Chicago
david.cheal
It’s my habit as a music critic to take notes at shows such as this: nothing extensive, just words and phrases jotted down to jog the memory when it comes to writing the thing up afterwards. Looking back at my scraps of paper for this, the London leg of the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble’s UK tour, I can see only a handful of scrawled words: “war”, “party”, and, er, “dum dum da dum dum dum”. I think I was having too much fun to bother with writing much down. It was that kind of night.The Hypnotic Brass Ensemble are a bunch of eight brothers, joined on tour by a drummer, who play – well, Read more ...
edward.seckerson
The Bruckner half of the programme appeared to have come early as Bernard Haitink and the Chicago Symphony sternly, doggedly, processed through the introduction of Haydn’s Symphony No.101 ‘Clock’. It was a portent of things to come. The prognosis was not good. A case of terminal seriousness would eventually render the performance irreversibly moribund.Haydn thrives – no, depends – upon a light touch. Furthermore his wit is built upon an element of surprise. Neither was forthcoming as Haitink’s Chicagoans launched somewhat poker-faced into the main presto of the first movement. A steady tempo Read more ...