27 Apr evening concert: Bostridge's Britten Serenade

[LeMartinPecheur]

Well, what a completely amazing performance! Only trouble is: I'm really not sure whether I think it amazingly bad or amazing simpliciter

Such histrionic bending of words and pitch, weird accents, never a line delivered without point-making. Well worth hearing once but I'm really not rushing to buy IB's recording. And I can't really imagine BB relishing it either.

Others' views please!

Now, on to Elgar 3: safer ground here I hope

[Tony Halstead]

Well, what a completely amazing performance! Only trouble is: I'm really not sure whether I think it amazingly bad or amazing simpliciter

Such histrionic bending of words and pitch, weird accents, never a line delivered without point-making. Well worth hearing once but I'm really not rushing to buy IB's recording. And I can't really imagine BB relishing it either.

Others' views please!

Now, on to Elgar 3: safer ground here I hope

Oh dear oh dear, I missed it!
But, how was the horn (an equal protagonist!) playing?

[DracoM]

Am I the only one with a long term problem with Ian Bostridge's voice?

[Nevilevelis]

Am I the only one with a long term problem with Ian Bostridge's voice?

No! Allan Clayton is the one to hear these days!

[LeMartinPecheur]

Tony: the hornblower did a very good job IMO, bar a few tiny cracked notes which were well recovered. I should have studied him more, but Bostridge kept holding my attention, if not necessarily for positive reasons

Would strongly recommend anyone with an interest to Listen Again (or whatever it's called), but will be surprised if some do not reach swiftly for the Stop button. I'd be interested to hear views on the current state of IB's vocal chords and technique. Perhaps he had a bug, should have cancelled, but attempted to do much with little? But he certainly made some extraordinary noises!

[BBMmk2]

I forgot all about it! I haven't heard the Handel concert yet!

[Nevilevelis]

Tony: the hornblower did a very good job IMO, bar a few tiny cracked notes which were well recovered. I should have studied him more, but Bostridge kept holding my attention, if not necessarily for positive reasons

Would strongly recommend anyone with an interest to Listen Again (or whatever it's called), but will be surprised if some do not reach swiftly for the Stop button. I'd be interested to hear views on the current state of IB's vocal chords and technique. Perhaps he had a bug, should have cancelled, but attempted to do much with little? But he certainly made some extraordinary noises!

I am listening as I write. It's a welcome distraction, so forgive the inattentiveness.

Let me first say that I have sung this work with the ECO in the same concert as St Nicholas - insane! It went well, and the band were superb. It's very difficult and the vocal writing says much about Pears's technique and vocal gifts, which were unique and highly individual. So are Bostridge's, which I appreciate, but he has long since lost control, it seems to me. Often flat, squeezed, mannered phrasing and diction (mangled vowels), no line, too much crooning and poorly supported. He may have been ill or in recovery - there's a lot going around - but the strain at the top is familiar. I'm really not a fan (you may have gathered!), but he has a huge career and I don't, so... Some people love it. They are welcome to it.

I thought the horn player was very fine.

NVV

[Keraulophone]

No! Allan Clayton is the one to hear these days!

Agreed, and Richard Watkins is the superb horn player on his CD recording with the Aldeburgh Strings :

http://www.linnrecords.com/recording-britten-serenade-apollo-cd.aspx

[Richard Tarleton]

Am I the only one with a long term problem with Ian Bostridge's voice?

No

I saw him sing this live with BBC NOW in St Davids Cathedral around 20 years ago, Michael Thompson the horn player. Was not tempted to listen to this.

[Barbirollians]

A Marmite voice it seems . I have not heard him sing recently though I have heard him in concert quite a bit when younger . I recall a very good Schone Mullerin with Uchida at the piano at an Aldeburgh Festival and an outstanding performance of Our Hunting Fathers with Daniel Harding conducting I think the LSO also at Snape .

I am a fan certainly of him in youthful voice . His Schone Mullerin on Hyperion is outstanding IMO.

[ardcarp]

I am a fan certainly of him in youthful voice

Me too, Barbs, when he was a delightful, light, English lyrical tenor.
Coping with increasingly demanding repertoire...and with age...certainly changes a voice, and a singer has to work out his own means of voice production that will serve him under all circumstances.

I have just listened to the SFTH+S, expecting...after some of the above posts.....to hear a Florence Foster Jenkins of the tenor world. Far from it. I think Bostridge has worked out his own very distinctive interpretation of the piece. For instance in This ae nighte I think he was making it deliberately rough, harsh, medieval, to suit the incredible (anon) words. This involved some note-bending and at times uncouth sounds. Yes, I agree some of his high note were not floating, but c'est la vie.

As I've said ad nauseam before, it is terribly hard for any tenor to walk in Pears' footsteps. Each has to work out his own way.....what to keep and what to jettison from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ0ITqRBaE0

BTW, I thought the BBCSSO and horn player Christopher Parkes really inhabited the piece.

[ardcarp]

PS Listening to the above link (Pears/Brain/BBCSO) it is tempting to wonder why anyone else bothers! But that's the dilemma. I wonder if Mary Chambers is around, and whether she thinks anyone else comes close?

[teamsaint]

I listened to the concert, prompted by the OP,on some rather ordinary kit, with the question in my mind, " Would I have been disappointed if I had paid to hear the concert?"

Despite a few moments that were less than perfect, and one or two odd things that might have been down to the transmission chain, I don't think I would have come out disappointed, perhaps just wondering if he had indeed been getting over a cold or something. We do, after all, have to cut singers a bit of slack, given the nature of their craft.

Cards on the table though, I like his singing in general.

[Pulcinella]

Haven't listened to this performance, but I did hear him sing the piece live a few years ago, at my one and only (so far) visit to the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. From comments here it does sound as if he's putting his own mark on the piece: I remember the 'This ae night' being somewhat as ardcarp describes.

I'm with ts: I like his singing in general, though I am by no stretch of imagination a lieder fan, so have not heard him in Schubert etc; and I like it very much in some cases (The English Songbook, for example).

[ardcarp]

He 'won' BAL this week (Schuman Liederkreis). Bostridge at his best? See posts under Record Review.

http://www.for3.org/forums/showthread.php?16981-BaL-29-04-17-Schumann-Liederkreis-(Op-24)&p=617966#post617966