Friday, April 15, 2011

Plane Ticket Wanted, or Maybe I Should Swim

I was not planning a trip to London this year, and certainly not during high tourist season, but the Proms will include a performance of Havergal Brian's Gothic Symphony, and when will there ever be another chance to hear that one live?

Other highlights include a performance of Guillaume Tell, Berlioz's arrangement with French translation of Der Freischutz, and a lot of recent music. Get whole story here.

15 comments:

Doundou Tchil said...

Drool more. There is a new joint BBC/Radio France commission of Pascal Dusapin, a concerto for String Quartet and large orchestra. Not just any old string quartet but the Arditti's ! Opera wise, apart from the French Freischutz and Glyndebourne Rinaldo, it's not a par
b on last year when we had Placido in Simon Bocc and Terfel in Meistersinger. Every single Prom is online on demand internationally for 7 days and often repeated during the year. So you won't miss out apart from The Gothic which will be an experience to be at even if it won't change the world as music. I think it will be on TV tho' only Europe. More proof that public broadcasting is a sign of civilization.

Lisa Hirsch said...

Yes...well, being there IS different!

Anonymous said...

Holy bleep. Yes, I would go to the Gothic, if I were anywhere around. Perhaps at least we can listen to the broadcast online afterwards. It's got to be better than the Marco Polo recording.

Lisa Hirsch said...

I'm seriously debating a crazy short trip to London.

Doundou Tchil said...

That Naxos CD is like squeezing yje universe into a soup can. And thi8s year is dull compared to last year whenn the lines for returns went round the block and guys were selling tix for Simon Bocc at £400 (even fully staged at rthe Royal Opera House they were max £250 Gu7ess the alternative is to have a party in a place where yoiu can turn the radio full blast til the walls shake !

Daniel Wolf said...

Take the trip, Lisa. You deserve the indulgence and we'd love to read your report.

Lisa Hirsch said...

Ahaha, the enablers arrive!!

Joe Barron said...

Well, I once went all the way to Minnestoa for a Carter festival. I mean, Christ &#8212 Minnisota. And there was a woman there who had come from Australia.

As Bart would say, go for it, Lise. A vacation is a vacation, and where else would you have such a good time, doing what you really want to do? Forget that it's a titotal waste of money. You deserve this.

Lisa Hirsch said...

What is this "deserve" of which you speak? I think everybody deserves certain things - a roof over their head, food, medical care, access to art, work, to be treated decently by people and systems. Expensive oversees vacations? Not so much.

I love London, but there are multiple less expensive ways to see a few concerts or operas than traveling there: Music@Menlo, which is in my back yard, Santa Fe Opera (for Griselda and Wozzeck), the Bard Music Festival.

Joe Barron said...

O, reason not the need: our basest beggars
Are in the poorest thing superfluous:
Allow not nature more than nature needs,
Man's life's as cheap as beast's: thou art a lady;
If only to go warm were gorgeous,
Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear'st,
Which scarcely keeps thee warm.

Lisa Hirsch said...

Is King Lear a good source of advice? :)

Joe Barron said...

A damned sight better than Goneril or Regan ...

Lisa Hirsch said...

Ha!

Well, I'm keeping an eye on plane fares. If they drop under a thousand R/T, maybe I'll go.

Henry Holland said...

Lisa, in 2011-12 Hamburg is doing a new production of Reimann's incredible Lear and Frankfurt is doing a revival of their production that was released on CD last year, so there you go!

Lisa Hirsch said...

You jest - there are going to be two productions of Lear in the same season, and not that far apart???

I am about to faint.