Carl’s Classic Coffee Break

I was at Cardiff’s  Gate Arts Centre last Tuesday for an evening of short operas presented by a group of students from the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. The main work was an adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s tale The Nightiingale And The Rose with music by Tom Floyd to a libretto by David Spittle.

The piece is Floyd’s first work on this scale and  its easy lyricism disguises a great deal of expertise. He writes for his chamber orchestral forces with imagination and skill, creating a soundworld which, while reminiscent at times of Benjamin Britten’s chamber operas, is distinctively his own.  Best of all he has a natural feel for the needs of his singers. His  fluid vocal lines allow the young cast to show off the expressive and dramatic capabilities of their voices  while ensuring that the words of the libretto, which carries the dark drama of Wilde’s tale, are always audible.  The Nightingale and The Rose is a promising beginning to a career as an operatic composer, although I could not avoid the feeling that a tighter musical structure and some juducious editing would have made for a more satisfying dramatic experience.  One can perhaps forgive some self-indulgence in a first major piece but Floyd would do well to keep a tight rein on it in the future.

The second half was made up of  short operatic scenes by Alexander Thacker, Stephen Benson and Rebecca Jayne Clarke whose Awakening was the highlight of the whole evening.  The awakening in question is that of a woman who has been in a coma for twenty nine years and the opera examines her confused emotions as she struggles to comprehend that she is no longer sixteen and the doctor’s ambigious relationship with his patient.  The austere musical language and minimal forces (two characters and four instrumentalists) draw the audience into a dreamlike scene where nothing is clear or certain. A moving and powerful piece and a composer to watch with interest.

The whole event was produced not by the college but by the students themselves.  It had a freshness and enthusiasm that were totally engaging and some individual performances that shone.  Tom Bates’ supple counter-tenor made light work of the challenge the contrasting roles of the white and yellow rose trees – his exuberant performance as the latter brough him the biggest cheer of the night.  Rhiannon Llewellyn, deeply touching in the part of  the nightingale, has a clarity and intensity in the upper register that would be the envy of many established sopranos.  The middle and lower registers have yet to develop the same intensity but no doubt this will come in time.

But the performance of the evening was Shoshana Pavett’s all too brief appearance as Sylvia Plath in Stephen Benson’s Ariel and the Crow.  Her powerful, dark-toned soprano voice is even and well-integrated from top to bottom of a wide vocal range and she met the demands of the part with a musical and dramatic maturity well beyond her years.

Ten golden rules from Richard Strauss (1920)

1. Remember that you should make music not to amuse yourself but to delight the audience.
2. Only the audience should get warm – you should not perspire when conducting.
3. Conduct Salome and Elektra as if they were fairy-tale scherzos by Mendelssohn
4. Never look encouragingly at the brass, except for brief glancs at important cues
5. Never let the horns and woodwind out of your sight – it you can hear them at all they are still too loud.
6. If you think the brass are playing at the right volume turn it down another notch or two.
7. It is not enough that you can hear every word a soloist sings. You should know it be heart anyway.  The audience must be able to follow without difficulty. If they cannot then they will go to sleep.
8. Always accompanysingers in such a way that they can sing without effort.
9. When you think you have reached the limits of prestissimo double the pace.
10. If you follow these rules carefully you will always be the darling of your listeners.

There was a time when great singers made music that carved a pathway through our senses to touch the heart.  Most were not well known outside the world of classical music lovers – only occasionally did a Caruso raise his head above the parapet to become a household name.

Then along came the three tenors and the media circus began in earnest.  First it was great singers staking a claim for popular interest, and of course the high fees the new popularity could bring them.  Then a spate of lesser voices sought to cash in on the new interest in opera excerpts. Singers with no operatic experience, limited training and no depth of musical background were promoted as “operatic” superstars.  These people do not touch the heart – they just mimic musicians who do.

BBC ‘s Maestro series gave the impression that all you had to do to be a conductor was to wave your arms in time to the music.  ITV seems set to provide the same level of insight into the world of opera singing.

The making of a great classical singer requires not only exceptional talent  but also years of study with expert teachers.  In a travesty of this process ITV have announced a “reality” series that claims, in one short series, to turn pop stars into opera stars.  Among the mentors will be Kathryn Jenkins, a prime example of a singer who mimics an operatic style without genuine experience or understanding of the real thing.  By itself that might make you think that ITV classical music team had completely lost the plot. Confirmation comes with the list of judges including such notable opera experts as Meat Loaf and Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen.

There is a well-known argument that any promotion of classical music is praiseworthy if it brings new listeners to the genre. But the ridiculous absurdities of programmes such as Pop Star to Opera Star and BBC’s Maestro promote nothing but misunderstanding of a great art form.  Surely there must be a better way to bring people to a love of wonderful music.

Best...flame war ..Ever (still)

Today I visited the Eddo Stern exhibition at Cardiff’s newly refurbished Chapter Arts Centre. This American/Israeli artist explores the interface between real and virtual worlds. His animated shadow puppets, made from modern materials and casting moving coloured shadows onto the wall, were visually engaging. But for me the highlight of the show was the computer animation Best…flame war ..Ever (2007).  This re-creation of an on-line war of words between two computer gamers is not only visually stunning, as was all the work on show but also creates a thought-provoking allegory about the development of conflicts from seemingly trivial beginnings.

If you are within striking distance of Cardiff this exhibition is well worth seeing – but it’s only on at Chapter until November 29th so hurry!

If you can’t get to Chapter then you can see Eddo Stern’s work at www.eddostern.com  or go straight to  
www.eddostern.com/flamewar.html to download Best…flame war ..Ever

A refreshing alternatve to summer pudding – this can be made with any combination of dark fruits and berries.

50 ml orange juice
60 ml crème de cassis
3 tablespoons clear honey
450 gr stoned black dessert cherries
225 gr trimmed blackcurrants
225 gr raspberries
2 tablespoons pine nuts

1. Mix the orange juice and cassis.  Add the honey, stirrring until it has dissolved completely.
2. Mix the fruit and berries.  Pour over the cassis mixture and chill for at least three quarters of an hour.
3. Serve with a scattering of pine nuts - and some plain yogurt or crème fraîche if desired.

Serves 4 – 6

Joyce Hatto was in her seventies when she released a stream of recordings of major piano works that drew such critical acclaim that one pundit describer her as a “national treasure”.  Her recorded legacy was considered quite remarkable - until the day when a music fan noticed that when he copied one of Hatto’s CDs for use on his iPod it revealed that the recording was, in fact, made by the Hungarian pianist Laszlo Simon.

From there the story of how Hatto’s husband, a recording engineer, had “harvested” the work of other pianists, subtly altering the performances before releasing the recordings in his wife’s name.

Channel 4 is showing a documentary about the scam on July 31st.  It should be well worth watching.  In the meantime you can read the story at the Daily Mail.

I have always been concerned at attempts to use classical music as a weapon against young people but, according to this story from The Daily Record, it seems I might have worried too much….

Shop bosses in Scotland tried to use classical music to drive off a gang of teenagers hanging around outside their door – but the kids liked it. The cheeky youngsters got so fond of Mozart, Bach and Vivaldi that they started coming into the store to ask for requests.  And bemused staff have now turned the music off for good.

Bosses at the Co-op in Cove, near Aberdeen, installed an expensive sound system and outdoor speaker to bombard the tracksuited gang with classical hits. But yesterday, duty manager Craig Singers admitted: “It didn’t work. We hoped the kids would hate the classical music so much that they wouldn’t come anywhere near us. But it had the opposite effect. They grew to like it.”

“On nights when the music wasn’t playing they would come into the shop and ask why it wasn’t on. That wasn’t what we wanted to happen. We’ve decided to stop playing the music now because there was no point.”

It supports what I have always believed – that everyone can learn to loveclassical music if they have the opportunity to hear it.  But I can’t help feeling a little saddened at the comment that there was no point in playing the music any more because young people had grown to like it. 

You can read the full story at the Daily Record.

I have known Copland’s Appalachian Spring for nearly forty years but it was only recently that I discovered it was originally scored for a chamber ensemble of thirteen instruments, the largest orchestra that could be accommodated in the pit of the theatre at the Library of Congress where it was first performed.

Appalachian Spring was created for choreographer and dancer Martha Graham and premiered in 1944.  The story concerns a pair of pioneering newlyweds in Pennsylvania but Copland was always firm that he did not create a musical representation of the Appalachian Mountains.  The title was given to the completed score by Martha Graham.

When Aaron first presented me with the music its title was Ballet for Martha - simple, and as direct as the Shaker theme that runs through it. I took some words from the poetry of Hart Crane and retitled it Appalachian Spring. When Aaron appeared in Washington for a rehearsal, before the October 30, 1944, premiere, he said to me, “Martha, what have you named the ballet?”
And when I told him he asked, “Does it have anything to do with the ballet?”
“No”, I said, “I just like the title.”

Appalachian Spring is essentially a dance of place. You choose a piece of land, part of the house goes up. You dedicate it. The questioning spirit is there and the sense of establishing roots.
(Martha Graham, Blood Memories)

While writing the work over the course of a year, Copland wrote that it was somewhat foolish to do as the ballet and its corresponding scores were historically short-lived. Copland was awarded the 1945 Pulitzer Prize for Music for this ballet and the full orchestral score has been a firm favourite ever since.

The reason for its popularity is easy to hear. Copland builds a whole world of musical sonorities on the simplest of materials, pairs of oscillating chords, scale passages and a shaker tune, ’tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free’, embody an idealised version of the pioneering lifestyle of freedom, independence and self-sufficiency.

The chamber ensemble version of Appalachian Spring will be performed by The Welsh Sinfonia in the concert hall of Cardiff University on October 11th, 2009.  If you can’t wait until then there are some excerpts on You Tube.

In the middle of all the publicity surrounding the theory of evolution during Darwin’s bi-centenary I came across this touching little quote that shows the great scientist regretting the cultural experiences he had missed.   

“…if I had to live my life again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week; for perhaps the parts of my brain now atrophied would thus have been kept active through use. The loss of these tastes is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.” – Charles Darwin

I was saddened to read of the death of composer Nicholas Maw last week. 

Maw has written little in recent years and his musical language kept him out of the mainstream for much of his career but, although his large-scale ambitions sometimes exceeded his capacity to realise them, at his best he created work of great lyricism and beauty that deserves to be heard more often.

There is a comprehensive obituary in today’s Daily Telegraph.