Brahms schokoladefest

I knew it was going to be a good night when I arrived at the artists' entrance of the RFH only to find my route blocked by a CHOCOLATE FESTIVAL. A row of tentlets had sprouted along Belvedere Road in the blazing spring sun, buzzing with stall-holders making, selling and eating all things chocolaty - and someone was giving a talk about why chocolate is good for you...

This was followed by the most astonishing performance of the Brahms German Requiem that it has been my pleasure to hear. It was preceded, to my surprise, by the reconstructed Mendelssohn Third Piano Concerto - see my Mendelssohn blog in a day or two for more on that. But the Brahms was one of those performances where the hair rises on the back of the neck and you can't explain it.

The LPO were playing their socks off for their principal guest conductor, Yannick Nezet-Seguin, with the London Philharmonic Choir and last-minute replacement soloists, including the marvellous Elizabeth Watts. The tempi were slow. Extremely slow. Yet everything shone. An extreme 'innigkeit', an inner fervour, the power of transformation again and again from darkness to light, despair to hope, with harps and cellos and flashes of upturned horns, and the searing certainty that Brahms is just the best. And at the end - a silence that lasted at least 25 seconds. The whole thing was absolutely astonishing. The microphones were up, so hopefully it will be preserved on the LPO record label.

I'm still on cloud 99, and this is not because of the chocolate.

Mark Elder calls for musicians to stand together

In an acceptance speech to the Incorporated Society of Musicians, which presented him with its Distinguished Musician Award yesterday, the conductor Mark Elder made some pertinent remarks. Musicians, he said, must be ready to stand together and mount a passionate defence of their art as the credit crunch bites, not to mention the blasted Olympics [that's my adjective, not his]. Below is some of his text. The full text can be read here.

(Please bear in mind that I wasn't there, I've met him only a couple of times and I didn't choose his taxi driver!)

‘Our debt to the next generation is supremely important in these coming years. Before the credit squeeze jumped on us, we were all nervous and apprehensive that the wonderful ‘Olympic dream’ would drain the resources that might otherwise have gone to the arts. Now that the credit squeeze has joined that pressure, it is all the more important to stand together and be prepared to speak out. Not as ‘whinging luvvies’ (as the scribbling profession would have us be called), but as people who stand up for something that they passionately believe in.

‘Thank you all very much for your belief in me and what I do. I will end with a memory that I have of how important it is realise how far into the different corners of the world music can go.

‘One November night in the pouring rain in New York, I eventually managed to get a taxi. I threw myself into it – the traffic was crawling down the Avenue – and I found myself in the company of an enormous Afro-American taxi driver. He was listening on the radio to the BBC Philharmonic playing Korngold’s Sinfonietta. I said to him, “do you like this classical stuff? Do you listen to this often?”

‘“Man,” he said, “it’s the only thing that keeps me sane. If I listened to my music, with all the crap driving I have to witness, I’d go out of my mind and there’d be more road rage than ever.”

‘Isn’t that great? Music can reach into people’s lives in ways that we can’t imagine. All of us here believe in music. We believe in the power that music can give people to change lives, to change our hearts, and we must go on saying that and not be ashamed of it.

‘Who says the English are cold? Who says that they don’t understand musical things? Who says this is the “Land without Music”? They used to in the 19th century, but they sure can’t now.’

to JDCMB

Dead violinists society: Zimbalist!

I've never seen any film of Efrem Zimbalist before. Here he is playing the variations from Beethoven's Kreutzer sonata, filmed in 1926. Like Heifetz and Seidel, he was a Russian-born student of Leopold Auer; like them, his sound inhabits a world that is entirely its own, and the tone here comes through with astonishing power, beauty and sensuality, despite having been recorded 84 years ago. Glorious. Hope you love it as much as I do!

There's now so much amazing old-school violin stuff on Youtube that it could keep us happy on JDCMB for a year at least!

Maurice Jarre dies at 84

The music of Maurice Jarre, who has died aged 84: Lawrence of Arabia, which was among his iconic collaborations with David Lean. It's rather extraordinary, to put it mildly, as the opening titles begin with four and a half minutes of pure music - see above. He composed Dr Zhivago, A Passage to India, Dead Poets Society and many more. It's perhaps a signal of how the status of film music has changed in the past half-century that Jarre's death was reported on BBC TV's Breakfast news yesterday (normally they only talk about such matters as the latest red tape around school dinners).

Full obituaries are appearing around the world. Here is one from the Los Angeles Times, which includes a quote from John Williams: 'According to composer John Williams, Jarre "is to be well remembered for his lasting contribution to film music. His collaboration with director David Lean produced truly enduring music that is beloved by millions, and we all have been enriched by his legacy."'

Over at One More Take, broadcaster/film maker/conductor Tommy Pearson shares his personal memories of Jarre and invites everyone to do likewise.

And here is a full obit from The Guardian. "Music is how I will be remembered," said Jarre. "When I die there will be a final waltz playing in my head and that only I can hear."

Meet Kirill Gerstein

That was Kirill Gerstein in Rach 3 with the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra and the delectable Dudamel.

Gerstein is my next 'victim'...I mean, my next interviewee... for the International Piano Series. Tomorrow night, he makes his debut in this fabulous sequence of recitals at Southbank Centre, and I'll be doing the pre-concert interview with him, starting at 6.15pm. Do come and hear him: his programme is exciting, dramatic and unusual.

Johann Sebastian Bach: English Suite No.2 in A minor, BWV.807
Sergey Rachmaninov: Variations on a theme of Corelli, Op.42
Interval
Fryderyk Chopin: Fantasia in F minor, Op.49
Arnold Schoenberg: 3 Pieces for piano, Op.11
Ferruccio Busoni: Sonatina No.2 for piano
Franz Liszt: Mephisto Waltz No.1

He has a fabulous track record that includes having been a Carnegie Hall Rising Star in 2005-6, projects with Andras Schiff and Steven Isserlis and a piano trio with Kolja Blacher and Clemens Hagen. He became the youngest student ever to enrol at Berklee, aged 14, after a faculty member was amazed by his jazz playing (yes) in Poland. But the classical style seems to have won in the end, with a triumph at the Arthur Rubinstein Competition in 2001. So he's come a long way from his native Voronezh, where he was born in 1979, and looks set to go much further.

Online booking here.