Wasn't able to listen to this initially so I caught up with it on Listen Again last night.
There was a lot of negative comment (in t'other place) about this collaboration but I expected to like it. After all, some of my favourite orchestral music features rock bands (or is that vice-versa?
). I think you'll all know that I'm far from a classical purist, so this is isn't going to be a blinkered "how dare they do this to our sacred cows" type of opinion, this is the honest opinion of somebody who
likes the "crossover" genre. And...
This wasn't a very good example of it. The orchestra and band didn't integrate well at all. When one shut up to make way for the other, the transitions were jarring and spoiled the flow of the music. The three jazz musicians were obviously talented but they were simply playing the wrong thing. It was unfocussed, hard to follow, and just generally... messy.
The best part of the programme was the encore, when band played alone. Beautiful music
And just for the sake of completeness: this was the first time I've ever heard Petrushka, and I wasn't very impressed with that, either.
