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http://www.theartsdesk.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=199:gergiev-lso-barbican-dutilleux&Itemid=24 Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s Valery Gergiev shimmying his way through Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe. There he was, London’s loosest-limbed maestro, back on the Barbican podium (just about) with the London Symphony Orchestra, after a summer flogging his chaotic Ring Cycle around the globe, returning to more favourable ground, an all-French programme of Debussy, Dutilleux and Ravel that had his dancing juices flowing and his legs a-leaping. Certainly, there’s no gainsaying his moves. The question is were they being put to good musical effect? Whenever the moment took him, the answer was surely, yes. As his flickering hands turned to liquid and his arms began impatiently to swing, those climactic waves of sound in Daphnis would surge up with unique urgency, breaking with a jerky bang of the head. The result was a visceral punch. These ruptures were of the modern, not the natural, world: skids, collisions and body blows of a forceful, relentless, machine-derived character. There was a brutality to the way the choir burst in with their consonantless calls in the finale, an acidity to the clarinet figures and a forbidding lack of swing in the timpani and snare drum pulsations. Were these the orgiastic sounds of love or war? A sympathetic thought went out to Mrs Gergiev at this point.
http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_concert_review.php?id=7457 There were similar inconsistencies in Daphnis – which like La mer suffered from being overloud and harsh-sounding at times (detail coagulating) – with passages that compelled and those that lacked focus; yet there was a feel of narrative, the score’s mystery sensitively touched-in and Gergiev directing with impulse and a sense of choreography. Surprisingly for such an august group, the London Symphony Chorus’s pitch was a bit suspect in a cappella passages, but there was no lack of abandon in the final dance, taken at breakneck speed – fine for an orgy if less satisfying for clarity and appreciating Ravel’s watchmaker’s notation. Most memorable was the ‘Daybreak’ sequence, gloriously spacious, raptly played, and genuinely emotional, with Gareth Davies then seducing us with a wonderful flute solo.
http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_concert_review.php?id=7779 Framing the concert were two contrasted works by Ravel. Gergiev seemed to take the meaning of Pavane pour une infante défunte in strictly funereal terms given the overall torpor of this account, and from which the greater expressive animation of the central section offered only minimal relief. If expression does yield to technique in Boléro, then its unremitting logic and strategic interplay of melody and accompaniment are their own, enduring fascination. This performance did not wholly avoid the pitfall of speeding up (however incrementally) as it got louder, but its precision and poise were undoubted – Gergiev clearly having set the parameters within which it evolved then letting the LSO do the rest. The outcome, if lacking the remorselessness the composer brought to his flawed yet fabulous recording, was true to the work's essence and also guaranteed to bring the house down.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/sep/22/lso-gergiev-review Ravel's complete ballet score for Daphnis and Chloé brought out the dancer in Gergiev; though things slackened slightly towards the middle, when the London Symphony Chorus made a brave go at the chromatic twists of their long, unaccompanied passage.
http://www.concertonet.com/scripts/review.php?ID_review=5867 Relaxed is not quite how I would describe their performance of the complete Daphnis and Chloé, with the London Symphony Chorus' forward, rather unblended sound becoming brittle and unyielding to the lush orchestral surroundings. Some conductors tend to recess the choral writing apologetically, turning Ravel's tribal, earthy, spooky atmosphere into an annoying hum. Much as I applaud any conductor who brings the chorus out as much as this, it was symptomatic of a performance that never put the brake on. Dynamics were even more extreme than in La Mer, yet had no build up. This was no languid, erotic courtship but a forceful proposition. The playing was Brilliant in both senses, dazzling colours from the woodwind, the shimmering and twittering brooklets and birds given full technicolour. This vividness is welcome in at a time when Ravel seems to be interpreted more blandly and cleanly, as if in fear of turning this fabulous score into mere programme music. A bit more dirtiness from the playing would have given the music a bit of mystery and warmth.
http://intermezzo.typepad.com/intermezzo/valery_gergiev/ Ravel opened and closed the programme. Both works demonstrated the limitations of Gergiev's batonless, air-massaging technique. An uncoordinated first bar entry was the first of several to mar his funereally-paced Pavane pour une infante défunte. And Gergiev's psychic powers alone weren't enough to maintain a flowing upward dynamic in the closing Boléro. Instead the LSO lurched unguided from one volume setting to the next, with overpowering saxophone solos striking an unduly brash note. It was all a bit of an unholy mess by the end, winning out only with the sheer exuberance of the playing.
http://www.musicomh.com/classical/lso-gergiev_1209.htm Ravel's Pavane pour une infante défunte made for a disappointing start. Saccharine sweet, the piece plodded along at an achingly slow tempo. The orchestra played well enough, but there was not enough of a stately, measured pace to dispel thoughts of Ravel's quip that it was the infanta who had died, not the music. Gergiev and the LSO were on better form with Ravel's Boléro, which ended the concert. Neil Percy was a little quiet at first with the incessant snare drum rhythm, but the pace quickly picked up to hypnotic effect, with Gergiev allowing the players their own quirky take on the famous repeated melody.
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