This past Saturday the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra was in town. The Pikey and I went and heard them.
Wow! We have a great orchestra ("Wow, what a terrific awwwdience!") here, but there's little that beats the calibre of those English kids sawing away.
The program:
Sibelius: Finlandia
Mozart: Concerto no. 5 for Violin ("Turkish")
Sibelius: Symphony no. 2
I guess you start by saying that the concert was awesome. Unfortunately it's going to be February before I go to a concert where there's no Mozart involved. I suppose I can live with that. The violin soloist, though, left a lot to be desired. There seemed to be a disagreement about pitch between her and the orchestra. It was painful and I winced a lot. Also it seemed that she played a little more romantically than one would like for Mozart and her tone was thin. Other than those things I guess she was pretty good! Oh.
Anyway, the Sibelius was all tremendous. For the budding film composers out there if you don't know Sibelius you should. This is especially true if you like Michael Kamen or James Horner. The brass section just rocked. Maybe a little out of balance. Just a smidge. Teeny tiny.
But still awesome.
What else does one say? It's the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, England's self-proclaimed "national orchestra". They're pretty much some of the best players on the planet. I guess, though, there's also a sense of complacency that goes with this particular territory because the concertmistress looked pretty bored much of the time. When she wasn't playing she was fidgeting with her brastrap or trying to clean out her nose. At least she used a tissue.
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