Upload
judith-jennings
View
215
Download
1
Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Fortnight Publications Ltd.
Better Luck than Brahms'Author(s): Judith JenningsSource: Fortnight, No. 257 (Dec., 1987), p. 27Published by: Fortnight Publications Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25551381 .
Accessed: 25/06/2014 10:13
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp
.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].
.
Fortnight Publications Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Fortnight.
http://www.jstor.org
This content downloaded from 91.229.229.101 on Wed, 25 Jun 2014 10:13:32 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
Better luck
than Brahms' SINCE he won outright the Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow, Barry
Douglas has become hot property inter
nationally. A smartly dressed audience packed the Ulster Hall to applaud his opening night interpretation of Brahms' First Piano
Concerto. The composer, who gave its first
performance in 1859?when it was not a
success?would have warmed to such a
rapturous reception.
Douglas evoked the delicate and the vibrant
from the Steinway with consummate ease,
supported by the impressive 110-piece Mon
treal Symphony Orchestra. This combination was particularly effective in the adagio, with
impeccably phrased dialogue between piano and strings, and in the thundering turbulence
of the finale. Fortunately the concert, which
included a flamboyant interpretation of
Strauss's Don Juan and Bartok's Concerts
for Orchestra, will be televised soon.
Incidentally, Douglas was spotted in the
Linenhall after his performance, chatting with
old friends who were not in dinner jackets, and he admitted to reading Fortnight.
Flute and piano recitals would suggest a
meagre attendance in the Elmwood Hall. How
can one account for three nights of full
houses in the Whitla? Perhaps because, as the
Festival blurb modestly asserts, they have
booked "the most famous flautist in the
world, who is also probably the most famous
Ulsterman in the world". No points for
guessing James Galway. Thinner, less
ebullient, more serious, he performed, in his
second programme, works by Hue, Feld,
Gaubert and Borne: composers probably unheard of by the majority of the audience.
The sensitive piano accompanist was
Phillip Moll, who had to be coaxed to
acknowledge applause, although his pedigree is almost as impressive as Galway's. The best
known works were Debussy's Clair de
Lune, perfectly interpreted, and En Bateau, restful with the rippling keys simulating undulations.
In the Feld sonata there was spontaneous
applause after the first movement, allegro
giocoso, which resembled an animated, noisy discussion. Borne's Carmen Fantasy, an
operatic pot-pourri, gave both performers the
opportunity to show off their expertise. The music was read throughout so it was
not until the encores that we could enjoy
Galway's puckish smile and rakishly twitch
ing left eyebrow. Of course we had Danny
Boy played with a lingering nostalgia and, as
a hint to the audience, who were sitting
confortably for more entertainment, a spirited
Flight of the Bumble Bee. Galway's next flight will be to London and from there round the world again. Let's hope he lands in
Belfast next November.
Judith Jennings
LU I .'.,. -JZ*m m^^mW^^^^^mmS^m^^m^mmmmmmm
Barry Douglas? hot property
Again I say these companies must be learnt from if we are going to
get our folk and saga literature on to the stage. The acrobatic dancing was stunning and amusing, and there was a beautiful mime of an old
boatman taking a girl across a river. You could feel the boat rocking. Maura O'Connell at the Arts was brilliantly accompanied by Arty
McGlynn and Nollaig Casey, plus a young Strabane guitar player of
real quality. Most of the songs were ordinary enough but when she
essayed the standard You'll Never Know she really did it justice, and she
brought the house down with her encore number, Irish Mollie.
The Road to Mecca at the Lyric started well. There was a
striking set by Shirley Bork, suggesting a humble South African house in which an ageing woman has discovered herself as an artist. The play seemed to have the virtues of Ibsen, painstakingly letting people
explore themselves to discover a spiritual truth. I thought Stewart
Parker could learn from this, for Pentecost works in the same mode
more flashily and impatiently. Alas the actors seemed strained and the three of them were trying to
sustain a long, slow, subtle text that lacked the images, atmosphere, and symbolism that keep Ibsen and Chekov going. Phyl Doherty's
Miss Helen embodied loss of nerve without suggesting the power that
had transformed her life and made her into an artist. Aingeal Grehan's
Elsa conveyed a superficial mixture of bad temper and affection, and
Kevin Flood's Marius Byleveld seemed like a third-rate Pastor Manders.
It is hard to say with a long, complicated play but I would guess it was the script's fault. The big truths when they came seemed com
monplace?that the local people were really jealous of the creative
artist, that the brash young woman was really ashamed of having had
an abortion, that the puritan pastor was really 'in love' with the old
lady. I suspect that the actors were crying out for a stronger director.
At the time of writing there were still big moments to experience.
Lynda Henderson denounced the RSC's Hamlet more fiercely than I have ever heard a play denounced. My heart warmed to her criticism of
Belfast audiences who are so keen to be called 'a good audience' that
they often applaud rubbish. However the word was that The Comedy of Errors was brilliant.
My last two Festival events were musical. At the Harp Folk Club
Mick Hanly and guitarist Peter Condell illustrated the rich depth of Irish popular music. Hanly writes fragmentary but serious songs in
what you might think is the impoverished Irish 'country and western' style?no style is impoverished if you use it right.
He is a lovely singer and a good guitar player, and his songs touch
all sorts of sensitive moments in the farcical tragedy of human
relationships, how we hurt each other, how we aspire to be 'in love' as
damned souls aspire to be in heaven. He has totally grasped an idiom
which allows his voice and Peter Condell's lead guitar to ravish an
audience?all musicality and sadness and creative energy.
Finally I got to the Guinness spot, which has always been a
highlight for me, to hear an American jazz singer I had never heard of
before I saw the programme, Betty Carter. She must be one of the best
singers in the world, torturing old standards like Blue Moon and All the
Things You Are?not to get more feeling out of them, but to remint
them as though you had never heard them before, as though you never
understood before what singing could be.
Before she came on we had our own high-class musicians?Gay
Mclntyre, Norman Watson?playing very competently, but somehow
unhappily. Gay tends to overdo his brilliance to prove a point. When
the Americans started to play it wasn't just the callow prejudice of the
audience that made the strangers seem better: they underplayed, but they knew what they were up to and believed in it. And then this lovely
middle-aged woman in black took hold of the microphone and
undersang the songbook with such musicality and personality that an
ignorant audience was awed and excited. Every drumbeat, every touch
on the bass, the piano playing, was bent to a common purpose
?celebrating the genius of Betty Carter.
She didn't sing one loud or impassioned note. She sang a lot of
substandard lyrics. She didn't make a joke. She might have been Bach reincarnated, giving herself musical problems and solving them with
the same serious delight that you feel in Bach, and a faith she didn't have to question that if you love the music and have the power all you have to do is get up there and do it.
The three young black musicians with her were teased and made love
to and sorted out by this maestro, reducing Holliday's What a Little
Moonlight Can Do to an almost wordless game between leaping
rhythms and a vanishing melody, or taking all the lushness out of All
the Things You Are and reaffirming the beauty of the song. Her scat
singing, for me, far outdoes Ella Fitzgerald's because it was what it
should be?a natural leaping on from singing the lyric to exploring the tune and harmonies, not a showing off, not a joke, but music, music,
music. Thank you! After the show we went down to David Grant's Old Museum to
drink a little wine and savour unfledged talents and discover what a
beautiful building that is. I hope it can be refurbished and set to work.
James Simmons As the Festival was coming to a close, good news arrived after
months of waiting for Noreen O'Hare, manager of the threatened Crescent Centre (Fortnight 252, 254). The Department of the Environment, which had threatened to put the building on the
open market, has now relented after strong opposition? and the
building is to be offered to the Crescent itself. No one will yet disclose the figure the Crescent has to raise for
the purchase, but Noreen is cautiously optimistic. Her response to
the news was simple. "We're absolutely delighted," she said. While plans are made for acquisition and development of the
building, Noreen hopes that a limited arts programme will get under way by the new year.
27 December Fortnight
This content downloaded from 91.229.229.101 on Wed, 25 Jun 2014 10:13:32 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions