Life This lunchtime I attended the final classical lunchtime concert at the Phil in which a quartet then quintet revealed to us a newly composed work by Ian Stephens called Dances Overhead and Brahms Clarinet Quintet. The former featured a nice rough provision on traditional folk dance themes and the latter slightly niggled because it sounded almost but not exactly like one of Mozart's Clarinet works in much the same way as I've discovered that most of anything John Williams has ever composed for films has been 'influenced' by something else in classical music. Even the Star Wars theme is basically something by Korngold for an old Ronald Reagan film sped up and with the ending knocked off.
At the back of the stage on the wall is a piece of kinetic art, some wavey lines and large round white balls which are supposed to denote a musical stathe and some crotchets. Its been there as long as I can remember -- might even be as old as the hall -- and I've always thought it should be moving, perhaps in time with the music. Sure enough today, it was moving, the balls up and down, the wavey lines left to right and vice-versa. I don't know if it was in time with the music -- I mean how would that work unless it was designed to be like those little plastic dancing flowers with the guitars -- but it was reassuring and something else to look at during the music (from where I was sitting I couldn't really see the players).
Between pieces there was the customary mini-interval, enough time for the players to go off stage, wash their hands, take some drink, whatever they have to. Someone from the hall dashed on stage to add an extra stand for the clarinetist in the second half, a surprisingly slow process as she tried to do it with the minimum noise. As she was about the step off stage, a human voice from the front shouted, piercing the silence: 'Will you turn that off!' This middle aged man. The someone from the hall looked at them for a moment and then realised they meant the sculpture and sure enough, seconds before the players returned, the sculpture stopped.
I'm left to ponder a few things.
(1) It's the first time I've heard anyone break the invisible barrier between the audience and stage in the Phil, at least at a classical concert. So it must have really been irritating. But really why? Was it that distracting? It wasn't as though
(2) Does he just hate art? In which case what's he doing at a classical music concert?
(3) No one else in the hall seemed to be bothered. Was it irritating them too but they left it up to this man to voice their concerns?
(4) Why didn't I ask for it to be left on if I was enjoying the up down/ left right so much? I burst out laughing and wanted to shout, 'No leave it on' but my ingrained repression stopped me from making a fuss. But I definitely whispered it out loud.
Since I'm without a psychology degree I'm without answers. I just wish that sometimes people would pipe down and just let the rest of us enjoy life's little surprises, like seeing sculptures moving for the first time in years.
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