(no subject)
To step away from theatre for a moment (and also to step away from trying to update our website at work... my html skills are more or less at the "try it and see what breaks" stage) on Friday evening I went to see the Aurora Orchestra's latest New Moves concert at LSO St Lukes.
Before I talk about the actual concert though- it never ceases to amaze me how it takes very little to make someone feel welcome or unwelcome. LSO St Lukes has no sign at it's Old Street entrance (or none that I saw) and then you walk down the side of the building and I'm so glad there were other people there or I might well have walked round in circles. Immediately inside were some of the lovely Aurora people (who I worryingly now recognise) who got me my tickets etc but once I'd stepped past them there were two LSO staff members standing looking bored right where I needed to choose left or right and neither spoke to me or looked at me until I had to actually thrust my ticket in their face and then I got pointed right where I ended up in a staircase with no signs and no people so I guessed up (as I was in the balcony) which was correct but I then had to find someone and ask to work out that the toilets were right down at the bottom AND it turns out that's where the bar is where,a gain no signs, they apparently queue from one side rather than it just being an ordinary bar. Thankfully a very kind gentleman steered me right at the interval but LSO left a rather bad taste in my mouth I fear.
Which is a pity because the building itself and the concert hall are gorgeous and a wonderful venue and from my £12 seat in the balcony I had a perfect view!
But on to the, utterly fabulous, concert.
Battle- Aurora Orchestra New Moves @ LSO St Lukes
So "battle" was the theme that held this programme together but it held together a very wide variety of music which probably shouldn't have worked as well as it did...
Battalia- Biber Performed by a small subset of the evening's orchestra with no conductor I LOVED this. I'd never heard it befopre but Biber uses the instruments so cleverly to make the sounds of war. The Double Bass at one point had to curl a piece of paper under his strings to help turn into the drums and thenlater the cello & double bass seemed to be exchanging loud shots with their violent pizzacato.
Incidentally I should point at out this point that their conductor, Nicholas Collon, now has a hair rival the double bass player who is also really very pleasant to look at *g* (as I'm not at home with my programme I'll return later to add his name :-P)
String Quartet No. 3- Shostakovich (arr. Barshai) One of the things I love about Aurora concerts is that Nichoals Collon often gives a little... explanation before they begin or things to look out for for those of us who aren't so familiar with the music. Here for example he talked about he five subtitles for the movements
1.Blithe ignorance of the future cataclysm
2.Rumblings of unrest and anticipation
3.Forces of war unleashed
4.In memory of the dead
5.The eternal question: Why? And for what?
and how the piece was almost immediately banned.
This arrangement was for a small orchestra rather than a string quartet but again I very much enjoyed it- particularly the slide fro movement 4 into 5 with the yearning sound of the cellos.
INTERVAL
'Venus' from The Planets- Holst (arr. Farrington) So this was the one piece I did know! And they played it beautifully. From where I was sitting I could see quite a lot of the audience and watched as many of them were clearly entranced by the music- myself included.
Maxamorphosis- Julian Philips So this was the main reason I wanted to come to this concert- it's a collaboration between a composer (Julian Philips) and a choreographer (Mickaël ‘Marso’ Rivière) and was written for Max Baillie who is Principal Viola for Aurora. I say written for him- there can't be many Viola players who also happen to be trained dancers!
I think this is a piece that would only work live really. Max started curled over his Viola as the strings of the orchestra slowly grew and swelled and then he mimicked the other Viola before slowly starting to stand and move as he played and then a female dancer approached him and he moved from playing to dancing- pushing his bow against her neck. The whole thing was rather mesmerising and as two more male dancers entered it was a strange battle between Max the musician and Max the dancer?
I don't think any words of mine are ever going to explain it properly but it really was amazing.
After that we had a pause as Nicholas Collon was presented with a Critics Choice award <3 and then he grinned rather ruefully and said that he wasn't sure they'd still want to give it to him after the next piece...
This Means War- Chris Willis So this piece... even more than the last one my words are not going to be enough. It's a reworking of Mars from The Planets sort of only reworked as a battle between dance crews, between dancers and the orchestra and within the orchestra itself! The dancers were from B-Boy's Attic and Company Decalage plus Max <3
And oh... I'm actually sitting here grinning just remembering it. It started as Mars starts but slowly recorded voices and sounds of glass breaking filtered over the top of the orchestra (I'm still 90% certain I heard a Princess Bride "you killed my father prepare to die" quote in there but the orchestra haven't responded to my question on twitter) and then the dancers came in and had a dance off battle thing (IDK anything break dancing but they seemed very good?)
THEN Thomas Gould, Principla Violin, picked up an electric violin and started playing and out bounced Max Baillie who, it turns out, is also a Violinst (as well as a Viola player & a dancer) and we had duelling electric violins for a bit with the dancers egging them on and then Max danced a bit and then some of the brass instruments had a bit of a go and the whole thing was utterly ridiculous but also brilliant.
There wer some older people sitting next to me and as the piece ended the guy on the end near me turned and gave me the biggest grin- I'd been wondering if they'd think it was too weird or strange but everyone there loved it!
Aurora Orchestra, via the Horrible Histories Prom last year, are responsible for me rediscovering my love of classical music and orchestral music particularly and I'd definitely recommend hearing one of their concerts however familiar you are with classical music.
Before I talk about the actual concert though- it never ceases to amaze me how it takes very little to make someone feel welcome or unwelcome. LSO St Lukes has no sign at it's Old Street entrance (or none that I saw) and then you walk down the side of the building and I'm so glad there were other people there or I might well have walked round in circles. Immediately inside were some of the lovely Aurora people (who I worryingly now recognise) who got me my tickets etc but once I'd stepped past them there were two LSO staff members standing looking bored right where I needed to choose left or right and neither spoke to me or looked at me until I had to actually thrust my ticket in their face and then I got pointed right where I ended up in a staircase with no signs and no people so I guessed up (as I was in the balcony) which was correct but I then had to find someone and ask to work out that the toilets were right down at the bottom AND it turns out that's where the bar is where,a gain no signs, they apparently queue from one side rather than it just being an ordinary bar. Thankfully a very kind gentleman steered me right at the interval but LSO left a rather bad taste in my mouth I fear.
Which is a pity because the building itself and the concert hall are gorgeous and a wonderful venue and from my £12 seat in the balcony I had a perfect view!
But on to the, utterly fabulous, concert.
Battle- Aurora Orchestra New Moves @ LSO St Lukes
So "battle" was the theme that held this programme together but it held together a very wide variety of music which probably shouldn't have worked as well as it did...
Battalia- Biber Performed by a small subset of the evening's orchestra with no conductor I LOVED this. I'd never heard it befopre but Biber uses the instruments so cleverly to make the sounds of war. The Double Bass at one point had to curl a piece of paper under his strings to help turn into the drums and thenlater the cello & double bass seemed to be exchanging loud shots with their violent pizzacato.
Incidentally I should point at out this point that their conductor, Nicholas Collon, now has a hair rival the double bass player who is also really very pleasant to look at *g* (as I'm not at home with my programme I'll return later to add his name :-P)
String Quartet No. 3- Shostakovich (arr. Barshai) One of the things I love about Aurora concerts is that Nichoals Collon often gives a little... explanation before they begin or things to look out for for those of us who aren't so familiar with the music. Here for example he talked about he five subtitles for the movements
1.Blithe ignorance of the future cataclysm
2.Rumblings of unrest and anticipation
3.Forces of war unleashed
4.In memory of the dead
5.The eternal question: Why? And for what?
and how the piece was almost immediately banned.
This arrangement was for a small orchestra rather than a string quartet but again I very much enjoyed it- particularly the slide fro movement 4 into 5 with the yearning sound of the cellos.
INTERVAL
'Venus' from The Planets- Holst (arr. Farrington) So this was the one piece I did know! And they played it beautifully. From where I was sitting I could see quite a lot of the audience and watched as many of them were clearly entranced by the music- myself included.
Maxamorphosis- Julian Philips So this was the main reason I wanted to come to this concert- it's a collaboration between a composer (Julian Philips) and a choreographer (Mickaël ‘Marso’ Rivière) and was written for Max Baillie who is Principal Viola for Aurora. I say written for him- there can't be many Viola players who also happen to be trained dancers!
I think this is a piece that would only work live really. Max started curled over his Viola as the strings of the orchestra slowly grew and swelled and then he mimicked the other Viola before slowly starting to stand and move as he played and then a female dancer approached him and he moved from playing to dancing- pushing his bow against her neck. The whole thing was rather mesmerising and as two more male dancers entered it was a strange battle between Max the musician and Max the dancer?
I don't think any words of mine are ever going to explain it properly but it really was amazing.
After that we had a pause as Nicholas Collon was presented with a Critics Choice award <3 and then he grinned rather ruefully and said that he wasn't sure they'd still want to give it to him after the next piece...
This Means War- Chris Willis So this piece... even more than the last one my words are not going to be enough. It's a reworking of Mars from The Planets sort of only reworked as a battle between dance crews, between dancers and the orchestra and within the orchestra itself! The dancers were from B-Boy's Attic and Company Decalage plus Max <3
And oh... I'm actually sitting here grinning just remembering it. It started as Mars starts but slowly recorded voices and sounds of glass breaking filtered over the top of the orchestra (I'm still 90% certain I heard a Princess Bride "you killed my father prepare to die" quote in there but the orchestra haven't responded to my question on twitter) and then the dancers came in and had a dance off battle thing (IDK anything break dancing but they seemed very good?)
THEN Thomas Gould, Principla Violin, picked up an electric violin and started playing and out bounced Max Baillie who, it turns out, is also a Violinst (as well as a Viola player & a dancer) and we had duelling electric violins for a bit with the dancers egging them on and then Max danced a bit and then some of the brass instruments had a bit of a go and the whole thing was utterly ridiculous but also brilliant.
There wer some older people sitting next to me and as the piece ended the guy on the end near me turned and gave me the biggest grin- I'd been wondering if they'd think it was too weird or strange but everyone there loved it!
Aurora Orchestra, via the Horrible Histories Prom last year, are responsible for me rediscovering my love of classical music and orchestral music particularly and I'd definitely recommend hearing one of their concerts however familiar you are with classical music.