…6th
March and I am heading to Los Angeles for meetings regarding the next run of
films for EXHIBITION ON SCREEN. I am
also heading there for some early press work on IN SEARCH OF CHOPIN. At Heathrow I was delighted to be told I was
on the Upper Deck of my BA flight to Los Angeles that I was then confused, on
boarding, when there were no stairs to climb….Doh! This was a new Airbus A380 –
with its two decks. Anyway, I wasn’t in
need of a bed as I had lots of work to do. I was feeling kind of pleased with
myself until I realised the guy in front had been on his Mac revising a
contract also for 6 hours straight. That
is some kind of concentration. Goes to
show that however hard you work there’s always someone else working
harder… That said, the past few weeks and months for
me have been – and sorry to my regular blog readers as you’ve read this before
– as busy. This really is an intense period in my life. Previous major TV series were exhausting - In
the Shadow of the Sun was tough. I Caesar took me to the absolute limit. Escapefrom Luanda was a chore – but nowadays it’s a full time job raising the funds
and another full time job contracting and another full time job marketing….all
that as well as researching, writing, filming and editing. Still,
the days may be very long right now but at least it involves a lot of
researching great art.
Time for a
brief update: where is the good ship Seventh Art sailing these days? As
those of you who read my blogs know, we have just finished IN SEARCH OF CHOPIN
and it has its world premiere in New Zealand in a few weeks, then Hungary,
Australia, USA, Canada….I have also been continuing the project with Leif Ove
Andsnes – we had our first sit-down to look at an edit the other day and it
went really well – though I admit we spent as much time discussing whether Man
City, Chelsea or Liverpool would win the league. Leif Ove is on tour in the US now and this
is the type of review he has been getting time & again:
Many young virtuoso pianists perform the Beethoven sonatas as a demonstration of their musical depth. But when he emerged as a major young artist, the Norwegian pianist Leif Ove Andsnes avoided Beethoven. He thought he should wait until he had “something to say,” as he explained in 2012 in an appearance on WQXR and WNYC radio studios. Well, Mr. Andsnes, 43, is certainly making up for lost time. He is in the midst of what he calls, perhaps too grandly, “The Beethoven Journey,” a multiyear immersion in the master’s works. For its main project, he is recording and performing the five Beethoven piano concertos with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, directing the ensemble from the keyboard. The second CD in this series was just released by Sony Classical, with superb accounts of the Second and Fourth Concertos. On Wednesday night, Mr. Andsnes performed a Beethoven recital at Carnegie Hall, one stop in a 19-city tour. The hall was nearly full for an evening that included only one of the popular sonatas with titles attached, the “Appassionata.” Mr. Andsnes began with the Sonata No. 11 in B flat (Op. 22), an overlooked work considered the last of Beethoven’s early-period sonatas. Its musical materials seem almost intentionally ordinary, with a crisp opening theme that leads to a nothing-special melody over a rippling accompaniment. But it’s what Beethoven does with such elements throughout the work that is so extraordinary. In his Apollonian approach to the piece, Mr. Andsnes brought out the surprising wildness and strangeness of the music. His performance had me recalling comments he made at the Greene Space. When asked why he had avoided Beethoven, Mr. Andsnes said that “pianistically” the music did “not have obvious sensual qualities” of works by Chopin, Schumann, Janacek, Grieg and Rachmaninoff. Well, from his playing on Wednesday, Mr. Andsnes has definitely found ways to connect with Beethoven’s pianistic sensuality. In the first movement of the Sonata No. 11, he brought milky textures and alluring colorings to bursts of undulant figures in the bass and stretches of passagework in the mercurial development. In the finale, each time the beguiling rondo theme returns, Beethoven makes it more elaborate and playful, qualities Mr. Andsnes conveyed with wondrous nuance and detail, while maintaining cool, almost sly control. He then turned to a late work, the Sonata No. 28 in A (Op. 101), giving a noble and beautifully natural performance of a deceptively complex score, which ends with a joyous yet knotty fugue. After intermission, he offered an exquisite account of Six Variations on an Original Theme in F. The “Appassionata,” the Sonata No. 23 in F minor, is a touchstone of Beethoven’s middle period. Many pianists make the most of the music’s stormy contrasts and intensity. Mr. Andsnes’s more magisterial interpretation allowed every stark element to come through while enhancing the dramatic sweep, especially during his uncannily controlled account of the onrushing finale. In response to a standing ovation, Mr. Andsnes performed three encores: an impish Beethoven bagatelle; the perpetual-motion finale movement of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 22 in F; and, for a change, the last of Schubert’s “Moments Musicaux,” played with beguiling tenderness.
My film on
Leif Ove will be on BBC4 in 2015 but it’s the exception not the rule. TV in the UK continues to be a mess: BBC4
doesn’t have a controller, BBC 3 is going on-line only. SkyArts hasn’t
recovered from the impact on Sky generally of higher prices for soccer caused
by their own sky-high fees they pay being topped by even higher fees (hundreds
of millions) by British Telecom. Sky Arts’ boss James Hunt has moved on. Channel 4 lost their arts comm ed Tabitha Jackson
a while ago and may well have no arts policy at all for all I can see. ITV does
Perspectives – celebrities on artists.
Radio is the best place for the arts but I was disappointed to read that
Mark Lawson has quit Front Row, allegedly for bullying (and I really admire
Front Row and Mark Lawson’s knowledge) but bullying is certainly rife in broadcasting.
Such a shame. While I’ve been travelling in the USA the
Director General of the BBC made a speech about increasing their arts
output. I’m delighted it’s back on the
agenda and felt to be worthy of a ‘big speech’.
They’d abandoned the arts a decade ago so this is a welcome U-turn. The only criticism I’d make is that they
always play it so safe: everything with presenters, opera from London,
Shakespeare, etc. They don’t exist in
the same commercial sphere as me or Sky Arts so the BBC is the one place where
you should be able to experiment with new ideas, less
white-middle-class-male-London-centric art, even make some films that are
themselves works of art. It has to be
repeated though that, in my opinion, art lovers have never in history been as
well served.
Talking of
arts lovers, my old mate Tim Marlow has just become director of exhibitions at the
Royal Academy – great news: I’m delighted for him. We’ll do less TV projects
together but I know he’ll do an excellent job and welcome less travelling.
The Big
Project (deservedly capitalized) continues to be EXHIBITION ON SCREEN. Hence the
main reason I am en route to the USA. I have some important meetings as well as
filming some interviews. We have some
big news coming up so keep an eye on the Facebook site or sign up to the
newsletter. For those of you who love
art, I think you’re going to be happy with the results of our labour.
Later….much
later….so here I am on the plane back to England. Madness; where did those three weeks go? It’s already a blur of planes, trains and
automobiles. I had some very successful
screenings of Season 1 EXHIBITION ON SCREEN, great preview screenings of
Chopin, and lots and lots of meetings and visits. Last, but certainly not
least, I filmed some fascinating interviews for forthcoming films. The rest of my work was scripting (and of
course endless contracting) for the big film that is coming up MATISSE: LIVEFROM TATE MODERN – on June 3rd!
UK only – then to the rest of the world in October. Now this is going to be fantastic….
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