Ever heard a really bad live performance of Sibelius?

Post about it here!

To discuss disliked recordings, click

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

.

_______________________________

My candidate in this discussion is a performance of the 2nd Symphony by Jukka-Pekka Saraste and the Toronto Symphony, the year was probably 2000 or so. Probably the "nth" performance of the 2nd by Saraste and the TSO during his 7-8 years there, but one I simply could not understand.

Specifically, the opening of the 2nd movement. It was in 3, so be it, but such an incredibly slow 3 that one could never justify it in their right minds withing the bounds of Andante ma rubato. Then in the 4/4 bar, where the bassoons come in with the melody and the pizzicato should logically continue at the same speed, he took a subito a tempo and the movement proceeded as it normally does.

The"effect" that was achieved by this slow and disconnected opening was incomprehensible to me, and quite frankly, during the performance, I was so ill at ease that I actually began to wonder whether or not this was a "different version", and was worried if the bassoons would come in at all, at this speed or at any speed.

The rest of the symphony, including the first movement, was fine, but unfortunately the performance will be forever marred in my memory by this strange quirk.

In April 1996 Neemi Jarvi gave a cycle of the symphonies at the Barbican centre in London with his Gothenburg S. O.
His account of the seventh was something of a disaster. Jarvi was at opposite poles to Georg Tintners 24'-57 which we discussed recently. He clocked in at 18'-30 and their was little sense of grandeur or conviction. Moreover Jarvi exibited the bad habit of scaling down the strings about halfway in an effort to allow the wind to come through. Not surprisingly their were boos at the end of the concert.--kullervopete.

Our new equation:

Code:

Sib 7 @ 18'30" = Boos at the Barbican

So much for Fibonacci.

In Canberra, Australia, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra played to a packed house. The concert program listed Sibelius's Symphony No. 2, to be followed by Tchaikovsky. But, because of a last-minute switch in conductors, there was an unannounced change in the schedule: Tchaikovsky's Fifth Symphony became the major work, followed by Berlioz' Hungarian March. Sibelius-whose disiplined power is poles apart from the romantic extravagance of Tchaikovsky-was off the program entirely.
Next morning, readers of the Canberra Times were startled to see Critic Peter Bailey's review of Sibelius' Symphony No. 2 ['The themes are catching and developed with simplicity and beauty...from the serious minor cadences of the opening Allegro we move to the lovely waltz-time theme of the Andante...'] Bailey carpingly dismissed the Berlioz work ['It seemed an anticlimax to have to listen to an encore by Tchaikovsky'].
As letters poured in, the Times quickly conceded that its critic had followed the program notes more closely than the music, published Bailey's contrite apology blaming his boner on 'confusion of mind and lapse of memory.'--kullervopete.

I was once at a 2007 all-Sibelius concert by the local orchestra (Lexington Philharmonic, Kentucky, if anyone was interested). The program included Finlandia, the violin concerto, and the second symphony. It was bad, but at least I could tell that the music was well-written... the orchestra came extremely narrowly close to falling apart, even the soloist was not infrequently out of tune, not to mention the orchestra. I guess this fueled my Sibelius craze; I simply had to find a better performance someday, or I would die with a huge void in my very soul...

World Violist, would you care to mention names? Conductor, soloist? Is the orchestra full-time, part-time, amateur?

I'm interested, because I work with a small orchestra that plays year-round (about 100 concerts including Promenades) into whose repertoire I am slowly trying to introduce Sibelius. As almost each piece we play is being played for the first time by the musicians, the performances are by no means perfect. I wouldn't call them disasters by any measure, but there is still a long way to go with each new piece we try, be it The Swan, En Saga or Symphony No. 3.

The point is that I believe orchestras should always try to expand their repertoire to include areas previously unknown to them, even at the expense of the growing pains that come with unfamiliar notes and idioms, especially with composers that have such specific voices as Sibelius. However, the Music Director must be conscious of the orchestra's limitations and never allow the performances to be embarrasing...

That was the Lexington Philharmonic in Lexington, Kentucky (USA). They are a professional orchestra, but they don't seem to have the technical necessities of one. And it isn't limited to Sibelius either - I've heard them playing other pieces, and compared with other live performances I've been to, with other professional (and non-professional ) orchestras, the Lexington Philharmonic just isn't up to par. However, it's all that some people around here have, so...

In a former non-professional life I have participated in quite a few embarrassingly awful performances of the Second Symphony, from somewhere in the second violins, so I can imagine just what you mean.

A quick recap from an earlier post:
Advice: never attend a performance of the a cappella version of Rakastava unless its is by a very good choir. I've heard it fall apart several times - usual place is the final section, where lesser choirs just can't keep anywhere near the pitch. In the end they have no option but to stop and restart. Not pleasant!

I agree, the Halle Youth Choir gave a fine performance at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester last November. We also had the rare chance of hearing the orchestral version immediatly after. Facinating experience.--kullervopete.

Well, I hoped I would never have to post about my own performance here, but here it is.

On February 13th 2009 the ZSO under my direction performed Rakastava during a pre-Valentine's day concert with the following programme:

Sibelius - Rakastava
Tchaikovsky - Romeo and Juliet
- Intermission -
Suk - Pohadka (A Fairy Tale - Raduz & Mahulena)

Just to recap and set the scene, here is a list of Sibelius pieces that we have performed thus far:

2005
Finlandia
Kurkikohtaus
Valse triste

2006
En saga
Symphony No. 3

2007
Romance in C
Violin Concerto
Symphony No. 7
Karelia Suite

2008
Valse triste + Kurkikohtaus
Luonnotar
Andante Festivo

2009
Finlandia

I list these just to remind people that I have been trying to progressively introduce Sibelius' music to our audience over the years, and mainly that the orchestra is somewhat familiar with the idiom. It is not as if in Feb. 2009 we are approaching his sound world for the first time...

That said, I'm afraid that Rakastava did not take. The orchestra either simply could not understand the music, or they could not understand the music through me.

The rehearsals were a rhythmic struggle from the very beginning. In the outer movements of the piece, many phrases begin after beats, and many of the accompanying voices move in-between beats. This was a huge stumbling block for us, as it felt as if the orchestra was constantly waiting, they simply would not move and fill in the "spaces" that are so beautifully wrought in the score.

Furthermore, the solo violin and solo cello, usually very capable players, were not quite on the ball with this one. Unfortunately, the solo cello got off by a beat in one spot of the second movement solos, and the solo violin never found a rhythmic groove and played much too carefully in the third movement.

Overall, the sound was just not right and my conducting at the performance, given the frustrating week of rehearsals, was shoddy. My beating was much too big and "beaty", my rubato was forced, as if trying to rescue something that was unrescuable by overcompensating and striving for some expression that just wasn't there.

What really surprises me however is why the orchestra simply couldn't take to this idiom. Obviously the piece is more technically difficult than Andante Festivo and more ethereal in expression than Valse triste or the 2nd movement of the 3rd Symphony, but it still sounds like Sibelius, and I thought that it would play like Sibelius, albeit with an orchestra that is just slowly beginning to explore this idiom... but it didn't. It played like a misunderstood contemporary piece by a third-rate composer and the orchestra met it with a sort of resignation almost before we even started.

With great humility I will post a video of it on YouTube tomorrow and link to it here for all of you to look and marvel at... I will probably withdraw it within a week, but I really want all of you to see it and witness how Sibelius can be a horrible struggle at times, all the more so given how much we love him...

Check back soon, video to come.

I have posted the videos in the Media section, take a look at them

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

. Note that as they are in the Media section, you must be a registered forum member AND logged-in to view them.

These videos are not on YouTube or anywhere else, they are only here at the forum.

Ahhh, now I see it.

Can of worms:
It's easy to forget that the world of Windows-based software contains so many traps for the unwary and wary alike. I've used one Windows programme in which you have to press 'Cancel' to print a document, for instance. Thank heavens I use a Mac.

Kurki, I think you're being a bit hard on yourself. The performance flows quite effectively at these (mostly) relatively brisk speeds and, despite the slight lapses you mention, I enjoyed the tone and expression of the violin and cello solos (thinking for instance of the tricky phrasing of the violin solo with the comma and change of bow one quaver before the barline). I'd certainly far rather hear the piece at this sort of speed than at the funereal tempi adopted by some conductors who seem to think it should sound like Grieg without the bovine excremental aspect. In the second movement I admired your concise beat. What I didn't quite get, throughout, was the full ethereal atmosphere, the feeling of total freedom for the constraint of the bar line – which is perhaps the most significant affective difference from the choral original. Maybe it's just the sound quality on the video, maybe it's the playing itself, or maybe it's a result of some caution resulting from your awareness of all those off-beat entries. In consequence, the Vivace in the third movement – where I think the rhythms can afford to be quite heavy [first violins in the four bars before C, cf. Kullervo, fourth movement!] – made less of a contrast than it might. I get the feeling that some of the players haven't yet quite made contact with the idiom – that they are looking for something less subtle, more heart-on-sleeve than Sibelius serves up, and thus that they are uncertain about the tone quality to strive for. But overall, yeah, not bad - certainly no disaster.

Pity there were so few people in the audience!
_______________________________
Click

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

for the Video in question...

So far I've watched the first movement and I thought it was VERY well done. Now, I do not know the ins and outs of the score like our dear Andrew B, so perhaps I am missing something, but these young, inexperienced ears thought the music was quite far from being a disaster, to be sure! I'll get back to you on the remaining two movements.

Yes, I too noticed the crowd looked sparse. Is it always that way, Kurki? But I suppose it's just like here. Copley Symphony Hall in San Diego is never sold out. After all, it's not like it's the Spice Girls, Madonna or Tom Jones performing. (Do the ladies ever throw their undies at you, Kurki?) It's not unusual to be loved by anyone...
__________________________________
Click

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

for the Video in question...

Andrew B wrote:

What I didn't quite get, throughout, was the full ethereal atmosphere, the feeling of total freedom for the constraint of the bar line ...

... and this is precisely what I simply could not communicate to the orchestra through the course of the week. This orchestra (and many other Czech orchestras to some degree) has a terrible habit of slowing down absolutely everything. So the slightest indication of rubato and the music tends to grind to a halt. I feel that Rakastava needs a special kind of rubato that doesn't necessarily slow down but floats along, and we could not achieve this effect.

Andrew B wrote:

... it's a result of some caution resulting from your awareness of all those off-beat entries.

Which relates to the above point. In order for this piece to float and flow, the musicians must feel the movement of the notes in between beats without necessarily feeling the beats themselves as an anchor. A conductor can help the orchestra with this by melding and de-emphasizing beats, but throughout 3 days of rehearsals this lead to sloppy and unsynchronized play, so as you can see on the video, I had to really beat just for the piece to stay together. This also led me to adopt a faster tempo than I actually wanted, because in a slower tempo, the orchestra would lose all sense of the inner rhythms and eventually grind to a halt.

Andrew B wrote:

I get the feeling that some of the players haven't yet quite made contact with the idiom – that they are looking for something less subtle ... they are uncertain about the tone quality to strive for.

And honestly, I didn't do much to help the orchestra achieve any type of shimmering tone-quality that is necessary for this music. I knew I was "beating" a lot, but I had no idea that I was beating that much until I watched the recording. I was afraid it would fall apart, but I think I could have trusted the players a little more and tried to shape the piece more than I did.

Unfortunately, I will not have a second chance with this orchestra to "get it right", as the players' reaction to the music was wholly negative.

Andrew B wrote:

Pity there were so few people in the audience!

In January and February, Marienbad is basically empty, some of the spa hotels are even closed. The audience was therefore basically all Czech. Our season is divided into 3 concert cycles, the cycle in which this concert took place is the least-sold one, with about 80 subscribers (we have about 160 subscribers total) ... also remember that Marienbad is a town with just under 15000 people...

Tapkaara wrote:

Do the ladies ever throw their undies at you, Kurki?

Not nearly as often as they should.
_______________________________
Click

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

for the Video in question...

I've just watched the video and the music came across as very modern sounding at times which was not unappealing. I can however understand maestro Kurki's concerns with the various problems of ensemble. Parts of it were quite moving. I know that Kurki selected Rakastava as his 'least favourite Sibelius piece' in that thread [29th March, 2007] and I quote : 'I don't like Rakastava very much, I find the first movement a poor mans Nightride or Karelia, while the third movement strikes me as a Mendelssohnian 'song without words' without the song. All in all, if I simply listened to the music without knowledge of the subject, I would be completely baffled as to what the music is supposed to be communicating both in musical and extra-musical terms'.

In view of Kurki's reservations regarding Rakastava might I ask the maestro why he decided to programme it. Would, say the Romance in C have been a safer choice. It was certainly no disaster and I remain very impressed by the maestro's honesty.-kp

kullervopete wrote:

I know that Kurki selected Rakastava as his 'least favourite Sibelius piece' in that thread [29th March, 2007] and I quote ...

WOW

Fantastic memory, kullervopete. That's incredible that you remembered that.

Only registered users can see links on this forum! Register or Login on forum!

is the thread.

Just a small correction, I called the 2nd mvmt a "poor man's Night Ride..."

The "spark" that caused me to programme this when I was laying out 2008-09 back in February 2008 was that I needed a short piece to begin a Valentine's day concert. I actually did think of the Romance in C, but we opened our 2007 all-Sibelius concert with that and it would have been too soon to repeat it. So I thought I'd give Rakastava a chance.

As I studied the piece I came to like it quite a bit. I enjoy the expression in the first movmement very much, and I forgive the 2nd movement it's repetitive simplicity in its context as a bridge between the outer movements.

As for the 3rd movement, I still don't think it "works" as a piece of absolute music, for me there is not enough musical substance to maintain a sense of cadence and pace. The movement demands an awareness of some extra-musical narrative, real or imagined. I explained "my" story of this movement at great length to the orchestra and briefly and sybolically to the audience before the piece... It can be very moving but relies on the orchestra and conductor to really sell each note, which I didn't.

Nevertheless, in the last 2 years my thoughts about this piece have come around full circle and now see it as a gigantic challenge that I would like to come back to at some point in the future.

Maestro, I compared your performance with my fine Gibson/SNO recording. In my opinion, yours only came up noticeably short in effecting that special quality of "fluid melancholy" in the finale, that to which you made reference and a cogent analysis in an earlier post. Otherwise, I enjoyed it very much. Thank you again for sharing.