Prom 33

Last night it was the Scandinavian Prom with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor Sakari Oramo. The concert opened with Sibelius Symphony no. 6 in D minor, which the orchestra played magnificently - all those sweeping passages soaring up into the roof of the Royal Albert Hall.
Then we had the usual furniture removals as the platform was re-arranged to include the grand piano - along with the promenaders' 'Heave-Ho' as the lid was raised! This was all in preparation of the second of the night's pieces Grieg's Piano Concerto in A minor, played by Alice Sara Ott, a new face at the Proms. Miss Ott who is German-Japanese seems to have come to notice through her famously standing in for established soloists such as Lang Lang, Hélène Grimaud and Murray Perahia, but also through her tour of Japan with tonight's orchestra. She played the Grieg beautifully and delighted everyone by playing an encore, Liszt's La Campanella.
The last piece after the interval was Nielsen's Symphony no. 4 'Inextinguishable' . As way of introduction to his symphony Carl Nielsen said “Music is life, and, like it, inextinguishable” and that is what this piece of music is all about, apparently. It was certainly a very exciting piece with lots of wind instruments, typically Scandinavian tones, but also some American accents coming in, too. In the last movement the two tympanists seemed to have a heated conversation back and forth across the platform. Needless to say there was a huge ovation for the orchestra and its conductor as the final notes faded away. And we were treated to another encore, this time a Swedish composer, Hugo Alfvén, and we think it was called the Song of the Shepherdess. So the four Scandinavian countries were represented at the concert.


Coming home there were warnings that several stations on the Underground and overground rail networks were closed at request of the police, but nothing could prepare us for the awful devastation caused by rioting that was reported in the news today.


Proms 2011 no 33 
Royal Albert Hall
Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra
Sakari Oramo
Alice Sara Ott

London Weekend

We set off for London on Saturday afternoon and dropped the bags at our hotel before making our way to Byrons for burgers before our Prom. Tonight we were treated to a performance by the CBSO with Andris Nelsons. They began with Strauss's Don Juan followed quickly by Midori playing the Walton Violin Concerto, a piece new to us. Midori turns forty this year, but was a child prodigy who performed with Zubin Meta in New York aged eleven. She played beautifully and received quite an ovation from the Proms audience.

After the interval the orchestra played Prokofiev's Alexander Nevsky Cantata along with the CBSO Chorus and soloist, mezzo-soprano, Nadezhda Serdiuk. It is a wonderful piece of music, which they interpreted with all the necessary drama of the tale. Finally we heard Strauss's Salome - Dance of the Seven Veils - but there were no dancers!

 

 On Sunday we dropped the suitcase at Waterloo and went for breakfast at Le Pain de Quotidien, delicious granola with yoghurt and fruit. After this we went up to the Royal Academy to see the Summer Exhibition. It seemed a little 'thinner' than in previous years, but there were several highlights such as another amazing Anish Kapoor piece, some lovely floral pieces from Dame Elizabeth Blackadder and some Michael Craig-Martin 'words'. In the courtyard was an amazing sculpture called Colouring Book by Jeff Koons. It is made from high chromium stainless steel with a transparent colour coating. It gave the illusion of being transparent, but really reflected the courtyard off its colourful surface.

 
Now we had time to stroll down to and through Hyde Park, along with thousands of other people. Lots of visitors enjoying the sun by walking, sitting on the grass, boating on the Serpentine, eating ice-creams or even listening, 1960s style, to Indian chants in romantic dress under the trees!  As we came to Exhibition Road the phone rang and our friends were already at Carluccio's, so we quickened our pace, not to keep them waiting. After a quick dinner, we walked up to The Royal Albert Hall and our next Prom, which was all Rachmaninov and mostly choral as we had the Chorus of the Mariinsky Theatre singing with the BBC Philharmonic under Gianandrea Noseda. It was a wonderful performance from the choir that has such a rich tone, especially singing those Russian syllables. The bass, Alexei Tanovitski was excellent and the little we heard from tenor Misha Didyk was also very good. Soprano Svetla Vassileva sang very well, but rather spoiled it all by trying to steal all the glory, and even had to be asked to leave the stage by the conductor (very politely, of course!) as she didn't seem to know how to retire gracefully!

And suddenly it was time to leave the RAH, get the tube down to Waterloo, collect the suitcases and make our way back home again. What a great weekend!




Prom 21
Walton Violin Concerto Notes
Midori biography
Prom 22
Chorus of the Mariinsky Theatre
BBC Philharmonic
The Royal Albert Hall