don@hcrvx1.UUCP (Don McKillican) (09/30/85)
I had the considerable pleasure last night of hearing a concert from Bernard
Haitink and the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, who are presently on
tour on this continent. The program states that the tour also includes Ann
Arbour, Boston, Pasadena, Washington D.C. and New York, but does not state
whether these cities are/were before or after this concert in Toronto.
Nonetheless, if anyone still has the chance to hear this group, GRAB IT!
I was not encouraged by the program, which featured Mussorgski's "Khovan-
shchina" prelude, Shoskakovich's 6th Symphony and Schumann's 2nd, none of
them works with which I was or ever desired to be terribly familiar. But
Haitink is a persuasive advocat of all of them, and we managed by dint of
industrious applauding to squeeze two Slavonic Dances out of them as an
encore, and I much enjoyed myself.
I was probably most surprised by the Khovanshchina. The basic "throaty"
tone of the Concertgebouw I have known and admired for years, but they
displayed here a shimmering string tone which was positively ravishing! Very
nice.
The Shostakovich was very well done. It's a pity the work isn't better known:
it lives in a very similar world emotionally to the much more popular 5th. The
initial slow movement was somber and meditative without letting the line sag,
which is a substantial tribute to Haitink's feel for the architecture. The
other two movements were vigorous, energetic, exciting, and all those sorts of
adjectives, and the orchestra really "came on" for the ending. Great fun!
(even if a bit hokey.)
The Schumann I was less happy with, granted I'm not the world's most devoted
Schumann fan anyway. The corner movements were okay, but I thought Haitink
got a bit lost in the cross-rhythms of the scherzo, and the slow movement
dragged some.
All told, an enjoyable evening. The orchestra is simply wonderful: a warm,
rich, full tone, great projection, and a solid command of their program.
Recommended.
Don McKillican
Human Computing Resources Corporation
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
{ihnp4,decvax,utzoo,watmath}!hcr!hcrvx1!dongreg@olivee.UUCP (Greg Paley) (10/03/85)
> I had the considerable pleasure last night of hearing a concert from Bernard > Haitink and the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, who are presently on > tour on this continent. The program states that the tour also includes Ann > Arbour, Boston, Pasadena, Washington D.C. and New York, but does not state > whether these cities are/were before or after this concert in Toronto. > Nonetheless, if anyone still has the chance to hear this group, GRAB IT! > I didn't get to hear them during this go-round, but I can heartily second the recommendation. When I first heard the orchestra live (in U.C. Berkeley's Zellerbach auditorium in early 1971, doing the Mozart Posthorn Serenade and Mahler 9th Symphony) the string tone was extraordinary, but there were definite weaknesses in the brass. Subsequent changes in personnel have seemed to do no damage to the string sound but have strengthened the brass considerably (particularly the french horns), resulting in an extraordinarily high quality, well-balanced ensemble. One regret I have is that Philips, since they have "gone digital" seem to have lost their capacity to capture the color and weight of this orchestra that so distinguished their analogue recordings from the Concertgebouw in the 70's. By this, I'm not condemning the digital process per se, since London have captured these qualities very successfully on the few digital recordings they've made there. As far as Haitink himself is concerned, I think his very lack of ego causes him to be underrated. He's never considered in the "superstar" category, yet he produces a steady stream of what I find exceptionally satisfying musical performances. The claim that a particular conductor doesn't superimpose his own personality onto the music is sometimes used as a way of hyping up a mediocrity. I don't feel that it applies to Haitink, since I find that he definitely has a character and style of his own, but that this style is such that it still allows the music to make its own statement. - Greg Paley