Tuesday 30 May 2000 Victoria Concert Hall	Virtuoso Violinists Series/Beethoven Symphony Cycle
	Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770-1827) Symphony No.6 in F major, op.68 "Pastoral" Pyotr Il'lyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1875-1937) Violin Concerto in D major, op.35 Jimmy LIN Cho-Liang violin SHUI Lan conductor

OVERALL NOISE RATING: 1 (Very quiet.)

The Noise Rating Index is a partially-objective measurement of pager and handphone blasts, 9pm and 10pm watch beeps, coughing-during-the-pianissimo-bits, intra-audience conversation and other mind-bogglingly inept noises emitted in the concert hall during actual performance of music. It is measured on a scale of 0 to 5, in increasing annoyance.

One of the last concerts of what has been a rather unpredictable season, and I'm sorry to say that I can't report better on this one. The chief disappointment was not, as perhaps expected, in the Beethoven (the Pastorale is one of the harder symphonies to 'pull off', much less do well - nothing to do with the collective standard of the SSO in Beethoven) but rather, amazingly, in the Tchaikovsky.

Beethoven's "Pastoral Symphony" received on the whole a very competent, and even enjoyable performance. Shui Lan's view of the work is probably in that of three parts (by far the most satisfactory to my mind) - the first two movements in a group, the next two in a group and the reverential last movement on its own.

Shui Lan elected to take a fastish tempo for the start of the first movement. This has its advantages and disadvantages, of course. If you choose to see the Sixth as a rather lightweight kind of piece, playing fast can bring out more of the cheerfulness and chirpiness of the piece; on the other hand the modified symphonic scale of the symphony, and the sheer length of the first movement and second movement point towards, for me, a requirement to take a more paced tempo. In addition, there is the marvellous early minimalist bit of writing in many parts, including the beginning of the first movement, which I feel is better brought out by a slightly slower tempo.

The movement on the whole was taken at a flowing rate, and unlike some conductors, Shui Lan managed to make it rather interesting, with suitable suppleness in tempo, and the orchestra in enthusiastic, robust form. The second movement, the Andante, was in contrast taken at a much slower tempo after an initially fast opening section.

One thing I didn't particularly like was the upper note trill the orchestra practiced - the 'Baroque' trill, which tends to make things perhaps a little neater, but less delicious. Phrasing in some places was workman-like, efficient but not very beautiful, which brought my attention to the again less desirable aspects of the SSO: Please, I beg of you, this is your music, which you have elected to play, since you are in an orchestra. Play with feeling, expression and beautiful phrasing - this is music, Beethoven's holy Art (heilige Kunst) The Andante on the whole was a little on the catatonic side - slow doesn't have to mean boring. On the other hand, the solos - the little wind "cadenzas" were very nicely performed indeed.

The Scherzo - the "Gathering of the Peasants" (really a peasant dance!) and the "Thunderstorm" were by far the most engaging parts of the performance, lustily performed, especially III. IV was robust and pretty exciting, if rather lacking in an impetuosity. A hard-headed timpani would have gone a long way to making the Storm a lot more exciting and ferocious. A rather extroverted reading of the score, with very nice playing from the horns in III and rather lacklustre playing from the bassoon on the whole in the solo parts.

The Finale, the crown of the entire work, has the title "Hirtengesang. Frohe und dankbare Gefühle nach dem Sturm" ("Shepherds' song. Happy and Thankful Feelings after the Storm"). On the whole this movement was rather a disappointment, with the solo horn at the beginning rather marring the beauty of the theme - not a terribly major problem, but enough to detract from enjoyment of the piece. There just wasn't much of a feeling of beautiful phrasing and happiness or thankfulness in the SSO's playing. What must we do in order to make every performance an occasion and an event - as indeed every Beethoven performance should be? If every performance were much more inspired playing on the orchestra's part, and more inspired interpretation on the conductor's part, I say, I'd gladly just have one concert every fortnight. There was evidence in the playing, and in previous concerts that the SSO can do a whole lot better than it was doing last night.

Now for the Tchaikovsky. As I commented to a friend after the concert, and if I may briefly make a rather broad remark regarding audiences, the majority of an audience watches concertos for a reason - it is the sense of excitement that one gets from watching acrobatics at a circus, to make not too far-fetched a comparison.

The minority goes to the concert expecting to hear music above and over the acrobatics engaged by the soloist. What we had tonight was not very satisfactory from either point of view, in my opinion. Shui Lan's accompaniment was patchy and under-rehearsed, and was just lacking in any degree of excitement, which given the repertoire, was just deadly. From the opening orchestral passage to the coda, Shui Lan's usual flaire seemed to have eluded him completely, and colour and depth were lacking, as was a sense of drama. But more disappointing even, was Lin Cho-liang's performance, expected to the highpoint of the day.

From his entry, I lost all expectations. Billed as being renowned for "the beauty of his sound", technical mastery and interpretive abilities, tonight's concert showed nothing of the sort. I question especially the first adjective - surely I have never heard a scratchier, uglier tone in the many violin concertos I have heard recently either on record or in concert. Sharp-edged and bony, the tone of the violin seemed to be constricted within the frame of the instrument, and unprojecting. A sleek, laser-like sound is of course the highlight of a Guarnerius - Heifetz-like, if you will. But beauty of sound and projection is also expected in such an instrument, so what went wrong?

Lin clearly eschewed glissandi in his playing, which was obvious from his opening passage - uncharacterized and unnatural. It was as if he was taking great pains to do so - Mozart's concertos might have been more suited to such an approach. In the many twists and turns of the concerto, Lin's playing was again undercharacterized and boring, un-Romantic in the most Romantic passages, undramatic in the most exciting, with his big-boned, scratchy tone getting in the way of even a glimmer of enjoyment. Intonation problems also featured, but most of the time, it was the feeling that Lin wasn't in complete control of the proceedings.

The middle movement was again a chore to sit through, passion thoroughly lacking in the performance, with the SSO's wind chorus in its usual shape.

The last movement started off pretty well on the orchestra's part, but quickly, Lin's tone asserted itself in the chords in his little cadenza at the beginning. In this movement, Lin frequently lapsed into indulgence. Again 'train-wrecks' - incidences where the violin and orchestra went completely out-of-synch - abounded, and Lin's playing in the staccato passages was frequently rather arbitrary taking many liberties, especially with note-values. Again despite all this there wasn't the jubilation and excitement that this music could offer.

When the concerto ended a lot of the audience burst out in applause, and there were even standing ovations. Having watched the far better performance last year (together with a great Shostakovich 15th Symphony in the second half - reviewed here), I have to say I was incredibly disappointed, and even more bewildered at the audience's reaction at such a sub-standard performance. The Kreisler Variations on a Theme of Corelli encore did nothing to enlighten me as to the applause he received after that.

Unbelievable, and my vote for the disappointment of the year.

Derek Lim is actually the second person to give Mr Lin a bad review here at the Inkpot. Damn, there goes our reputation man.

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716: 1.6.2000 ©Derek Lim

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