Santa Rosa Symphony 5/16
My thoughts:
Wagner: boring. They just didn't commit. Brass was way sloppy.
Ravel: Much more life. Soloist was A-OK. Brass was still kind of bugging me.
Messiaen: This seriously pissed me off. They had some scholar talk for what felt like hours before the piece. That's what program notes are for. If I wanted a lecture, I would have gone to one. It completely interreupted the program and by the time they actually started the piece, I was just bored. And angry that the experience had been ruined before it even started. They seriously beat it to death before it even had a chance. And I LIKE that piece of music, and it's really rare to see a regional orchestra play stuff like that so I felt really lucky to see it performed. They just blew it by inserting this extended talk with tons of examples. It was a good performance for such a difficult piece, but the lecture was a huge programming mistake. It was completely unnecessary. Don't assume your audience isn't going to "get it" unless they have it explained to them in detail. Just let the music speak for itself. In the end, it was really great to see that music performed, but the talking was seriously detrimental. Big mistake.
Wagner: boring. They just didn't commit. Brass was way sloppy.
Ravel: Much more life. Soloist was A-OK. Brass was still kind of bugging me.
Messiaen: This seriously pissed me off. They had some scholar talk for what felt like hours before the piece. That's what program notes are for. If I wanted a lecture, I would have gone to one. It completely interreupted the program and by the time they actually started the piece, I was just bored. And angry that the experience had been ruined before it even started. They seriously beat it to death before it even had a chance. And I LIKE that piece of music, and it's really rare to see a regional orchestra play stuff like that so I felt really lucky to see it performed. They just blew it by inserting this extended talk with tons of examples. It was a good performance for such a difficult piece, but the lecture was a huge programming mistake. It was completely unnecessary. Don't assume your audience isn't going to "get it" unless they have it explained to them in detail. Just let the music speak for itself. In the end, it was really great to see that music performed, but the talking was seriously detrimental. Big mistake.