Manipulating the Reformation - political bias at the BBC?

From St John's Smith Square a very good concert marking the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, with soloists Mary Bevan, Robin Blaze, Nicholas Mulroy and Neal Davies, with the Choir of Clare College, Cambridge, and Clare Baroque, conducted by Graham Ross. Works by Bach and Mendelssohn and Martin Luther himself, but also by non-believers like Brahms and Ralph Vaughan Williams.  Excellent programme and performances.  But far less admirable was the deliberate political bias with which the BBC packaged the concert and indeed, the whole concept of Reformation.  

The Reformation was a revolution in European history, definitely worth commemorating.  But it was not "Martin Luther's Reformation" as if he dreamed it up on whim.  Christianity always was schismatic, but this break succeeded because social conditions were changing.  The development of printing, for example.  Intellectuals like Erasmus and Linacre were changing attitudes.  When Luther posted his 95 theses on the doors of the church at Wittenberg, he was not starting a new religion. The Reformation took off because it was politically expedient, and exploited as leverage by kings and princes. We should mark the Reformation, but we should also see it in the wider context of cultural change, rather than as a calculating power grab. 

So why does the BBC package the Reformation as "a Brexit Moment"? A stupid comparison, demeaning to religion, and to the millions who have died for their faith on all sides.   AN Wilson says that "Protestantism was the first great Eurosceptic thing, the setting up of local power bases against a shared wisdom." which is true to some extent, but disregards the Pax Romana which brought civilization to the tribes of the north. Or perhaps some people don't want to be reminded of the Sack of Rome by "barbarians" and the dark centuries of ignorance that followed ?  "Breaking Free", indeed. 

For centuries after the Reformation, Europe was torn apart by wars, using religion as an excuse.   There was no universal consensus, nor should there have been, since society isn't monolithic, except through  repressive coercion.  Democracy is an ideal which recognizes that no-one has to think the same thing. Otherwise there wouldn't be a need for representation and discourse, or checks and balances against abuses of power. Absolute control is the opposite of democracy. Leaders who fear opposition become dictators.  There is a difference between winning elections and good governance.

The sad fact is that the media can manipulate opinion, thereby destroying the fundamentals of democratic process. An institution as big as the BBC can't help but have some bias, but when bias becomes so pronounced, it no longer reflects the fact that not everyone thinks the same way, nor should have to.  That is why the BBC needs to be more scrupulous, since it should be responsible to the nation as a whole.  British identity draws strength from concepts like fairplay and tolerance, even diversity.  Values that reflect Jesus's teachings : "Love thy neighbour as thyself". These tenets are the fundamentals of democracy.  Will the BBC be able to stand up to political and commercial pressure? For the sake of this nation, I pray.

The Ghost of Sir Henry Wood? BBC Proms 2017

The 2017 BBC Proms Season, just announced, is a travesty, far adrift from the founding principles of the Proms, and indeed of the BBC itself.  Once the BBC stood for excellence, with its guiding principles to "educate, entertain and inform", the logic being that the public can tell good quality from bad, and value learning and self-development.  Now we have a Proms season whose priorities are not musical so much as an ad for a BBC that is itself dumbed down beyond recognition.  Will the ghost of Sir Henry Wood rise, like the Commendatore, to smite those who have despoiled his legacy?  

The First Night is only 70 minutes or so, so it won't tax the attention span. True, Igor Levit will play Beethoven, and Edward Gardner will conduct John Adams Harmonium, a big, if limited, blast. so it won't be bad.  But once we could expect more. Daniel Barenboim brings the Staatskapelle Berlin to "launch this year’s cycle of Elgar symphonies". Direct quote from the BBC Proms website. What Elgar symphonic cycle? One on Saturday, the other on Sunday. The Third, realized by Anthony Payne, is probably too outré for the new Proms market.  It's been pushed to the doldrums of late August. Thankfully, Sakari Oramo conducts: he does it well.  

What kind of audience is this year's Proms aimed at?  Read the summary here.  Sure, it's good to have pop, light music etc. but not at the expense of serious music. One of the basic principles of marketing is to believe in what you're trying to sell.  Raise the bar, aim for excellence, and grow the market .Pitch below the lowest possible denominator, and kill whatever audience you already have while lowering standards and decreasing expectations.  If the primary product is music, then sell music,. All the gimmicky sales patter in the world won't make up for non-product.  If people really believe  Scott Walker is a "Godlike genius", good for them, but don't downgrade Beethoven.

Why sacrifice an existing market to try selling to another which might have completely different priorities?  Or perhaps that is the hidden agenda. The Far Right, the commercial sector, and vested interests have everything to gain from dumbing the BBC down. Sir Henry Wood believed that people were able, and willing to learn. Now, we live in an era where any kind of expertise is sneered at. Getting ahead means dismantling the edifices of advancement.  There's a whole lot more at stake than just the Proms and the BBC.

Fortunately, some of the principles of Proms planning remain, since they follow rules so simple anyone can master them.  Add a few big names - Haitink, Christie, Rattle, Salonen, Bychkov, Gardiner - and the punters will pay.  Bring in the BBC orchestras, most of which are good enough to do serious music and do it well enough without scaring the unwary.  Mark non-musical anniversaries like "Reformation Day" a term Martin Luther would have baulked at, then throw in music that has little to do with one of the revolutions in European history.  Hire famous foreign bands like the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, whom everyone loves, and a few cheaper ones. Throw in a few blockbusters like Schoenberg  Gurrelieder.(Rattle 19/8) .and  Handel Israel in Egypt on 1/8 (William Christie and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment), Bring along an opera (usually Fidelio which needs little staging) and import a ready-made from Glyndebourne and bingo! The formula works, like a well-oiled machine, running with minimal human intervention.

Thus, for those who actually like music  there are other good things to seek out. Hidden under the banner "Take a musical thrill-ride from the chaos of creation" on 19/7 is Pascal Dusapin's new Outscape. Look out too for Thomas Larcher's Nocturne-Insomnia on 15/8  New British works - David Sawer's The Greatest Happiness Principle on 29/7, and Mark-Anthony Turnage Hibiki on 14/8. Excellent younger conductors like François-Xavier Roth and Les Siècles (16/8), Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla (21/8),  and Jakub Hrůša (26/8 - good programme).  Formula is all very well, and formula has saved the season  Read my picks HERE.  But eventually it will not be enough to rely on mechanical formula. It's all very well to meet political targets but long term, it is music that matters, not flashy marketing.

BBC Ten Pieces - Motherhood and poisoned Apple Pie

What's really behind the BBC Ten Pieces? Mass public applause, but what else would we expect? Populist appeal is like Motherhood or Apple Pie. In reality not all mothers or apple pies are good things but woe betide anyone who dares question.  With the shadow of Harriet Harman looming on the horizon, arts organizations don't have any choice but applaud, even if there are much better ways of reaching the public than silly Diktats like Ten Pieces.So it's up to people who care about the arts to respond.

There's not much point querying the Ten Pieces per se. They've been dreamed up by middle-aged, middle-class suits who assume that young people are too stupid to like anything that's not loud and brash.  The real danger is that such narrow-minded rigidity is inherently opposed to the  richness that makes the arts worthwhile. Creativity thrives on imaginations, individuality and freedom of expression. The BBC Ten Pieces are like a Stalinist Five Year Plan. What looks good on paper - and to politicans - doesn't work in real life.

In March,  Tony Hall unveiled his masterplan for the BBC and arts policy. Read more here. In theory, it could work. The BBC really was the centrepiece of the British arts world once, with imaginative, adventurous vision. But Ten Pieces trivializes the whole concept. Music education isn't just for the young, but for everyone, and it's a continuing process. "Ten Pieces" is a slogan like "The Great Leap Forward". What does it really mean? Designated playlists? Uniformity instead of diversity? If listeners get turned off by some of those choices (rightly so in some cases) will they be turned off the arts in a wider sense? Committee-think is for robots. Maybe politicians and bean counters like that sort of thing. But real people, and those who value the arts, aren't robots. 

Henry Wood's Jubilee RARE film

Recently released Pathé film footage of Sir Henry Wood conducting the BBC SO in Ralph Vaughan Williams's Serenade to Music with 16 soloists The film was made during a recording session atb the Royal Albert Hall - see the engineers and their state of the art technology! Hear  how the announcer calls RVW "R Vaughan Williams" to avoid confusing listeners with "Ralph" or Rafe"

Joined Up BBC Arts- Tony Hall's vision

Director-General of the BBC Tony Hall announced today his vision for the "biggest push we’ve made in the arts for a generation. There’ll be more arts on the BBC than ever before.....  I want Arts and Music to be as recognised with the BBC as BBC News is."

Read the full text of hs speech here. There's nothing specially new in this per se. This new statement follows on from the outline Hall unveiled last October (read more here). He's firmed up on specifics, e.g., announcing a remake of Kenneth Clark's Civilization. That was a symbol of the time when the BBC was indeed the arts conscience of this country, leading the way with innovative content and far-sighted commissions. The problem is, society has changed. Perhaps the world has dumbed down: we can't expect organizations to remain unscathed, especially in an economy where many vested interests compete. The BBC must justify itself. Big organizations need scrutiny, but with that comes bean-counting silliness: Look at any big organization, private or public. The odds are against visionary leadership. Hall did good things for the Royal Opera House, but I suspect the age of the Reiths is over. Good luck to Hall for trying, at least.

At least Hall is addressing technological change. The Space failed because it was disastrously mismanaged, but in principle, it could take off.  If the French and Germans can do umbrella arts web channels why can't the British? The BBC is in a better position to do this than anyone else, even if it drives Murdoch and other competitors nuts. It just doesn't make sense to scrap an organization that's way ahead of anyone else. In the US, opera houses and orchestras are in meltdown. So much for the model of private funding. The arts aren't a luxury but fundamentally important to the ethical health of the nation, especially when education standards are dropping. 

Innovation depends on good people. I'm not convinced that creating Arts and Music supremos will do the job, per se, unless they're good at what they do.  The bigger the ambit, the less detail.  Once BBC Radio 3 was serious music. Now, there's no music at all after 10 pm. It's unfair to blame presenters, some of whom are less inane than others. The rot comes from applying Radio One values to a genre that suits people without Attention Deficit Disorder.

One  thing Hall skirts around is the international nature of the BBC. It represents Britain.Whatever any government of the day might do, the BBC symbolizes Britain as a force for good in the world. It does more for foreign policy than guns and bombs. The perceived political bias that so upsets so many is largely irrelevant on a world scale. (In any case cultured minds learn to think for themselves.) Although there's more competition within the UK from other media providers, the realities of a digital, global economy suggest that size matters. Organizations have to be multinational. If the BBC is to fulfil this international role, it might need to rethink its funding base. Now, we're getting really radical.

photo : Deskana

BBC Future : Tony Hall unveils his vision for the BBC

BBC Director General Tony Hall unveiled his new vision earlier this week. Perhaps it didn't get quite the attention it should have thanks to the "Powerpoint Presentation" style of the speech. Full text here. You can almost see the bullet points and autocue prompts beeping across the screen......

In realspeak,  it amounts to an awareness of new forms of technology.  "More than 9 million devices accessed BBC Sport Online on transfer day. 40% of requests to the iPlayer now come from mobile devices – 40%. A couple of years ago the figure was just 6%. We had one and a half million requests for our sitcom Bad Education before the first programme had even been broadcast. What a great opportunity this is. And we’re going to embrace it just as we embraced television, just as we embraced the internet. Just as we created Freeview and the iPlayer. We are going to reinvent what we do, bit by bit, step by step, to serve this new audience."

True : The BBC embraced television very early on and innovations like i-player and international online broadcasts  What Tony Hall says is that they're going to expand i-Player to reflect the changing ways people connect to the media. No more "listening to the radio" but accessing content on other devices whenever it suits the listener/viewer. Some shows to go onto i-Player plus even before they go on regular media.  

How does this translate for the Arts, especially classical music ? "I want", says Hall, "for BBC Music to be a brand that stands proudly alongside BBC News or BBC Sport." ......"We’ll make sure that the arts don’t disappear into niche channels by bringing more landmark arts shows back to BBC One and also to BBC Two."  This IS significant because the arts are part of normal life. Thousands must have followed the BBC Proms simply because they can on TV at prime time. The downside might be that this kind of viewer might expect something populist rather than art for art's sake. But still, there was once a time when audiences accepted upmarket rather than dumbed down. It's scary that kids today, according to another recent report, are less educated than their grandparents.

Hall also announced the launch of The Space, the BBC's joint venture with the Arts Council of England. When this was first launched in July 2012, I hailed its potential. (read more here) "The potential for thespace.org is huge......an umbrella for the arts of all kinds. Strength in numbers, economies of scale. I don't know if thespace is experimental or permanent but it's a good idea. It could be a treasure trove. If the French and Germans can do such things, why can't we?"

The BBC has bigger archives than any other arts institition in the world. If these were made available, it would be like unlocking the biggest gold mine the world has ever seen. A decade ago, the BBC wanted to open its back catalogue. Record companies didn't want the compeition.  With links to other bodies like the National Theatre,  the British Film Institute and so on, The Space could become the flagship of British arts. The prospects are dazzling. Tony Hall doesn't mention many specifics apart from hinting at new commissions and ventures, but in theory The Space could do for British arts what i-Player has done for the BBC.

The 2012 launch of The Space mwas an unmitigated disaster. First the name, so bland and forgettable that it showed up lower on google than a completely separate arts venue with a similar name. Serious rebranding needed, and a professional marketing strategy. The original Space was created by techno geeks with no insight into the arts whatsoever.. Items were included just because they happened to be available : no broad vision, no basic insight into what's happening in the arts world. Thetre needs to be real vision, and genuine understanding of the arts in their broadest form. A good business principle : getb the product right and the rest will follow.

Part of the reason the original Space failed was because the Arts Council England isn't a visionary organization. There's no vision in the British arts in general. That's why we have disasters like the management of the South Bank, fiddling about with short term sales targets, losing the raison d'être for its very existence. So we're stuck with the piecemeal thinking of a horrifyingly expensive rebuild, pushed through by questionable methods. Please read my Band aid or Surgery? and National Theatre slams South Bank Proposals. If the Arts Council did proper policy planning, we might not be in this situation. For once, I agree with Richard Morrison, who sugeested pulling the South Bank down and starting from scratch.

Where is real leadership - and vision - going to come from ? As continuity announcers used to say "Over to you, BBC".

Verdi 200 Birthday BBC Radio 3

Giuseppe Verdi's 200th birthday tonight.  Celebrations have already started.

On Monday (with five days still to listen) Don Carlo from Salzburg with Jonas Kaufmann and Anja Harteros. Although the performance took place only a few weeks ago, it is so good that it's already spoken of as being one of the classics. Read my review of the filmed broadcast.

More Kaufmann and Harteros  in Il trovatore from Munich, on Saturday. .Sacrilegious thought : how similar this plot is to Fidelio! But that only goes to show, yet again, that good ideas can transport freely.

Anna Netrebko on Thursday, in Verdi's  Giovanna d'Arco, also from Salzburg. This opera is one of my favourites because I like Joan of Arc (and have been doing a series on her various incarnations in music and film).  Read more about another performance of Giovanna d'Arco HERE.

Throughout this week, Verdi will fill BBC Radio 3's afternoon slot at 1400, and "Composer of the Week". Also various talks and studies, some more promising than others. The BBC has, in fact, been broadcasting Verdi all year as part of the Verdi 200 series. Nearly every opera and non-operatic work has been or will be broadcast online. The Proms were a bit of an anomaly but also not so surprising when you really think about it. Good Verdi needs to be done very well indeed, and costs money, and good Verdi stagings don't come cheap, and there's a lot more Verdi around than Wagner. Besides, I'm glad that the BBC Proms splashed out to the max with Wagner. It was much more fun than if they'd timidly spread themselves too thin.

Les Troyens online, but the real story is the medium

From tomorrow 5th July, the Royal Opera House Berlioz Les Troyens will be available live, then available online and on demand until late October, after which cinema screenings start and presumably a DVD release will follow. And for free, too, if you pay UK TV licence fees. In the rest of Europe, it will be available on Arte TV. It will be available internationally from Monday 9th July on http://thespace.org/  HERE is a link to my analysis ofthe film.

Rarely has any ROH production been given such  exposure. My review is HERE. But even more significant is the medium through which the broadcast will be delivered. It's a new website thespace.org, a joint creation of the BBC, The Arts Council of England, the British Film Institute and various different partners.  In Europe, comprehensive website broadcasting like this isn't new, Mezzo.tv and Arte.tv and Medici.tv have been around for ages. But there hasn't beem any similar site in the UK. So the potential for thespace.org is huge. It reaches far beyond the BBC. Sadler's Wells, the Globe Theatre, the BFI, art galleries etc can participate, creating a huge umbrella for the arts of all kinds. Strength in numbers, economies of scale. I don't know if thespace is experimental or permanent but it's a good idea. It could be a treasure trove. If the French and Germans can do such things, why can't we?

At the moment there isn't a lot of content, though there's masses and masses of Shakespeare, not only from the Globe Theatre but also international productions and a rare 1910 silent film of King Lear, painstakingly hand-tinted. The BBC's archives will be available. At present there's a very well made film-length documenatry called From the Sea to the Land Beyond, using historic footage of British life.  Highly recommended.  More to come, as well, like John Peel's sound archive and broadcasts from festivals. The problerm is that much of the content seems to have been written by technology geeks, so there's little consistency in what's being offered. Perhaps it's early days, but the possibilities are vast. From a business, legal and political perspective, there all kinds of angles and complications. But vision was never easy.

Then  there's the problem of public perception. Remember the hysteria when it was claimed that we couldn't see Britten's War Requiem  at Coventry Cathedral ? Since it was available as normal on i-player what was the fuss about? And it was live on thespace and is still available online for the foreseeable future. I-player generally has a 7 day limit, thespace seems indefinite. But maybe it's a British tradition to moan and whine, whatever happens. So you need a TV licence? That's the law. So you have to pay for viewing from Arte? So what, it's cheaper than travelling. At the end of the day, no broadcast is ever the same as the live experience. Everyone seems to want everything free, but the arts are not cheap to produce, and audiences should take some responsibility. In Europe. we're lucky. We could be stuck with the US model.

Nikolaus Harnoncourt against the bland and safe

Nikolaus Harnoncourt doesn't do small talk, so the idea of him giving an interview to the normally vacuous BBC Radio 3 Music Matters seemed a contradiction. But a reader who listened wrote me, praising the interview highly. Listen because it's a real interview, where Harnoncourt is talking in depth and saying controversial things from the heart. He opens out because the interviewer, Suzy Klein, is intelligent.  When you have subjects like Harnoncourt, you don't do sloppy technique. Klein is good, and Harnoncourt responds. This is the sort of thing BBC Radio 3 should be doing if it's to maintain its credibilty.

Harnoncourt talks about his early life in a way that informs what he went on to do. He wanted to be a sculptor. Though he became a musician, that feeling for wood and organic shapes informed his musicianship. Later he would work with ancient instruments that had been locked away in monasteries since their suppression under Joseph II. Instruments have individual voices, and as a string player himself, Harnoncourt appreciated the sounds they "wanted to produce".  Harnoncourt's fascination with period instruments stems from this respect for individuality. He hates dogma. Historicism for its own sake is out, too. He prefers working with musicians who don't specialize. "They don't eat baroque food!" he says, meaning that no-one can truly replicate the baroque mindset. "I'm not a warden in a museum". The great works of history "have no time, the works of Leonardo da Vinci, of the Greek sculptors, of Mozart, they have no time,  they are always up to date and never old". What we learn from period practice is a more sensitive way of listening to instruments and to music.

Harnoncourt speaks about orchestral traditions. In the past, Viennese orchestras were dominated by Czech players. "It was said that only Czechs could play horns properly", he says, "and string players were Hungarian, who knew the gypsy style". In Harnoncourt's youth, American money and American orchestras swept in. "I hated the sound of American orchestras, " he says, where every note is polished and correct. Of George Szell, with whom he worked, he says "He should be happy that I didn't kill him...  there was not one minute of music making", Harnoncourt mimics Otto Klemperer's disdain""Szell? Look at him".  "But he was a kind of god and all the American orchestras tried to imitate him". "Americans are so afraid of making cracks on tones that they shorten their instruments so they will not crack. But that's not music, it is security. For me, security and beauty are not compatible, at all. When you seek beauty you have to go to the rim of catastrophe". If one of his musicians "cracks" because he risks everything to get beauty and fails, "then I thank him for the failure. If you seek security you should find another profession".

So safe, bland and international doesn't appeal to Harnoncourt. Concentus Musicus Wien began as a group of musicians playing for their own pleasure. They had to copy manuscripts by hand, and track down authentic instrumenst to experiment with, some of which were bought with private funds. This "band of renegades " as Suzy Klein describes them, were exploring new approaches to repertoire, informed by what a composer might have heard. " I tried to understand what a composer meant". True artists, like Casals, Busch and even Alfred Deller weren't afraid to make stylistic mistakes if they expressed the true spirit of the music. Erich Kleiber, "the real Kleiber" as Harnoncourt calls him, was so good that if "I had more real musicians like that I would not have left the orchestra". Harnoncourt dismisses the idea of conductors as superheroes ("Karajan had to fight politically to keep his 'von'")  and doesn't like the term Maestro, which he personally reserves for his hairdresser. For him, the composer is god.

Listen to the interview HERE til Sunday. It puts the controversy of HIP versus non-HIP into perspective.  Please also see another voice of common sense "Is Sir Colin more HIP than he lets on?"

Schubert Auf der Donau video

BBC Radio 3's "Spirit of Schubert" week was addictive. Something new to listen to again and again. Like the first ever recording of a song about transvestites! It was written for a club Schubert belonged to. Hear it around 1130 on the Saturday night slot.  Wonderful, too, some of the human stories on the request shows, like Alicia de Larrocha trying out someone's new piano in Zambia.  With such good material, why did they have to go spoil everything with Schubert Lab? We don't need to be treated like morons. At least Schubert Salon had Graham Johnson, who always talks sense. "Classical or Romantic?"  Johnson squelches that. Composers don't think of themselves in categories. Schubert learned from the classics and did his own thing. He helped create "Romantic"  I can't be the only person suffering withdrawal symptoms after this marvellous week. Fortunately some of it can still be heard on repeat for several days.

Above, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Svatoslav Richter in the Napoleon Room of Schloss Ismaning in 1978. The full concert is available on DVD. This excerpt is Auf der Donau D553 (1817). Full text and translation HERE on Emily Ezust's Lieder and Song Texts site, a fantastic resource. A couple are floating down the Danube. The piano part describes gentle waves, the steady movement of oars. But this is a poem by Mayrhofer, for whom water was associated with obliteration. Waves don't keep their shape, they don't stay still.  Then the forceful second strophe, where short, sharp questions cut against the flow. The "armoured strongholds" of men are destroyed in war, but nature (the river)  remains. In the undergrowth (dank, tangled) the boat is becalmed, the men afraid. "Wellen drohn wie Zeiten Untergang" (waves threaten to draw them down, like time has destroyed the castles and towers on the river banks) The word "Untergang" repeated with grave menace. Schubert wasn't to know that Mayrhofer would drown himself in a river years later (The Danube, I think). But even then he didn't set the poem as sunny boat ride.

Schubert Laboratory or Schubert Lobotomy?

BBC Radio 3's Spirit of Schubert runs on. It's being sold as a gimmick, with come-ons like "Schubert Lab" which examines Schubert "under a microscope". I kid you not! Those words are used. But music isn't scientific. It's subjective.You might learn facts like strudel making but you won't learn Schubert until you listen with your soul. And that's a skill that comes with time and the willingness to fully engage. This isn't Tom Service's fault. It's the result of a continuing process of dumbing down that's affected the whole culture business.

Fundamentally, the media are hooked on the idea that mass means value, not quality. Look at any newspaper. The more outrageous the article, the more comments, even though most of the comments are gibberish. But that doesn't matter, as long as the article gets attention. It's mob rule via new media.  Far from encouraging new ideas and opinions it stifles genuine, independent  thought. Live blogging, for example, works fine with breaking news stories, because no-one knows the story yet. Live blogging during performances is moronic. Sure we're responding every moment but until we've processed all the data we're in no position to understand the whole.  Someone told me recently about a broadcast where tweets went across the screen like subtitles. Yikes! The message there is, don't listen or watch, read what other people think, however fragmentary (and often brainless).  Everyone has an opinion, but it's what goes into making the opinion that counts, and it's not an instant process.

So the BBC Spirit of Schubert is an interesting experiment. It operates on many different levels at the same time, and its range is so wide you have to pick and choose. In Australia, car boot sales are called "Trash and Treasure". In amongst the tat you might find a rare gem. There are some marvellous things on this Spirit of Schubert  week, scattered around so you have to be alert and prepared for surprises. It's quite amazing how much there is. This series is not something anyone can run up in a weekend. Extremely rewarding, though sometimes you have to zap the mute.  For me that's part of the fun, and without fun, what's the point?

You never know what you might learn. Request shows are naff for many different reasons (often nerd territory) but these have thrown up unexpected wonders. One man asked for Peter Dawson's Erl King sung in stilted Victorian English (before German recordings were easily available) Yow, it was dated, but the beauty was in what it meant to the man, who heard it as a boy and became hooked. His Dad bought him a piano, though that was the last thing a military family needed to cart around. A window on a world now gone. But it's a wonderful story, because it shows that people can learn in all kinds of situations.

I love hearing about experiences like this. Once I met someone who had come to Schubert via John Cage. His insights were refreshing and taught me so much. Years ago, before Amazon and Paypal I was part of a gang who smuggled Lieder into China. Passionate listeners, who treasured every song. Every discovery is a step on the road to greater adventure. Hyper-ventilating instant opinions substitute the idea that learning is quick fix and finite.

Last night, at the Royal Festival Hall, there was a schools orchestra event. The place was full of excited under 12's with scaled down instruments. The kids had been having fun playing, improvising, learning to "really" listen and create.  Kids don't need dumbing down, nor adults.  Treat music with respect. In the concert afterwards, Lisa Batiashvili showed the same creative spirit when she conducted as well as played Mozart Violin Concerto No 3, in the absence of the scheduled conductor. It was a chamber experience, the LPO players communicating with her as individuals. Batiashvili's style is lithe and gracious, so the performance was very individual and personal. Exactly opposite to the Mahler 9 mechanically delivered and mangled. On paper, it looked OK, but as music it was awful. Sure, the conductor was a substitute, but this time the back up system did not work. The LPO deserved better.

New Year Free opera and more

TV and Radio treats, most on-demand so they won't hold up your social plans. You could see the New Year in with Lang Lang and Howard Skempton on BBC Radio 3 but for me, from 1800hr, it's La Traviata from The Royal Opera House with  Beczala, Perez and Keenlyside. This production has been done so many times that it's become pretty tired, but this second of the four casts was a surprise hit.

The opera is a vehicle for sopranos who always sound amazing, since Violetta is written wonderfully for voice, flatteriung every woman who sings it. Papa Germont is a vehicle for big name baritones because they don't have to sing all that much for their fee and star billing. And Alfredo's are often cast with up and coming media darlings. So along comes Piotr Beczala, and suddenly the perspective switches. It's like hearing the opera with fresh ears, from Alfredo's point of view. Beczala is extremely experienced and has one of the most beautiful lyric voices in the business. When I hear him, I think what Fritz Wunderlich might have been had he lived. Beczala has another advantage in that he understands his roles from within, so the singing flows from deep sources. So La Traviata takes on new life. "It's like falling in love all over again," said a friend. A good experience ! (review here)

On New Year's Day you can catch Maris Janssons live from the Musikverein, Vienna on TV and on Radio from 10.15.  The current production of Wagner Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg at the Royal Opera House is worth catching at 1445 on January 1st It's enjoyable on its own terms, once you get your head around the fact that it's more good natured Donizetti than Wagner. (review here) It's unidiomatic but but at least genial, and not as bland as Walt Disney Wagner at the Met.

Mozart The Magic Flute from the Lucerne Festival should be worth hearing too. Daniel Harding conducts the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, whose personnel he has been connected with for years. The cast is mostly English or resident in England, which might be interesting. 

Wild cards : Kurt Weill's Street Scene, one of his better "American" works, not that that's saying much. Much more unusual is the programme that places Beethoven's Egmont Overture in context, with readings from the original source. It also includes Sibelius's Kung Christian II. The performance isn't particularly rivetting, but the piece is worth hearing, even if it's very early work. It precedes the symphonies and more ambitious works like The Tempest but has affinities with his Kalevala pieces.

(Photo © 2005, 2006, 2007 by Bjørn Erik Pedersen)

Why we should worry about the BBC cuts

£700 million worth of cuts to the BBC from the last year's £3.5 billion expenditure (about 20%) because the licence fee is being frozen. Big cuts to sport, hardly surprising, since that's what commercial broadcasters want to control. Obviously, there's slack in the way any big corporation is run.  For example, most people made redundant get the statutory minimum, around one week per year worked, max £400 per week. You're lucky if you get £5000. It's shocking that the BBC pays up to 2 full years or a maximum of £75000. Since they're laying off thousands of staff, it might be cheaper to keep them on..

But what does it mean to classical music? BBC Radio 3 used to be top of the market but has been spiralling downwards for years. If the BBC continues to self destruct, we might as well listen to Classic FM. Or not at all. The Proms are safe because they're symbolic, but they're planning to slash around 25%  of key elements, like live broadcasts and performers. Cutting waste and management is one thing, but cutting the core of the whole service is plain short-sighted.  The way the recording industry has collapsed. there's a huge niche for live and original. But the BBC don't seem to have twigged how the industry has changed. Are they killing the goose that lays the golden egg?

BBC Radio 3 supports the whole music industry. Nobody makes money from seat sales alone: Broadcast fees make a huge difference to the income of any venture. Now the BBC Plans to cut live broadcasts, which are a key feature of the schedule. We all can hear some of what's on at the Wigmore Hall, for example, without getting into London, and we get to hear top European orchestras and opera companies as well. Smaller venues and festivals may not survive without BBC support. We get to hear what's on at the unusual East Neuk Festival in the Outer Hebrides, for example. Without broadcasts we won't get variety and regional ventures, and places like the Wigmore Hall might not have the leeway to keep standards high. The end result? Less music. less variety, lower quality.

It's because of the BBC that the British audience demographic is so much more integrated than in most countries. This itself keeps standards high, because everyone has to have something worthwhile to offer. Take away these unifying broadcasts and we could turn into a nation of insular one-horse towns, where there's no competition or wider perspective. It also might mean doom to specialist interests. No one-horse town can support specialisms like early music on their own. So will we get safe and boring? One of the cuts targets already announced is new music. The Proms prove that there is an audience for innovation. Eliminate new music and you eliminate development, sponsorship of new talent and composers who'll not reach mass markets in their lifetimes. Remember Schubert, and many others. Whether you like new music or not, it's part of the lifeblood of creativity.

Even the BBC orchestras and singers are possibly under threat. This is nuts, as they are an integral part of the whole industry. Each orchestra has its purpose, and regional significance, and the BBC Singers are world class. In turn, they provide work for musicians, composers, and creatives. Cut back on gimmicks like celebrity presenters, popularity charts, glib talkshows, even the BBC Young Generation Artists Programme (which spins duds and well as goodies). But don't cut the core business. Pretty prattlers (male and female) you can get anytime. You can't replace years of professional experience.  Bizarrely, one of the ideas being floated is to replace orchestral programming with more chamber music. That logic doesn't work. You may have to pay more musicians in an orchestra, but orchestral music is what most people want to hear. They might as well amputate much of the classical tradition. You can't appreciate chamber music without knowing the bigger picture. As for opera, I suspect the BBC won't understand at all. Seriously warped economics.

Meanwhile, they want to keep the plethora of channels , each with its own infrastructure of overheads and cushy management.  Some channels are essential services, like the Asian Network, but what's the point of BBC TV 2 or 3 reduced to doing nothing but repeats? Again, technology has changed the business. With online on demand, we can get repeats any time, we don't need to support a repeats-only channel. For a while BBC Radio 3 was turning into back-to-back repeats of Composer of the Week, recycling the same programmes over and over. Recently, they've gone back to real broadcasting and more realtime concerts. But no more. This time maybe even CotW might be replaced by repeat drivetime drivel, because that's even cheaper. And you don't really need to listen. But maybe that's the long-term strategy. Stop people paying attention and they'll swallow whatever they're given. Perhaps that's the rationale behind having lots of soundbite news snippets instead of in depth investigative journalism. That's not just the BBC of course but a result of the Attention Deficit Disorder that politicians and big business would like the population to develop.

What is going on? Don't they have the business nous to realize that, if you have a unique product, you don't strip it down so it resembles junk anyone else can do? The BBC is our patrimony, and has made this country what it is. It helps keep the whole music industry afloat. Rupert Murdoch, for example,  has long wanted the BBC cut down so his ventures can compete. OTOH, if capitalism is so good, why can't he outshine the BBC without whining?  A good horse can win without the competition being hobbled. Too much short-term thinking and vested interests in this country, not enough vision.

Huddersfield Festival on the BBC

Sort of!  The 2010 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival programme looked really good. Rebecca Saunders as composer-in-residence, for example. Saunders is one of the most exciting British composers though she lives in Berlin and is oriented towards the German scene. Mentor, Wolfgang Rihm, no less. Read more about Rebecca Saunders on this site and also on the Huddersfield website which has videos, soundclips and an interview with her. For her, it would have been worth attending.  November, though, is a busy time for me and Huddersfield is far away, and for that kind of money you could go to Berlin, so I thought I'd catch up with the BBC broadcasts.

Sure enough, for the next five weeks each Saturday night, highlights from the Huddersfield Festival  can be heard live, online and on demand. Which is excellent because the music reaches thousands more, and broadcast rights help cover costs. Usually the BBC is scrupulous about telling us what pieces and which composers will be played. Now you have to guess and look back at the Huddersfield site for help. Obviously those keen enough to tune in will be listening anyway, but it's cumbersome and inconvenient.  Contemporary music needs sensitive marketing (especially with the image Huddersfield throws up).  The BBC blurb tells nothing. Surely a bit of finesse wouldn't go astray?

Is this a sign of some new BBC policy? Another programme features music from Turku and Talllinn. But what music? Admittedly this is a programme about tourism and junkets, but it would be nice to know. (We can all guess Arvo Part etc)  Maybe audiences don't want music anymore but lifestyle decor. But personally I think, in times of restraint amny business should concentrate on key product. Cut the extras like trips abroad, boxes at the Proms, celebrity presentters etc and stick to music. MORE JOBS LESS JUNKETS (read link!) Indeed, on hearing the programme, all my fears were realised. Two presennters not one and the music  treated like it was an intrusion. Interviews with festival director and musicians OK because they care about what they're doing, though the director could have been edited, which is normal practice. With contemporary music you need to get people to think, wow, I want to hear more. Here, you have to fight the impulse to switch off.  Too much emphasis on window dressing presenting, the product itself down the tubes. Defeats the whole purpose of broadcast. Maybe I shouldn't have said "more jobs" but real jobs. Notice the BBC website now has a tab for "presenters". Wrong perspective.

Mozart Marathon, BBC

Mozart Marathon on the BBC has yielded some good moments, amid mindless chatter. Some of the talk shows are informative, but much is filler. The BBC has to aim at the generalist, not specialist market,  but "too" general is tricky. Presenters who know and genuinely know the subject, please, not just pretty faces (male and female) But still, musically there are good things.

I was surprised how much I enjoyed the oratorio Die Schuldigkeit des ersten Gebots (available online til Sunday), written when the composer was only eleven. Some good ideas there like sudden flourishes, especially in the soprano part that make you jump til you remember it's a small boy's idea of high jinks. Often it's very studied, which is hardly surprising since Mozart (and his Dad) are showing how clever they are but it's lighthearted and charming. Not bad for a depiction of the First Commandment! Hans-Peter Blochwitz, Aldo Baldin, Margaret Marshall, Inge Neilsen, Ann Murray, Sir Neville Marriner, Stuttgart. Naturally, in this BBC Marathon, it's paired with Apollo et Hyacinthus  in the well known recording with Arleen Auger and Anthony Rolfe Johnson.

Other rarities are hidden in "Through the Night" broadcasts. Ascanio in Alba K 111 on 5/1, Il sogno  di Scipione K 126 on 6/1, and late tonight Il re pastore.  I've been hunting for Mozart song, but searching is difficult. Because there's so much, it's  a good idea to be selective, choosing things that aren't easily available on the market. On the other hand, who could resist Nikolas Harnoncourt, Concertus Musica Wien, La finta Giardiniera with Moser, Gruberova et al?  More historic Harnoncourt tomorrow (Fri 7/1) Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail.  Peter Schreier in 1988, my hero, always full of character. 

Saturday Night is a double bill Le Nozze di Figaro and La Clemenza di Tito. First, Andrew Davis, Chicago Lyric Opera and second, René Jacobs, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra., Two very different approaches, which makes for a good contrast. Mark Padmore, Bernarda Fink, Pendatchanska and Marie-Claude Chappuis in  the latter make Jacobs/Freiburg the one for me.

One extra anecdote which proves why exposing kids to Mozart pays off.  I took my kids to Mozart's Birthplace in Salzburg when they were tiny. Paintings on the walls,  little furniture, and thankfully not re-designed for "kid appeal".  One of my kids walked around, confidently identifying the portraits. "That's Mozart's sister", "That's Mozart's Dad". Really impressive, other tourists turned round. "How did you know" I asked. "Saw it in a book you were reading" says preschool pipsqueak.

New Year Broadcasts Verdi Strauss Mozart

Ten years into the new millennium! Yet it seems like only yesterday. Since then we've had 9/11 and the War on Terror with all the wars, terrorism and hyper-security that's followed. The economy nosedived worse than anyone could have imagined.  The last Great Depression took ten years, ended only with a war. This one started with a war and won't end unless fundamental structural changes are made. Won't happen soon. In 2008 I saw it coming and made predictions no-one then believed. Most have come true, unfortunately. But as Heinrich Herine put it 200 years ago:

Wenn die Kinder sind im Dunkeln, Wird beklommen ihr Gemüt, Und um ihre Angst zu bannen, Singen sie ein lautes Lied.(When children are in the dark, they sing to chase away their fears)

New Year's Eve BBC TV 4 extravaganza is Verdi Rigoletto, yes, the famous one from RAI Mantua with Placido Domingo, Ruggerio Raimondi and Vittorio Grigolo, the one that was filmed live on location. This is the one that proves blind adherence to stage directions means squat without dramatic vision. The ultimate "traditional" that proves traditional alone means zilch. On the other hand, the sense of occasion, and the sheer presence of Placido : I'm watching again, gladly.  Click on the link to see what I wrote originally. This time it seems to be compressed into 2 hours, which maybe means no chatty bits. If you really, really like chatter there's another week of the repeat of "The Best of European Opera 2010" from 2nd Jan but you might want to be fully tanked to watch that.

Still available on BBC i-player are Don Giovanni from Glyndebourne and Tannhäuser. from the Royal Opera house, both of which I've written lots about and much more than  reviews. Both will be discussed for years pro and con, so you need to know them.  On Saturday (New Year's Day), though, there's an alternative Mozart Don Giovanni. Franz Welser-Möst in Vienna with Ildebrando D'Arcangelo as Don G. Audio only but this should be sparky - it's Vienna after all

Earlier in the morning on New Year's Day,  the traditional all-Strauss extravaganza, also conducted by Welser-Möst, who has proved his real worth despite years of  abuse from smalltime bullies.  This programme wil also be broadcast live on BBC TV2 at 11.30 which might be better as we'll get the colour and sense of occasion  That's the medicine that makes the spoonful of sugar go down. (The Sound of Music is also on TV)

With the New Year, an unprecedented Mozart Marathon on the BBC, with every single scrap Mozart ever wrote, even the discards and juvenilia.  Normally blockbusters like this are overkill, but looking analytically at this series, it might actually be worth doing. It seems coherently put together, the focus being on learning and exploration. Some of the presenters are good, some borderline worthless, so we shall hear. If marathons like this are worth doing, they're worth doing well and only a big organization like the BBC can carry it off properly. Kings Place is holding a Mozart Unwrapped series which sounds interesting  but is of necessity limited to what can be done in a small venue. Mozart Total Immersion, full steam ahead!

Last Night of the Proms 2010

Renée Fleming, Prom Queen! Complete with helmet and flag! The BBC Proms are the biggest block party in the whole world, as well as the Biggest Music Festival, and the Last Night of the Proms is the biggest party of the whole season.

Imagine, 86,000 tickets issued for the various events, Hyde Park and other free open air venues and concert halls in the UK completely packed out. Millions more listening at home or with friends (where you safely quaff champagne). All over the world, online too. By tomorrow the repeat broadcast will be available on the BBC Site, and also more clips on youtube both official and pirated.

La Renée gave us a Rule Britannia with genuine baroque flourish: nice change! She knows how not to take herself too seriously, though, which is a saving grace. In any case, no-one comes to the Last Night for High Art. That's why I loved Sergei Leiferkus singing Edward German's Who were the Yeomen of England? with heavy Russian accent at the 1910 Proms Last Night reconstruction last Sunday. (There is a special clip of this on the BBC listen again site)  This should become a classic!

No English singer could sing German without Heavy Irony. When a Russian sings it, it's hysterically funny. As a historian friend told me apropos this Prom, that London in 1910 was full of exiles, Russians, Polish, Jewish and Indian. Good point! One thing the British should be proud of is that London was a world city, even then, a haven for progressive thinkers. This is one aspect of Britishness that's worth remembering, which right-wing bigots forget.

At the Last Night of the Proms in 1946, my mother was in the arena, a penniless refugee, recently liberated from a camp, in England for the first time. To her, Land of Hope and Glory really meant something. Flag waviing is fine, jingoism isn't. A few years ago showing off got out of hand, and some people were more interested in hogging attention than the musical spirit of the Proms. Thank goodness BBCTV crews don't focus on these types anymore, but linger on ordinary members of the audience. Ban vuvuzuelas, someone! They're intrusive and fascist, the sonic equivalent of a fart.

One of the pleasures of the Proms is the "ordinary people". Wonderful to spot friends in the audience, having fun, not playing up for TV. And watch around 48 minutes into part 2. There's a celebrity in the crowd, but the cameraman doesn't notice, so it's a fuzzy group shot. He's completely unassuming, no airs. The people around him probably didn't realize he's a star. Bet HE sang nicely.

Jiří Bĕlohlávek was lovable, because he. too, is unpretentious. His English is odd ("Gent-lemen") but it's much better to have a conductor who expresses himself through music than through showmanship. The speech is one tradition we could do without. It's unnatural, as it creates unnecessary stress on a conductor who isn't that way inclined. Most of them haven't the guts to say, let me do music not clown. Bĕlohlávek's genial, and you can see his nerves, and the relief on his face when he starts to do what he's much better at.

Post mortem on the 2010 Proms season is now up.  It's been wonderful, extremelty well planned and balanced, spectaular flourishes, many good moments and only a few duds.

That silly season again - BBC Proms !

It's that silly season again - the BBC Proms 2010 start Friday. A whole  summer ahead, 90 or so concerts, live, online and broadcast all over the world. Easily the hugest, massivest music festival in the world. The world's Biggest Block Party, where everyone can join in, all over the world, as long as they have net and radio connections. Which means some guy in Outer Mongolia, Tuvalu or Peoria will be able to join in, courtesy of the British taxpayer. This is a much better use of public money than bombs, threats and guns. Cheaper and longer lasting than the Ministry of Defence.  

One of the most worrying things about the future of  classical music is the way it's becoming insular, dominated by anglophone media. It doesn't reflect what's really happening in the world. Although the Proms are presented in English, they help break the anglophone stranglehold. The music is universal.

Which is why the BBC Proms are NOT like any other music festival.  No pretentious tossers here, pretending to follow with a score. Following Ferneyhough might make sense, but those clever types are usually following something like Carmen, looking for things to object to. While the rest of us are having fun paying attention to the music. Not that the BBC Proms are Beckmesser-free.  For some people the whole point is to get off on misery, but let's not waste time on them.

Another revered Proms tradition is finding fault. Usual ritual rants: not enough women composers, too much "new" music like that dangerous Stravinsky. My beef is embarrassingly incompetent presenters. Of course the Proms aren't perfect. But think of the sheer logistics of organizing a series like this, which features many of the biggest names in the business, and orchestras from all round the world. Impossible to get everything right all the time.  The fun of the Proms is that it stumbles on regardless and somehow pleases most of the people most of the time, which is more than can be said for many things.

Silly season - but it's good because people relax and let their hair down. Or up, if you're a woman and it's hot. Because it gets very hot indeed in that Victorian dome. Plus 6000 people emanating body heat. Just be glad that we're not Victorians. Nowadays people shower, wear loose (washed) clothes and use deodorants. Victorians didn't.

And if it's not baking, it's storm conditions. Which are OK, except when the queue snakes round the block for hours beforehand. This weekend, with three blockbusters in a row, those queues are going to happen.  Which connects to another Proms custom, the Bivouac.

If we're going to camp out, we'll do it in style, complete with fold up chairs, parasols, picnic baskets big enough to feed thousands! OTOH, the food is atrocious and over priced. Admittedly you can't make money with summer only restaurants, but all others in the vicinity are poor. And don't forget the fold up bikes, and near Last Night, the flags, banners and silly hats. Some of my friends wear DJs and evening gowns, but that's part of the fun, too, sort of ironic, post modern. Irreverence is a good thing!

Really Sacred Myth. The idea that those in the arena are somehow superior "real" fans. Some do go every single night and have been doing it for decades and a lot of this tribe really do know their music as well as the orchestras. In fact several are "in" orchestras when they're not in the arena. But the myth has snowballed and taken on a life of its own. No, going to every concert isn't necessarily a sign of knowledge. Sometimes it's OCD. And often, the best acoustic isn't down there, muffled by bodies.  So non-arenarees, don't feel intimidated  The arena is tremendous fun for many reasons, but  does not confer divine status

The Proms brings out an aspect of Englishness that is hard to describe. In the US it's known as Nerd. But affectionate nerd, for the most part. Although there are lots of silly "rules" like chanting, sitting in sacred spots, status issues, and death threats if you jump a queue, etc. there's also a noble purpose. The Proms raise huge funds for musical charities. It's not just for show. When you pop money into those buckets, it's appreciated. Dedicated counters stay up for hours, checking all is above board and the money goes where it's due. It's a serious business that deserves respect.

Yet how many Proms traditions are really as ancient as we think they are? That's one of the reasons why they're doing a recreation of a 1910 Prom, so we can experience the difference. Things don't always stay the same. We might even, one day,  be able to live with the Last Night exported to Wembley Stadium, its natural home. 

Please see my pieces on the Proms in July,  and August and September.  I'll be writing lots, but not slavish churning out. I usually do about 40, only ones I can say something  original about. I have a life beyond the Proms!  Please come back, subscribe, bookmark.  And always, HAVE FUN!
Photo credit

The postman knocks....

The other day, my postman delivered a parcel from a big European opera house, complete with fancy logo and wrapping.  "Fantastic stuff, opera!" he said, "I'm hooked!". He told me he'd been watching Tony Pappano's series Opera Italia on BBC TV4 which can be watched online, on demand, everywhere for 2 more weeks, and a new one coming up soon. With a recommendation like that, how could anyone resist? So I hurried to watch. Yes, my postman is right!  This really is wonderful. Pappano's a natural communicator, he makes you feel how he feels, draws you in and makes you care almost as passionately as he does. He communicates. So what if "clever folk" already know the material. Pappano's enthusiasm makes you want to delve further into the subject. In the long term that's much more important. Recommended!

In complete contrast, steer clear of the Wagner show also on offer. I watched that because there was a publicity shot of Alice Sommer Herz, but didn't get that far as I switched it off, thoroughly sickened by Stephen Fry.  Here, the presenter is the subject, which itself is irrelevant except as it promotes the presenter's ego. "Oooh" says Fry, "I can't believe it, they're letting me play Wagner's piano" Honey, it's high profile BBC TV, of course they'll let you. But that can be excused.

Far worse is the crass exploitation of the Holocaust. Everyone's interested in that subject, so as long as you create a connection, you get viewers, even if the actual product has marginal connection. Sorry, but to me it's immoral to use the dead for personal gain. Maybe to others this is OK, but to me it's not.

If this had been a serious look at how Wagner connects to Hitler, it would have been reasonable, but this was just cynical exploitation.  Barely above the level of dirty minded Nudge nudge, wink, wink, count the money as it rolls in. I've long admired Alice Sommer Herz, so I couldn't bear to see her used like this. Perhaps what she really said was heavily edited.  A friend watched to the bitter end and said that Alice had said things like "I wouldn't sit thru 5 hours of Wagner",  and "You listen, I won't". Alice is 106 years old, she's heard it all before. She's still sharp as a tack, and has no time to waste. Most revealingly, when asked if they'd played Wagner in Theresienstadt, she snapped, "We didn't have a Wagner sized orchestra". At one stroke, Fry's pander is punctured.

Mahler in Manchester Mondays

Mahler, Manchester, Monday - ten weeks of Mahler from Manchester's Bridgewater Hall will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 over the next ten weeks. Various conductors traverse the whole sequence 1-10.

Last week Gianandrea Noseda conducted the First Symphony.  Noseda's been conducting the Manchester-based BBC Philharmonic for nearly 10 years now, so this was as good a performance as you'd get from a team so used to working together.  The concert was hyped by an obsequious presenter on the BBC last week, so I refused to listen until a trusted friend told me how much she'd enjoyed it. And yes, it was very good! Not one for the ages, but very well paced, lively, lucid, a sense of freedom and even smiling good humour. Even the big cataclysm came off with  a sense of irony, which is good. When you're young, you pride yourself on defeating monsters. How could you be a "Titan" unless you can prove something? So the more hyper the drama, the better, even if it's nothing like the real dramas of life to come. The point is that glorious, exhilarating finale, which Noseda and the BBC Phil  did with great panache. Indeed, one of the best Noseda performances I've heard.

Tonight, Markus Stenz conducts the Hallé in Mahler's 2nd Symphony, and next Monday, Vassily Sinaisky conducts Mahler 3 with the BBCPO. Hopefully, the BBC will use different presenters and speakers, and try not to aim the series at the lowest common denominator. Many people are completely new to Mahler, but not all. And for those new to the composer, that's all the more reason for commentary that's well informed and challenging,..

The "selling point" of this series is that each concert will be prefaced by a new commission, which is good. Marina Mahler, who does listen to a lot of new music, is quoted in the programme as saying "If you don't like new music, you don't understand Mahler". It's common sense.  All artists carry the past with them, but if they have any integrity they are original, they're saying something new.   Because there's so much money to be made from Mahler, there's pressure to repackage him as mainly "Romantic",  operatic, Wagnerian, because that sells better than new ever will. But this conveniently overlooks Mahler's interest in Schoenberg and other new music of his time. And the fact that he died aged only 50, cut off in his prime. What might he have done had he lived another 30 years?

Paired with Mahler 1 was Kurt Schwertsik's Nachtmusiken.  It's "Mahlerian" in the sense that it's a mix of different styles and images, but it's not very original. Mahler didn't do allusions  for their own sake. Allusions aren't the same as pastiche. Schwertsik's a pal of H K Gruber, but without the craziness that makes Gruber distinctive. Tonight Friedrich Cerha Like a Tragicomedy (Cerha was the man who completed Berg's Lulu). On broadcast, each concert is supplemented with live recordings of Mahler performances from all over Europe this year - not the usual standard commercial issues.