This was a very big event in a very big cathedral. It was a joint effort between Liverpool and Cologne, with which Liverpool is apparently twinned. It involved the RLPO and Choir, the choirs of Liverpool's Anglican and Catholic cathedrals, The Cologne Oratorio Choir, and I think 3 choirs from Cologne Cathedral (they have four) including the Boys' Choir. The same choirs had just performed it twice in Cologne, with a  German orchestra and I think different soloists.

We arrived early, in fine weather with the Cathedral bells ringing out, people streaming in, and a lot of cheerful German choirboys still sitting around outside. Inside, people were already sitting in the "well" (the extreme west of the cathedral, where you can't see the main area) and the screen was already showing the performance area. We had paid for a seat in the front (east), which proved a mixed blessing. There was a tremendous sense of occasion.


The choirs and orchestra (conducted by Ian Tracey) were in front of us, as was the soprano (the young Latvian Marina Rebeka, very loud and clear), but, unluckily for us, Ian Bostridge and Hanno Mueller-Brachmann were placed at one side behind us, together with the chamber orchestra (conducted by Eberhard Metternich from Cologne Cathedral) - so we couldn't see them and, to be honest, couldn't always hear them properly either. The Owen settings with least accompaniment fared best - "Move him into the sun" sounded wonderful. I don't know why this position was chosen - when I sang in the War Requiem in the cathedral years ago, everyone was together at the east end, but perhaps the huge choir this time meant there just wasn't room. I never quite worked out where all the boys were - their voices seemed to come from everywhere. Very beautiful disciplined singing from them.

Considering the size of the choir, I thought it was remarkably clear from where I was sitting, the pianissimo passages very well sung. The more complex parts get a bit lost in the cavernous acoustic, but then Britten said he preferred it in, say, Ely Cathedral, where not all the words were audible, to the Festival Hall, where they were. Certainly the drama was intact, with quite wonderful sounds rolling all around us. A concert hall just isn't the same.

From what I could hear, Bostridge and Mueller-Brachmann sang most beautifully. There were shades of Fischer-Dieskau in the German-accented "Bugles seng" (as it sounded), though his English was actually very good and seemed to improve as the evening went on. And of course, Britten made absolutely sure that certain key moments would be audible in any circumstances, so "Dona Nobis Pacem" floated up to heaven, and "I am the enemy you killed, my friend" made its full impression. Lots of sniffles round me (though not from me - I must be more more hard-boiled than I thought).

Altogether a memorable occasion, and as the Dean pointed out in his excellent introduction, this is a work that is not about history. It's about something that is still happening, and so (sadly) is just as relevant now as when it was written. The poet's warning, as ever, hasn't been heeded.

I enjoyed reading your review, Mary.  You're seeing a lot of Ian Bostridge this year, aren't you?  I know people have reservations about his voice but I've never failed to enjoy his singing.  Cologne and Liverpool have a lot in common with their massive cathedrals which survived WWII - possibly because of their value as landmarks for the bombers!  I wonder if the visitors were taken to to St Luke's down the road.

I can't say I regret my decision not to buy a £10 ticket.  The norms of the TV lounge are already influencing the behaviour of concert audiences too much for my liking without having screens in the concert venue itself.  But my main concern was that the 'well' seemed to be on a significantly different level from the performance area so I was concerned the voices would be barely audible or, perhaps worse, relayed through speakers. 

I find I like Ian Bostridge in all the things I heard him in as a teenager (all recordings) - primarily Schumann's Dichterliebe and Britten's Our Hunting Fathers (which I still can't hear sung by anyone else, especially not a woman, my idea of the piece is so inextricably bound up with Bostridge's slightly nasal tone - great for 'Rats!' but also great for the ridiculously discursive Auden intro and fillers). I still find these, plus his Schubert CDs from around the same time, almost entirely unobjectionable, but anything I've heard him in more recently I've found grating in some way.

But then, I seem to find most classically-trained singers grating these days (including Roderick Williams, despite many of the posters here I respect most being paid-up fans).

Which is why I've already booked to hear him singing Macheath.  It seems a very unlikely role for him but I trust him to know what he's doing.



I've never seen him in the opera house.  Interestingly, some friends saw him as Vasek several years ago and thought he was brilliant.  I wouldn't like to say what their opinion is worth, but it was certainly an honest one as they'd never heard of him at the time.  I'd never heard of him the first time I saw him.  That was in a thoroughly memorable performance of Schumann's Scenes from Goethe's Faust.  I can't say he stood out but the cast list was perhaps the most impressive I've ever heard at the RFH for an ordinary concert: Margaret Price, Christine Brewer, Lisa Milne (sopranos), Ruby Philogene (mezzo),Catherine Denley (contralto), Ian Bostridge, David Maxwell Anderson (tenors);Simon Keenlyside (baritone), Kurt Rydl, Jonathan Best (bass).


I'm surprised you haven't got at least one of his recordings of the Serenade given your enthusiasm for his live performance of that piece.

I can imagine Bostridge might be a good Vasek. I didn't like his Quint or his Caliban, though. He can sing the notes well, but he's not the world's best actor.

I first came across him when he was just beginning to be well known. I was in the choir, he was the soloist (Finzi, I think), and he was about 30. He looked 16, and I remember thinking that he had a very Oxbridge voice. I didn't know then that he had never been a choral scholar, but had managed to be a graduate of both Oxford and Cambridge.

I hardly ever buy CDs of anyone now. I used to, as a way of getting to know pieces, and to hear legendary performers. I like my music live if possible. I listen to what they broadcast on R3, read reviews (the internet is so useful for that) and go to everything I can. CDs (unless of live performances, and even then to some extent) are so edited, engineered, re-taken and generally messed about that I don't regard them as real performances, though I know many do. In fact, to quite a lot of people CDs seem to be what music is.

 

There was a review, very complimentary, but it isn't in the online edition for some reason. A friend cut it out for me. Peter Spaull wrote  a preview as well, and that wasn't online either. Odd.

Thanks Mary.  Maybe some reviews don't have copyright clearance for the online edition; which is, I suppose, fair enough.  I wonder if the same thing happened with the McCoy Tyner concert.