vigour. All of us
(including bonus companion Sir Elmlah of the Templar, who we spotted in the
first half sitting the choir seats, ie behind the orchestra, and with whom we
joined up for a drink afterwards) are fans of the London Symphony Orchestra for
their polish and poise, and we did agree that the LPO aren’t quite as good in
this regard. There were some moments where they didn’t sound brilliantly
together and things became a little blurry, but it’s hard to ruin a piece such
as this, and overall their delivery was really very enjoyable. Plus the tickets
were only £9 each, and though you’re far away from the stage, the sound in the
RFH is great pretty much wherever you are.
We had a swift
post-show wine, and Brother Neil had a go on the bicycles that are set up next
to the Christmas trees just outside the RFH – the more you pedal, the brighter
the fairy lights get! Good fun.
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| Camp as Christmas? Just kidding. |
The 243 and a nice
chat with Sir Elmlah of the Templar brought me home to bed and some good long
rest that shall hopefully see off the worst of whatever is threatened by the
Ailment. All in all, a lovely evening out.
