That's right. Berios' idea in having the names of current performers (and accompanying repertoire) named within the piece was that the work's performance history would thereby accrue the same 'strata' of history, gradually, as that movement attmepts to do by all its quotations of musical works written over the course of about 500 years. Whacky, eh? But brilliant and funny at the same time.

Yes, Jean, but Berio realised it wasn't feasible to include a complete list: it was enough that each performance would have 'recorded' the facts live. It's a conceptual idea, man.    (Actually, he was the sort of composer who would have loved to have written another work in which all such available data would have formed the main material - but no...)

Beethoven and Bruckner tonight, and I am going to a reception for new subscribers before the concert.

Actually I am cheating because I am not a new subscriber, but the person who is can't go.  It just shows how much their marketing has improved, because there were no such things when I was a new subscriber.

And these days they send me an email to remind me every time I have tickets for a concert!

Well, it's not sold out yet, and I can get away, so now it's just a question of the weather.  I don't so much mind getting soaked on the way back but I'm not sitting in the hall in wet clothes; so if the skies open as they've threatened to do all afternoon I'll give it a miss.  I'm always happy to see the inscrutable Mr Lewis, though; and, being a simple soul, I'm very fond of Bruckner 4 so I hope the rain remains light.  I can't go on Sunday because I'm heading South on Saturday - Elektra at Covent Garden - and not coming back until the middle of next week after our concert society's monthly event on Tuesday

I just got back from the RLPO/Paul Lewis concert.  I had an early bonus when I benefited from Merseyrail’s £1 to town & back ticket which runs every Thursday evening from today until Xmas to encourage people to go late-night shopping.  Then there was a late bonus in that I just caught my train – a minute later and I’d have had a half-hour wait.  The concert in between was a bit of a mixed bag.  No 1 has always been my least-favourite Beethoven PC and I’m afraid Paul Lewis didn’t change my opinion tonight.  I’m sure it was a perfectly competent performance – apart from what sounded like one absolutely disastrous note in the first movement – and I was impressed with the first movement cadenza; but I’m afraid I still essentially like the concertos in descending order – 5 closely followed by 4, then 3 closely followed by 2 with 1 at the bottom.  Still, they’re all Beethoven and decent performance of any of them is worth hearing.

I read on the website that this was Petrenko’s first go at Bruckner with the RLPO and I ended up wondering which orchestras he has done Bruckner 4 with.  Maybe my expectations were too high.  Only a few weeks ago I heard a superb Bruckner 4 at the Concertgebouw; and the last symphony I heard from Petrenko was Prokofiev 5.  So ‘RLPO fails to match Concertgebouw Orchestra standards’ and ‘Russian conductor impresses more in Prokofiev than in Bruckner’ is hardly shock news!  But the Bruckner was rather ragged.  The grandiose bits were, by and large, fine; but the wind instruments seemed too often to be making their entrances as if they’d just been awakened with a jolt.  The whole piece lacked its usual fluidity; and the 2nd movement was almost dull.  But only almost.  I always think that, for those who like it, Bruckner 4 is one of the fastest hours in the repertoire.  Time flies by and it takes a truly bad performance to spoil it.  Tonight’s performance was far from bad, just less than wonderful.   Which brings me to the audience.  Is anything ever less than wonderful for this lot?  Petrenko was coming back for the third time when I left to run for my train and people were on their feet already.  This seems to happen all the time and, while I obviously accept that people have different opinions from mine, it’s just not possible for every concert to be that great.  It was a good attendance, though.  I estimated that the top floor was 90% full which, considering the concerto will be repeated on Sunday, is impressive.

Well they're just ignorant provincials, aren't they?

I don't care how over-the-top their reactions are, so long as they keep coming to the concerts.  It's not so long ago, remember, that we nearly lost the orchestra altogether.

That's an acknowledged way of avoiding disappointment, Mary!  Actually, the chances are your experience will be very different from mine.  For one thing, Number 1 might be your favourite of the Beethoven PCs; and, of course, you have a different symphony.


I don't think the two are  very closely connected, are they?  I can't imagine many people come just to applaud, or stay away because they object to excessive applause.  I just think it would be a shame if what used to be a sign of great appreciation became a formality.  As I'm sure I've mentioned earlier, Liverpool is not the only place where this happens: a standing ovation in Amsterdam is pretty much meaningless.  Indeed, not prompting an SO must be tantamount to being booed.

One thing I found far more annoying last night was the two hall staff who, during the first movement cadenza in the concerto, entered through one door, walked up the stairs, and went out through the next one - then did the same thing in reverse during the third movement.  It's bad enough when punters move around during the performance: for the hall staff to do it displays incompetence of a very high order.