Edinburgh festivals, etc.
I said I'd post something about the Edinburgh festival: thoughts or impressions or some piece of writing vaguely inspired by the festival or an incident I was a part of while there. Well, I've been sitting on it for a month, and nothing is coming, and nothing looks likely to come; and I'm not feeling the urge to say anything of this sort, or the urge to have the urge to say anything. So here's a list of things I attended, in reverse chronological order. I will elaborate on request; things in bold are particularly noteworthy, which means that, if you see this person/group/piece playing/performing/being performed near you, consider him/her/them/it recommended.
- Joanna Newsom. I actually saw her in Glasgow on the 20th, with Brendan, well after returning from the festival. She gave a great performance. The orchestration was different, of course - it was just Ryan Francesconi on guitar/banjo/tambura/kaval, Neal Morgan on drums, two violinists, an excellent trombonist, and Newsom - but the songs were pretty similar to the recordings. Morgan blew me away, as usual - his taste and imagination is astounding. I bought his CD, which I've yet to understand, so I won't comment on it, beyond saying that it's for drums and voices throughout, which makes it possibly the album in my collection with the strangest instrumentation.
In the actual festival:
- Hélène Grimaux with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Vladimir Ashkenazy playing Ravel's Piano Concerto in G, Sibelius's Rakastave (really good!), and some Richard Strauss.
- Steven Osborne: A concert of lots of small jazzy pieces; Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag, Kapustin préludes, an improvisation, Gershwin préludes, etc.
- The Royal Concertgebuow under Mariss Jansons: Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments and Firebird Suite, four Dédicaciones by Berio, and Bartók's Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta. This was an amazing programme!
- Some late-night free musical comedy.
- James Crabb & James Vassilev: tango music. Crabb, on accordion, was good; Vassilev, on classical/flamenco guitar, played with all the expression and sensitivity of a plank and ruined everything.
- Kevin Bridges: a young Scottish comedian (23?) who acts like he's 50 and looks like he's 30.
- Alasdair Beatson played a number of concerts in the Royal Overseas League (ROSL). He played Schumann, Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Mozart... He is an amazing performer, who plays hunched over with his feet bouncing around and oblivious to everything; he talked once or twice between pieces, to introduce them, and he was painfully shy and fidgety. So, needless to say, he played with incredible music; everything he did sounded beautiful. I liked Mendelssohn and Mozart for the first time when he played them. All the things which are clichés under poor hands make perfect sense under his. I think he'll be a really big deal when he's built up a reputation (he's still quite young). He has a CD out; opus 1s of Schumann, Brahms and Berg, I think. He has another one coming out: Mendelssohn.
- Bartók, Schubert and Janáĉek string quartets in the ROSL, performed by the Solstice String Quartet, who are, I guess alright. They also played Beethoven in another of their ROSL concerts.
- Rhod Gilbert: a Welsh comedian.
- The Royal Scottish National Symphony Orchestra under Stephane Denève, playing Ravel's l'Heure Espagnole, a good fun opera (in which, at one point near the end, the conductor spun around on his podium to make a shout, as the score apparently suggested), Chabrier's España (awesome piece), and Ibert's Escales.
- A Book Festival discussion on the ability of computer games to contain great stories. The interlocutors were Steven Poole, Trevor Byrne and Naomi Alderman; the chair was Charlie Fletcher.
- Ben Schoeman played a few concerts in the ROSL; the one that stuck with me was the one in which he played Busoni's piano transcription of Bach's Chaconne in D minor. Schoeman is a fine pianist, though no Beatson, but that Chaconne is one of the best pieces I've ever heard; in transcription at any rate (I don't know the violin original).
- Roger Scruton gave a talk at the Book Festival about the value of pessimism in politics or something.
- Are You There?: A play the set of which was done by a fellow student.
- Tabú: A very energetic acrobatic circus thing, with live band and everything (with great polymathetmatic musicians playing original music - even the bassist was polymathematic, and picked up a trumpet at one point!).
- Prue Leith, Allan Massie and Stephen Poliakoff read writings from authors who were, or who died while, imprisoned for political reasons in an Amnesty International Book Festival event.
- Will Pickvance & Friends: a late-night cabaret thing in a coffee shop.
- Marek Kohn and Fred Pearce, two pop-science writers, talked about, respectively, what Britain will look like in 2100 given current climate change rates, and that there is no more need to worry about an ever-increasing world population, as the world rate of children-per-mother is 2.6, only slightly above the replacement rate of 2.3, and dropping. The real problem, Pearce went on to say, is that we are consuming ever more, and it is to this problem that we should be directing our thoughts and money.
- The Kronos Quartet: They played Reich's Different Trains, a première by a middle-eastern composer, Crumb's Black Angels, and the weirdest encore I've ever heard: a piece of cheesy film music, complete with full-orchestral backing through the PA. Drums and electric bass and everything.
- John Bishop: A Liverpudlian comedian/raconteur.
- An abysmal local blues/jazz band in The Jazz Bar.
- Josie Long: A comedian who jokes about the internet and science, and who really cares about being earnest and moral. She's really, really unusual, but(/therefore?) very good.
- Anatomy Act: A student play, in which four actors played four aspects of one person.
- The Brodowski Quartet played a few concerts in the ROSL. They played a concert of Piazzolla, Shostakovich and Shulhoff (whose 'Five Pieces for String Quartet' is superb!), and did great, great things with these pieces; but when they tried to do Mozart and Haydn, they played arrogantly and insensitively. They also played Tchaikovsky's first string quartet, which is over-excited and simple like they are, and they did it very well too.
- Andrew Lawrence: A British stand-up. A bit pseudo-intellectual, but does a good job of being jaded-but-yet-hopeful.
- A New Zealand-based piano trio played a few concerts in the ROSL too; they were great in many ways, but musically not delicate enough. For example: the 'cellist played Bach's played sixth 'cello suite, and played almost every note perfectly, but hardly rested on the important notes at all. It was mechanical, and really rather unsatisfying.
- The Cleveland Orchestra under Franz Welser-Möst: Played some Ives and Bruckner's Eighth, in an early version. I don't think my seat was good enough to get a good impression, but one of the Ives pieces was for four sets of tubular bells in different keys, a trumpet and a trombone. And that was damn cool.
- The Tallis Scholars: Beautiful plainchant and choral music, performed by one of the best ensembles in the world, which, sadly, went straight over my head.
- A recording of the radio show Just a Minute: This is a BBC comedy quiz show, and one of the funniest shows in the world. The recording of the show I attended was one of the most mirthful hours I've spent in my life. The panellists were Paul Merton, Shappi Khorsandi, Giles Brandreth and John Bishop. The chair was some famous comedian. All of them had great wit and speed and joy.
- Porgy & Bess: The Gershwin opera. Which was sung in full operatic mode; hearing 'Summertime' in the opera voice is weird, and, I'm pretty sure, objectively bad taste. And I couldn't hear a word, and there was no programme; so the opera was meaningless to me.
- Fiesta Criolla: A troupe after the Renaissance/medieval style, I guess. They played music from Mexico of this era. They were superb, but they played in a church, up into the rafters of which went the strong and precise rhythm. They played really good, lively music; but they should've been playing in a small venue. And possibly 500 years ago.
- Too Much Culture: A terrible comedy show I left halfway through.
- Ardal O'Hanlon: The Irish comedian who play Dougal in Father Ted. Very good, if a bit self-censored.
- Ferdinand Mound gave a Book Festival talk on the similarities between modern-day and Classical Greek culture. (They're a lot more similar than has been given credit, was his thesis.) I have no idea why I went.
- Seymour Mace: A fierce rude and angry (and possibly drunk) comedian, who nonetheless managed to create an inclusive and mirthful atmosphere in his tiny venue. He played at something like 11:40pm. I doubt he'd've been allowed play any earlier.
- Rhapsodies in Red, White and Blue (I forget which orchestra (and didn't write it down. Why?)): They played the original jazz-band version of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, which was fun. The tuba player doubled on the string bass. This was super-weird. Did Gershwin write in the score that these instruments are to be played by the same person? Why? Why did anyone listen? Or, if he didn't, is it just a really happy coincidence that there's never tuba and string bass playing at the same time, and that the orchestra happened to have someone who could play both these instruments, and so they decided to save on wages by just having him play both? Weird weird weird. They also played Ives's fourth symphony and a weird patriotic Copland piece.
- John Adams's 'El Niño': I really loved this oratorio thing. Adams's colours are frequently incredibly beautiful, and some of his ideas and ways of looking at orchestrating lines are just genius. He doesn't always get it right, but he does do fascinating and original things all the time.
- Shappi Khorsandi: Comedian who normally talks about politics, but who talked about her just-finishing divorce this year.
- Tenchi Simmei: A Japanese martial art which looks an awful lot like music. It involves hitting drums, but the appearance, how you hold yourself, and so on, are all also important parts of the art; which is what makes it not simply music, I suppose. In any case, it was very good, even if the banter between pieces was embarrassingly bad.
- Gyles Brandreth: a comedian/raconteur and ex-Conservative MP.
- Fascinating Aida: a comedy cabaret troupe. All three members are female. There's something in the way they use, or don't use, or knowingly use, their femininity, which is really delightful. They're also some of the best comedians I've ever seen. And their political witticisms in the style of traditional Bulgarian choral music is one of the best appropriations I can imagine there to be.
- Joanna Newsom. I actually saw her in Glasgow on the 20th, with Brendan, well after returning from the festival. She gave a great performance. The orchestration was different, of course - it was just Ryan Francesconi on guitar/banjo/tambura/kaval, Neal Morgan on drums, two violinists, an excellent trombonist, and Newsom - but the songs were pretty similar to the recordings. Morgan blew me away, as usual - his taste and imagination is astounding. I bought his CD, which I've yet to understand, so I won't comment on it, beyond saying that it's for drums and voices throughout, which makes it possibly the album in my collection with the strangest instrumentation.
In the actual festival:
- Hélène Grimaux with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Vladimir Ashkenazy playing Ravel's Piano Concerto in G, Sibelius's Rakastave (really good!), and some Richard Strauss.
- Steven Osborne: A concert of lots of small jazzy pieces; Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag, Kapustin préludes, an improvisation, Gershwin préludes, etc.
- The Royal Concertgebuow under Mariss Jansons: Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind Instruments and Firebird Suite, four Dédicaciones by Berio, and Bartók's Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta. This was an amazing programme!
- Some late-night free musical comedy.
- James Crabb & James Vassilev: tango music. Crabb, on accordion, was good; Vassilev, on classical/flamenco guitar, played with all the expression and sensitivity of a plank and ruined everything.
- Kevin Bridges: a young Scottish comedian (23?) who acts like he's 50 and looks like he's 30.
- Alasdair Beatson played a number of concerts in the Royal Overseas League (ROSL). He played Schumann, Brahms, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Mendelssohn, Mozart... He is an amazing performer, who plays hunched over with his feet bouncing around and oblivious to everything; he talked once or twice between pieces, to introduce them, and he was painfully shy and fidgety. So, needless to say, he played with incredible music; everything he did sounded beautiful. I liked Mendelssohn and Mozart for the first time when he played them. All the things which are clichés under poor hands make perfect sense under his. I think he'll be a really big deal when he's built up a reputation (he's still quite young). He has a CD out; opus 1s of Schumann, Brahms and Berg, I think. He has another one coming out: Mendelssohn.
- Bartók, Schubert and Janáĉek string quartets in the ROSL, performed by the Solstice String Quartet, who are, I guess alright. They also played Beethoven in another of their ROSL concerts.
- Rhod Gilbert: a Welsh comedian.
- The Royal Scottish National Symphony Orchestra under Stephane Denève, playing Ravel's l'Heure Espagnole, a good fun opera (in which, at one point near the end, the conductor spun around on his podium to make a shout, as the score apparently suggested), Chabrier's España (awesome piece), and Ibert's Escales.
- A Book Festival discussion on the ability of computer games to contain great stories. The interlocutors were Steven Poole, Trevor Byrne and Naomi Alderman; the chair was Charlie Fletcher.
- Ben Schoeman played a few concerts in the ROSL; the one that stuck with me was the one in which he played Busoni's piano transcription of Bach's Chaconne in D minor. Schoeman is a fine pianist, though no Beatson, but that Chaconne is one of the best pieces I've ever heard; in transcription at any rate (I don't know the violin original).
- Roger Scruton gave a talk at the Book Festival about the value of pessimism in politics or something.
- Are You There?: A play the set of which was done by a fellow student.
- Tabú: A very energetic acrobatic circus thing, with live band and everything (with great polymathetmatic musicians playing original music - even the bassist was polymathematic, and picked up a trumpet at one point!).
- Prue Leith, Allan Massie and Stephen Poliakoff read writings from authors who were, or who died while, imprisoned for political reasons in an Amnesty International Book Festival event.
- Will Pickvance & Friends: a late-night cabaret thing in a coffee shop.
- Marek Kohn and Fred Pearce, two pop-science writers, talked about, respectively, what Britain will look like in 2100 given current climate change rates, and that there is no more need to worry about an ever-increasing world population, as the world rate of children-per-mother is 2.6, only slightly above the replacement rate of 2.3, and dropping. The real problem, Pearce went on to say, is that we are consuming ever more, and it is to this problem that we should be directing our thoughts and money.
- The Kronos Quartet: They played Reich's Different Trains, a première by a middle-eastern composer, Crumb's Black Angels, and the weirdest encore I've ever heard: a piece of cheesy film music, complete with full-orchestral backing through the PA. Drums and electric bass and everything.
- John Bishop: A Liverpudlian comedian/raconteur.
- An abysmal local blues/jazz band in The Jazz Bar.
- Josie Long: A comedian who jokes about the internet and science, and who really cares about being earnest and moral. She's really, really unusual, but(/therefore?) very good.
- Anatomy Act: A student play, in which four actors played four aspects of one person.
- The Brodowski Quartet played a few concerts in the ROSL. They played a concert of Piazzolla, Shostakovich and Shulhoff (whose 'Five Pieces for String Quartet' is superb!), and did great, great things with these pieces; but when they tried to do Mozart and Haydn, they played arrogantly and insensitively. They also played Tchaikovsky's first string quartet, which is over-excited and simple like they are, and they did it very well too.
- Andrew Lawrence: A British stand-up. A bit pseudo-intellectual, but does a good job of being jaded-but-yet-hopeful.
- A New Zealand-based piano trio played a few concerts in the ROSL too; they were great in many ways, but musically not delicate enough. For example: the 'cellist played Bach's played sixth 'cello suite, and played almost every note perfectly, but hardly rested on the important notes at all. It was mechanical, and really rather unsatisfying.
- The Cleveland Orchestra under Franz Welser-Möst: Played some Ives and Bruckner's Eighth, in an early version. I don't think my seat was good enough to get a good impression, but one of the Ives pieces was for four sets of tubular bells in different keys, a trumpet and a trombone. And that was damn cool.
- The Tallis Scholars: Beautiful plainchant and choral music, performed by one of the best ensembles in the world, which, sadly, went straight over my head.
- A recording of the radio show Just a Minute: This is a BBC comedy quiz show, and one of the funniest shows in the world. The recording of the show I attended was one of the most mirthful hours I've spent in my life. The panellists were Paul Merton, Shappi Khorsandi, Giles Brandreth and John Bishop. The chair was some famous comedian. All of them had great wit and speed and joy.
- Porgy & Bess: The Gershwin opera. Which was sung in full operatic mode; hearing 'Summertime' in the opera voice is weird, and, I'm pretty sure, objectively bad taste. And I couldn't hear a word, and there was no programme; so the opera was meaningless to me.
- Fiesta Criolla: A troupe after the Renaissance/medieval style, I guess. They played music from Mexico of this era. They were superb, but they played in a church, up into the rafters of which went the strong and precise rhythm. They played really good, lively music; but they should've been playing in a small venue. And possibly 500 years ago.
- Too Much Culture: A terrible comedy show I left halfway through.
- Ardal O'Hanlon: The Irish comedian who play Dougal in Father Ted. Very good, if a bit self-censored.
- Ferdinand Mound gave a Book Festival talk on the similarities between modern-day and Classical Greek culture. (They're a lot more similar than has been given credit, was his thesis.) I have no idea why I went.
- Seymour Mace: A fierce rude and angry (and possibly drunk) comedian, who nonetheless managed to create an inclusive and mirthful atmosphere in his tiny venue. He played at something like 11:40pm. I doubt he'd've been allowed play any earlier.
- Rhapsodies in Red, White and Blue (I forget which orchestra (and didn't write it down. Why?)): They played the original jazz-band version of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, which was fun. The tuba player doubled on the string bass. This was super-weird. Did Gershwin write in the score that these instruments are to be played by the same person? Why? Why did anyone listen? Or, if he didn't, is it just a really happy coincidence that there's never tuba and string bass playing at the same time, and that the orchestra happened to have someone who could play both these instruments, and so they decided to save on wages by just having him play both? Weird weird weird. They also played Ives's fourth symphony and a weird patriotic Copland piece.
- John Adams's 'El Niño': I really loved this oratorio thing. Adams's colours are frequently incredibly beautiful, and some of his ideas and ways of looking at orchestrating lines are just genius. He doesn't always get it right, but he does do fascinating and original things all the time.
- Shappi Khorsandi: Comedian who normally talks about politics, but who talked about her just-finishing divorce this year.
- Tenchi Simmei: A Japanese martial art which looks an awful lot like music. It involves hitting drums, but the appearance, how you hold yourself, and so on, are all also important parts of the art; which is what makes it not simply music, I suppose. In any case, it was very good, even if the banter between pieces was embarrassingly bad.
- Gyles Brandreth: a comedian/raconteur and ex-Conservative MP.
- Fascinating Aida: a comedy cabaret troupe. All three members are female. There's something in the way they use, or don't use, or knowingly use, their femininity, which is really delightful. They're also some of the best comedians I've ever seen. And their political witticisms in the style of traditional Bulgarian choral music is one of the best appropriations I can imagine there to be.