I don't care about admitting it. I've been crying with sheer joy at odd moments during this evening's concert. I'd almost forgotten what that was like. Fantastic! Thank you!

I hate to pick out anyone in particular because it was communal music making of the highest order but am I right in thinking that the first clarinet and first horn really were very good?

What energy! I missed most of the Shostakovich, but then went to BBC4 in time for the end of it and the rest of the concert, not music I really care for, but I was bewitched by this orchestra and conductor. If only something similar was done in more countries.

Notwithstanding Rattle's endorsement of Dudamel, I might well have been equally suspicious of the hype had it not been for the fact that I happened already to have heard their new Mahler 5 recording before reading any of that; OK, that performance is not going to knock absolutely everyone else off their pedestals but it is an astonishing achievement for a bunch of youngsters who are simply not at all by nature or historical experience culturally attuned to Mahler.

I found the central part of the opening movment of the Shostakovich Tenth Symphony rather ponderous and lacking in momentum, as though some kind of lead weight was hanging upon it, yet even in this the rather unusual interpretation was far from lacking in conviction. I don;t know how large the string section was but suspect that it was pretty enormous - the general standard of string playing was pretty high, with moments of scrappiness almost entirely absent throughout. The remainder of the work showed this orchestra to be a serious contender in this oft-played and splendid work - generally fine precision of attack, an excellent horn solo in the third movement, fine but only just controlled energy in the second movement and coming into its own perhaps best of all in the finale. A most remarkable achievement for an ensemble from an area which, again, simply has no historical precedent in the performance of such music.

Best,

Alistair

May I recommend a little look here?

http://www.deutschegrammophon.com/artistmicrosite/DUDGU/en/sistema_story.htms

250,000 musicians. About 1% of the country's population.

'Lennar Acosta, now a clarinettist in the Caracas Youth Orchestra and a tutor at the Simón Bolívar Conservatory, had been arrested nine times for armed robbery and drug offences before the sistema offered him a clarinet.

"At first, I thought they were joking," he recalls. "I thought nobody would trust a kid like me not to steal an instrument like that. But then I realized that they were not lending it to me. They were giving it to me. And it felt much better in my hands than a gun."'

The whole programme was FANTASTIC!  I loved it all.  Oh that Latin rhythm - can't tell you what it does to me.    The drummers, bongos - well all the percussion were fantastic.

Ho! This was so popular that when I arrived at more or less my usual time, I was number 64 and ended up in the middle of the fifth row However, this was not really surprising, given th'aforementioned publicity they've been getting.

I agree that the first movement of the Shostakovich was a little elephant-like, but the speed alone of the second movement more than made up for that! The second must have been just as quick as Gatti's with the RPO last year. This time, however, and RPO TAKE NOTE, the string off-beats remained as off-beats.

The Latin stuff took a little longer than it should have to get used to after the Shossy. But the arena was coming close to a last-night-style sea of movement at points.

Adrenalin was in such profusion following the exit that not even the bus driver's cursing could dampen it.

I've been intersted to see so,many posts here and on the BBC board expressing praise for this concert.

Although I felt the perfomance of the Shostakovitch 10th symphony was very clear and precise, I felt it was quote lacking in vitality and expression. I couldn't really  call it an 'interpretation' at all.

This impressions was reinforced when I compared it with the composer's own interpretations of his piano concertos and other works, very wild and intense, with at times scant regard for accuracy.

It was at the Proms,in 1972 I think,that I first heard the 10th sym. played bythe LPO conducted by Bernard Haitink, a performance,as I recall much more inthe spirit of Shostakovitch' own playeng.

 

Regrettably not, David, just a bit too far back. Actually, had the one stuck on the microphones continued on its way I might, with a bit of luck, have got it. Would have missed the microphone sight though.