Monday, May 7, 2007.12:34 AM
What a concert...
Anyway, wanted to blog about *** concert last friday, 4th May. There were complimentary tickets that day, so I went. This female cellist, NK, performed Dvorak's cello concerto in the first half and Beethoven's 3rd Symphony 'Eroica' was up for the second. Well, I was late for 4 mins so had to wait till they end the first movement of the concerto.
It's so embarassing to have the people on stage waiting for the latecoming audience to get seated in the middle of a piece. It'll be the first and last time I ever do that.
NK plays on a 17th century Guarneri cello AND ... a 17th century Du Pre Stradivarius!!! That aside. Her performance was disappointing and uninspiring. The sound coming from her more-famous-than-thou cello was unexpectedly ... small and depth-less. Some finger slips here and there resulting in some intonation and note inaccuracies. Her encore was a Russian folksong which I think an amateur can play it lor. Even more disappointed. The only treat was that she was rather pleasant to look at. I bet shasha had a great time feasting.
While she was doing her encore, I recalled the last 'live' cello concerto I was involved in a month ago at the same hall. QLW charmed everyone with 3 encores, starting with a duet (!!!) with his student, Liz. Later on were virtuosic displays taken from Bach's cello suites and the other also a kind of dance movement. Another 3 months ago, QLW's student performed the Elgar cello concerto. Both his concerto and encore were inspiring, enjoyable and moving despite a few mistakes. Yes, perhaps most people have gotten so used to watching virtuosic encore performances that soloists get 'penalised' for playing simple pieces. Then again, the word 'soloist' always goes together with the word 'virtuosic'!
Next came the Eroica. The orchestra, led by yayaling, took about 10bars to find their tempo. I think either the orchestra didn't understand his conducting or he's doing it too fast. (I think both.) Not even halfway through the 1st movement, the principal horn missed his entrance of the main theme. (......) Anyway, the entire first movement was quite a wreck from the 3rd bar to the end.
Then came my favourite 2nd movement. The double basses couldn't groan properly and it became such a slow, drawn out groan. Painful. The oboe solo that came after the violin melody was tooooo emotional. And for the rest of this movement, Yaya ling fiercely and very clearly directed the basses' groanings till the end.
By this time, I had lost all interest in what was going on onstage. And when the symphony ended, I gave my unenthsiastic yet polite applause and exited the hall. The orchestra gave no encores.
You should have seen the musicians' faces. Eyeball rolling and sheepish grins.
.:. 0C o m m e n t s.:.