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A U G U S T 2 3 , 1 9 9 9 .
I'm beginning to think that Foggy, Misty London-Town is a mythical leftover from the industrial era. Today was bright and sunny, as it's been for pretty much our whole stay.
Julie dropped me off at Windsor, where I tramped around Windsor Castle, the fairy-tale castle you drew when you were a kid. Then to London, to scoot around between the cigar places on St James Park. A pleasure! (And no, I'm not bringing you back a Cuban.)
Boy, am I glad I got to Royal Albert Hall early. I figured I might just check it out early just in case, and sure enough there was a line for the Arena prommers that went down the lane, across the street, down that lane and past two more buildings, etc — actually, I didn't see the end. (Eat your heart out, George Lucas!)
The line for the galleries was considerably shorter (which is strange because for a giant piece like the Mahler 3rd, the sound is much better there), so I got in and made friends with some fellow-musicians, string players all of us.
Two hours later, the concert was starting, and I was in a prime place high on the top balcony rail looking over a packed hall — half of London was there, to see the other half perform the Mahler 3rd Symphony, with Bernard Haitink conducting.
What a show! Mahler makes masterful use of the formal schemes handed to him — the sonata-allegro form in the half-hour-long first movement is especially well stretched to its limits — but his changes in mood from theme to theme are so extreme that this might be titled the Short Attention Span Symphony (paradoxically, for six movements and 1 3/4 hours). The second movement in particular sounds like a gentle exercise in channel-surfing. The third is more like watching a dramatic and involving movie and constantly being interrupted by your girlfriend, who happens to play the post-horn.
This was cool because Mahler wrote this symphony for THX.... and, sitting in the gallery, we got the full experience, because the antiphonal musicians were all around us: the drummers across the way for the military breaks in the first movement, and the fluegelhornist right next to us in the third. And I do mean right next to us. She was about a living-room's length away from me, with a music stand and a TV monitor showing Haitink. Hmmmm --- I think that trumpet players just don't get to the fluegelhorn often enough to know their way around it: she was the weakest aspect of the evening, fluffing every other phrase. But it was cool being right there.
The mezzo-soprano who sang the fourth movement, Michelle deYoung, was just about as good as you could ask for — a mellow, rich tone, and right on top of the pitch, with warmth and deep emotion in her delivery. Perfect! And of course the women of the BBC chorus and the ding-donging children did a fine job, too. What a great idea, to use children as bells, with their straight, flat voices and distinctive tone.
Only in the sixth movement did I remember that TV monitor and stroll over to watch Haitink conducting from roughly an oboe's-eye view. He's really 'in the pocket,' more like a pop director, in the faster moments, but reverts to the ahead-of-the-beat practice of most classical conductors during the expansive moments. And of course the finale is one big journey of expansiveness! Haitink doesn't necessarily hand the cues over on a silver platter (the way our George Winters does, so that watching him makes for a great play-by-play commentary), but he does give a polite nod to bolster confidence; and he has this great practice of shaking his hands like a frustrated Parkinsons patient whenever there's a crescendo, never losing the overall description of the tempo. It's neat to watch the effect this has on the players. You can hear his actions being made manifest.
Oh, to be a timpani player! If you got to play the Mahler 3 only once or twice in your career, it would all be worth it. What a great final few minutes this is, with a Beethoven-like extending of the coda to the breaking point, married with a Wagner-like brassy grandeur that makes you feel like you're standing in the heavens themselves, watching the New Jerusalem take shape before your eyes.
The audience simply roared for minutes on end as deYoung and Haitink came out to take bowing turns with the chorus and the various soloists. I can't imagine how left out I would have felt in those scattered, lonely boxes! Really, one feels more in the middle of things in the gallery or the arena. My musician-friends and I wiped the inspiration from our eyes and wound down the stairs.
Well, I was shooting for Mariss Jansons and Shostakovitch's mind-blowing 6th, but it was either that or see Peter and Julie before I leave, so guess what.
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I'm already trying to figure out how I can get to Londre next year at this time, and do nothing but Prom. They put on something like eighty concerts in a couple of months. It really is, as its advertising promises, the greatest music festival in the world. Thanks, and thanks, and thanks again to Peter and Julie, and the delectable 8-month-old Alexander, for hosting us. They set us up with bed, food, wine, ale, transportation, hob-nobs, new friends, train schedules, historical tourguiding, and family love.
