Any comments on this?  The hall was criminally empty for a performance of one of the great works of the 20th Century.  I was chatting to an usher during the interval and she said the attendance is always low if there's a première on the programme.  This struck me as bizarre.  I didn't particularly like the 'Powder her Face' stuff but it couldn't be described as hard work.  And it was very short.  In fact the reason I struck up a conversation with a member of staff was that I more than half expected the audience to turn up after the interval.  This was at least the second ridiculously short pre-interval session this season.

Duke Bluebeard's Castle is a wonderful piece - almost everyone I know who has heard it loves it; but for some reason it seems to deter the Proms audience.  The attendance wasn't much bigger for the Saraste concert performance that ended up being released as a commercial CD; or, if memory serves, for the Boulez a few years earlier.  I was at both those Proms and I don't think last night's was as good as either of them.  I won't say I didn't enjoy the evening but the voices were drowned out far too often - and not just when the organ was blazing either.  Was the balance any better on the radio?

I watched on television, and was about to say I hoped the Bartok sounded better in the hall than in the broadcast...but it's very interesting to hear that the singers were drowned out in the auditorium. They weren't at all drowned out in the broadcast, to the extent that I was sure they were receiving excessive 'help' from the sound engineers. This was especially evident in the sections where the orchestra had a recognisably full-throttle 'sound' but were strangely muted in comparison to the singers. The overall effect was quite a dull, unappealing and superficial lack of depth and drama. (That also seems to have been partly to do with the performance, which seemed rather uncharismatic to me. I don't think Dohnanyi bothered much with Bartok's tempo instructions.)

The Ades was, well, pretty insubstantial wasn't it? A few novelty sounds, a lot of extraneous passing-around of repetitious material between various groups of instruments, a lot of (apparently) clever deconstruction of forms and themes but not really anything to interest me (like any perceived depth or substance, for example). I was interested to see that the side drum was damped with a brown leather glove - although it still sounded like a side drum to me. And as for the comments by the panel that it was really witty music, well, I can see that, but "ho ho" to that.

Sorry, what's that you say? This isn't the Grumpy Old Rant Thread? Oh dear. Sorry.

I saw it on TV as well - what really gave me the irrits was the camerawork, I'm afraid. The thought that it might be possible to keep a camera still seems not to have occurred to anyone, at least not sufficiently often. And the angle the camera took on the bass (as often as not looking up at his teeth when he bared them for high notes) was hardly flattering. Although the Adès isn't really my cup of tea anyway, it was rather revealing how much more colourful it was in its chamber- than in its full-orchestral dress (as revealed in the little excerpt they played during interval) despite everyone having said the opposite.

I did very much enjoy hearing what Malcolm Gillies had to say as well - seemed to me that he managed to make substantial comment accessible and interesting as opposed to the gush one hears much too much of on such occasions. But I would say that wouldn't I?

Spot on, Ron. Does any such TV version (or even a televised production) exist?

Thanks for the comments.  I looked at the BBC board before I began my journey home this morning and was rather surprised by the high praise for this performance.  By the time I got home some posts had been added which were more in line with what I thought I’d heard. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbradio3/F7497567?thread=4501081

Perhaps the engineers have been over-zealous but it does seem to have worked because the positive comments seem to come mostly from people who heard the performance on the TV or Radio.  I’d still rather have been in the hall with all its flaws but I wonder if it’s fair to be too critical of the engineers.  Certainly you wouldn’t want to broadcast the sound exactly as I heard it if you had a choice.



It is indeed door 5, Tommo. It could have been louder but perhaps it’s a good thing it wasn’t.  If the organ is at 12 o’clock we were at 7 or 8 and the sound was impressive but not as overwhelming as it sometimes is.  Had we been sitting between 10 & 11 as we were for ‘The Apostles’ I wonder if the effect would have been beyond overwhelming but for the organist’s self-restraint.  It’s a very powerful instrument!

I enjoyed the Bartok and could hear the soloists fairly well from where I was in the circle, although there were a couple of bits where Struckmann was drowned out by the orchestra. The acoustics are so unpredictable there that I'm not surprised people in other parts of the circle couldn't hear as well.

After the "Gotterdammerung" the other night I was a bit disappointed that they didn't apply their disco-light effects to the opening of the castle doors, where it might actually have been appropriate 

I've enjoyed "Powder Her Face" (in its entirety) before but I thought that performance of the suite was rather half-hearted. Perhaps they were demoralised by the empty hall, in which case they did well to cheer up after the interval.

Lighting effects are certainly specified.  I agree that this was a missed opportunity - especially when the lighting effect we DID get was a bright-pink squiggly mess projected onto the organ (i.e. completely inappropriate to the music).

I have always maintained that Bluebeard could be a major popularising vehicle for opera via a well-made, inventive film. The potential for striking visuals is there in abundance, coupled with some of THE greatest music of the 20th century. It seems to me a missed opportunity.

So much filmed opera is so obviously compromised by its stage-bound nature that it beggars belief no-one has seen the possibilities here. Plus, of course, its brevity means it can be presented complete in a digestible format for new listeners.

Can I just say that that the C major which opens "Behold my spacious kingdom" is one of the greatest sounds of the 20th century.

There, said it...