Let music untune the sky!

The second concert that I attended in La Palau de la Musica started at ten fifteen in the night.

It was the Orquesta de Cámara y Coro Nacional de Bielorrusia conducted by Piotr Vandilovsky with Liudmila Efimova as director of the chorus performing Handel’s Messiah.

So we were presented with a Russian Choir and Orchestra performing an English oratorio in Catalonia. And what language did they choose in which to perform? German!

Now I know that there might be purists among you who might point out that Händel’s birthplace was a little further to the east than London. But that does not deal with the expectation of hearing familiar archaic words sung in dreadful accents by foreigners.

How can I ever forget my first live hearing of The Messiah in St Tropez in a small packed church where the chorus sang “Foe untow uz a chi is bor!” with the enthusiasm that comes with real confidence in signing in a foreign language. The bass in that performance was singing in a tongue which didn’t even seem to be remotely related to the Indo-European language family, let alone French English. A most satisfying experience.

It took me a while to stop sulking that the performance last night was in a foreign language before I could begin to enjoy the music!

This was a performance in which one felt that the conductor was in control. His positive and authoritative style of conducting kept his considerable forces together. He had a modest, yet compelling presence on the stage and you could believe that Piotr Vandilovsky was an essential component in the finished sound.

This was by no means a ‘pure’ version of the piece with the chorus sometimes sounding more like the Huddersfield Choral Society than a Handaelan choir. The (very young) orchestra too, with limited resources in terms of players produced a full modern sound while respecting the ornamentation of the original. Their ensemble playing was excellent, though it did get a little more ragged towards the end of the evening as the clock inexorably advanced nearer to one o’clock in the morning.

The soloists, Titiana Petrova (soprano), Natalia Akinina (mezzo), Arseni Arsov (tenor and Zapiokin Vitali (bass) were a mixed bunch with the graph, as it were, slewed towards the left in terms of ability. After my initial shock of hearing the tenor sing some foreign version of “Comfort ye my people” I gradually warmed to him, but his later performances were far too forced for my taste and at times he was positively unmusical and tuneless. The mezzo produced an unpleasant throaty warble while the soprano’s terminal vibrato was constantly irritating. The bass was the worst of the lot only occasionally producing something which matched the music.

The orchestra, with a leader whose exuberant style sometimes missed the meticulous direction of his conductor, was excellent throughout (allowing for exhaustion!) and was always worth listening to when the soloists that they were accompanying were best forgotten.

The chorus was gusty and enthusiastic. As is often the case the tenors could have done with more resources and the division of the chorus into paired couples from time to time exposed the sometimes forced quality of the singing, but they made a wonderful and joyful sound that was a pleasure to experience.

This was a long concert, but time never seemed to lag. A most creditable performance which could only have been improved if they had made some attempt at the English libretto!

The first concert of the evening was part of the ‘Festival de valsos I danses’ which is part of the programme of music provided by the Orquestra Simfónica del Vallés conducted by José Antonio Sainz Alfaro.

The popular programme of music from Rossini to Johann Strauss did little to stretch this fine orchestra but it left you wanting to listen to something meatier – though I also know that with playing of this quality there is something to be said for a concert of pure pleasure and entertainment rather than pedagogy!

All section of the orchestra played well with a fluency that sometimes veered into superficial facility. The most revealing pieces were the Brahms Hungarian Dances numbers 5, 6 and 7. Here the more syncopated rhythms seemed to be glossed somewhat by a legato approach which emphasised lyricism at the expense of national musical idiosyncrasy. But these are carping criticisms in a concert which was obviously as enjoyable to produce as it was to listen to!

The horns (always possible sources of weakness in any orchestra were confident – and that word could stand for the whole of the orchestra’s performance. It was a little disconcerting to see the horn section perform a sort of musical chairs after each number – but then horn sections are a law unto themselves!

The conductor was laconic in his performance to the point of caricature and looked more like a stand-up comedian at the end of his career than a music maker!

In the first half of the show Rossini’s Overture to The Thieving Magpie (La gazza ladra) was the most revealing. This was a well studied piece by the orchestra with masterly use of light and shade and with the orchestra not afraid to resort to the most garish vulgarity for the brass in the conclusion. Thoroughly enjoyable!

The second half of the concert was taken up with Strauss. The conductor was obviously looking for a Viennese type of audience participation but I think that Catalan audiences share a certain reticence with their British counterparts. With we British it is only the quintessentially middle class faux ‘wildness’ of the habitués of the Proms that allows us to step outside the self imposed constraints of proper behaviour in a classical concert.

Alfaro broke the glass wall between performers and audience by picking up a microphone in the second half and talking to us. During one talk after a spirited performance of the Pizzicato Polka when the rest of the orchestra had chatted, wandered about and generally ignored the strings, then played their own jazzy version of the polka, I knew enough of what he was saying about the highs and lows in music (the high being the strings and the low being everyone else!) to murmur appreciatively when eh illustrated another high and low by referring to Barça as one and Español as the other!

The conductor’s hard work eventually paid off when we gradually became a little more relaxed about clapping and making cuckoo noises as part of the music.

For me the high points of the concert came in the encores. Alfaro (born in Sant Sebastià) first played a beautiful Basque song orchestrated with some sensitivity and then hurriedly played a fantasia on Catalan themes which reminded me of Grace Williams’ version for Wales. This was loved by the audience who were encouraged to sing along quietly – which they did. Even I was able to join in at one point in a very muted and self conscious sort of way.

The final encore, the Radestsky (?) March, allowed full participation in a Germanic display of hand clapping and provided a fittingly crashing finale.

This was a brilliant concert and I look forward to their next concerts.

At last an orchestra whose musical ability matched the mad magnificence of their setting in the Palau!