Skeletor's Postcard From the Edge

The Piano in Glasgow

Being a theatre writer, I proudly march into other areas of performance and shout that I understand exactly what is happening here. However, that review I did of Beethoven's First when I spent 500 words complaining that some guy got in the way of the orchestra and kept waving a stick at them might have destroyed my musicological credibility. Consequently, I now try and sit next to David Kettle and copy his notes at the interval. 

Anyway, if you want to see me make a fool of myself, the City Halls are putting on their annual Piano festival (it's year four and counting). I'll be somewhere at the back, hoping that there isn't too much of the difficult stuff... then I look at the programme and realise I might be okay...

Saturday 8 November


6PM ALASDAIR BEATSON & HEBRIDES ENSEMBLE
Judith Weir Arise! Arise!

Adès Piano Quintet
Schubert Notturno in E flat major, Op.148 (D.897)
Adès Darkness Visible

“Artistry incarnate – that was Beatson” Sunday Times
An outstanding pianist himself, Tom Adès writes wonderfully for the piano and his Piano Quintet is fantastical and brilliant. Not short on references to the grand Romantic tradition of piano quintets – Schubert, Brahms, Dvorák – it bristles with new ideas and possibilities. The wonderful young Scottish pianist Alasdair Beatson joins Hebrides Ensemble for this special performance.

Well, I am sure to spot the references.

Recital Room, City Halls (unreserved seating)
7.30PM DENIS KOZHUKHIN
Haydn Sonata in D, Hob.XVI:24
Schubert Sonata in D major, D.850
Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition

“flawless technique, combined with a healthy musical approach, intense lyricism and a beautiful touch.” Trouw (The Netherlands)

Denis Kozhukhin is no stranger to Glasgow having thrilled audiences with his stunning performances of Prokofiev and Rachmaninov concertos in recent seasons. We’re delighted to present his debut recital of Classical and Romantic favourites, with Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition delivering a mighty climax:

“… in Kozhukhin’s hand it rose to the final peroration with magnificent, unforced grandeur.” Daily Telegraph

I thought I would be okay with Haydn and Mussorgsky (they use Pictures to introduce classical music to the kids, sometimes). But I have no idea what a peroration is. David?

Grand Hall, City Halls (reserved seating)


SUNDAY 9 NOVEMBER

3PM KATYA APEKISHEVA

Scarlatti Sonatas in F minor Kk.466, E Kk.380 and B minor Kk.377

Janácek In the Mists

Schumann Faschingsschwank aus Wien, Op.26

“a profoundly gifted artist” Gramophone

A prizewinner at the Scottish International Piano Competition, Apekisheva has forged a multi-faceted career as soloist and chamber musician. This solo recital juxtaposes the brilliance and poise of Scarlatti with Janácek’s passionate miniatures and Schumann’s Viennese Carnival scenes.

Recital Room, City Halls (unreserved seating)





5PM ELISABETH LEONSKAJA & EMERSON STRING QUARTET

Shostakovich Piano Sonata No.2 in B minor, Op.61

Beethoven Quartet No.11 in F minor, Op.95, ‘Serioso’

Shostakovich Piano Quintet in G minor, Op.57

“The popularity of mercurial Elisabeth Leonskaja… has never been higher, perhaps because she is one of “the last of the great Russian school”” Sean Rafferty, Bach Track

Hang on, is there really a magazine called Bach Track? 

One of the world’s greatest pianists teams up with one of the greatest quartets for an unmissable pairing of Shostakovich and Beethoven. Georgian pianist, Elisabeth Leonskaja was rewarded with a standing ovation in 2012. Here she plays music very close to her heart due to her strong association with Shostakovich and his music, not least his hugely popular Piano Quintet.

I'll be fine here: I like Shostakovich. I can hunt for clues about the pressure of Soviet censorship during the quiet parts... and he is one of those relatively modern composers who can do all the fancy technical stuff, but still likes a good tune. A Russian tune, so pretty tough, but I can dig it.
Grand Hall, City Halls (reserved seating)

This is just the first weekend. I am going to continue you this as soon as I find my Idiot's Guide to Classical Music.

Quartet for the End of Time

I have just been reading Sophie's World in the bath. Rushing quickly past the image I have just conjured up for your repulsion, I got as far as the bit where they talk about the difference between Time in Hindu and Semitic culture. Apparently the Hindu model - adopted by most early Indo-European civilisations - sees it as circular. The Jewish innovation was to go lineal. The circle versus the straight line... and the impact this has on the way that we think about existence.

So, I went to see Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time (Hebrides Ensemble), with a special introduction by former bishop Richard Holloway. Messiaen was firmly in the lineal school - I am always surprised that a composer so dissonant could be so Christian - and this composition was inspired, in equal measure, by The Apocalypse of St John and Messiaen's internment in a POW camp.

It's a nice touch, having a reflection before a concert. Of course, the programme notes help out idiots like me who want to talk about classical music but lack the theoretical foundations. But Holloway's brief chat tied in the Quartet to Blade Runner, the contrast between Christian and atheist visions of the End, TS Eliot, the horror of World War II and a multiple choice option of how to listen to the piece (either as a brave statement against a final existential nothing, or a hopeful reminder that God is going to sort it out afterwards).

The Quartet might be informed by readings of Revelation, but The End Times it references are very much the vicious antics of WWII. There is a clarinet solo that honks a bombing raid, a violin and cello imitating birds as they scatter, and a whacking great piano part that slaps the rest of the instruments like a big daddy gangster on his mooks. It is not so much a meditation on the moment when Time stop for good (Sophie's World didn't say, but I think that the end of time will involve the Space-Time continuum being rolled up and put in the cupboard of eternity): it's a musical picture of an apocalyptic period of history, written from behind the barbed wire.

Uncomfortable art has been doing the rounds lately - pair this with Ann Liv Young's Mermaid show, and I am starting to feel as if Glasgow is hosting a series of philosophical, theatrical punch ups. And I did feel uncomfortable during the Quartet - the clarinet feels uniquely suited to acting out the annoying pricks of anxiety, and Messiaen's messing with the rhythm patterns (no, I don't understand how he does it, but I did hear it. Honest) is disorientating. On the way home, this gave me plenty of pondering about why I attend art - it isn't like my life is some cheery sequence of cartoon happy episodes - and what I want from music.

That's the sort of navel gazing I avoid in the bath by reading novels that pretend to be a history of philosophy, and so back to Sophie's World. And back to Time: and the dishonesty of talking about it. Yes, it might be circular, it might be lineal. To find out, I am going to have to get outside of it, and I am not sure how to do that without getting stuck there. Music does seem to have ways of suspending my perception of Time - those Fluxus numbers at Minimal Extreme encourages me to pretend I was falling into a Black Hole and the songs were a simple statement examined from multiple angles, simultaneously.The Quartet is a seminal work of WWII, and has an appropriate ugliness.