Classical CDs Weekly: Beethoven, Haydn, Gabriel Prokofiev
Nine cellos for the price of one, underrated piano sonatas and a charismatic conductor revisits Beethoven
BBC Proms: West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Barenboim (Concert Four)/ Kronos Quartet
Proms hot up for Beethoven Seven but the late nighter proves a damp squib
Much has been written about how old-fashioned Daniel Barenboim's Beethoven cycle feels. Yet what can seem backward-looking is in fact a perfect reflection of Barenboim's personality. Each and every symphony appears with a swagger in its step and a cigar in its mouth. Last night's instalment - taking us to the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies - was no different.
BBC Proms: West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Barenboim (Concert 3)
Heavyweight Beethoven proved leaden-footed at times
We’ve had more than our fair share of Beethoven symphonies in London recently. But with the Proms’s monolithic Daniel Barenboim cycle now midway through, memories of Riccardo Chailly and John Eliot Gardiner are being steadily blotted out. Gone are the frisky tempos, the lightness of touch, and in their place we’re being reintroduced to Beethoven the heavyweight. There’s majesty here certainly, and occasional moments of compelling originality, but also a fair amount of frustration.
Barenboim, Staatskapelle Berlin, Boulez, Royal Festival Hall
Mastery and quirkiness but no transcendentalism in Liszt and Wagner
What next - Boulez and Daniel Barenboim in Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov? The two numbered Liszt concertos are probably as far as they're going to go in lacier romantic repertoire, and last night it didn't feel far enough to justify the predictable standing ovation.
Daniel Barenboim, Tate Modern
Chopin a casualty in the great struggle between pianist and building
It had all the hallmarks of being an almighty car crash of an event. Barenboim? Chopin? Turbine Hall? You might as well have dumped the piano at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Actually, acoustically, it wasn't quite that bad. It sounded as if Barenboim was playing next door. Next door in France, that is. Or Germany.
Staatskapelle Berlin, Barenboim, Royal Festival Hall
Barenboim continues to wow his adoring public in the Schoenberg/Beethoven challenge
The returns queue gets longer and so does the wait – considerably longer than the 69 minutes of programmed music in this the second of the Daniel Barenboim Beethoven/Schoenberg series. But what a satisfying two–course meal it was: Schoenberg’s “transfigured night” of desire and confession, Verklärte Nacht, and Beethoven’s grandest piano concerto, No 5, “The Emperor”.
Staatskapelle Berlin, Barenboim, Royal Festival Hall
The great conductor-pianist fills the hall with Beethoven and Schoenberg
Anyone who can sell out four concerts of Beethoven and Schoenberg, even if it's only half-scary Schoenberg, surely looms large in the public imagination. Daniel Barenboim is a great humanitarian figure, and has been a thought-provoking interpreter of the classical and romantic piano repertoire for nearly 60 years, so it's not surprising that half of London wants to hear him in the Beethoven concertos. As a conductor, his natural element is earth; less so air, wind and fire.