So if the UK votes "leave" then what?

As the New York Times says we would be in control again but of what and who would be in charge? Let's speculate!

David Cameron resigns because, although the “Leave” camp has said that they want Cameron to stay in office after the referendum, his position is unsustainable and made impossible by the undermining of his negotiations with the EU by his own reinforced and confident right wing. 

After a great show of agonizing and false reluctance, Boris Johnson agrees to stand and is elected leader of the Tories and therefore Prime Minister. In a re-run of the Blair -Brown Agreement he picks Michael Gove as his chancellor, and together they quickly set about implementing the radical right wing policies proposed by members of the Leave Campaign.  With Gove as the brains and Boris in the role of spin-meister, dealing with the task of presentation, amongst other things they:

•  Withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights (sorry that was Cameron's idea!);
•  Remove EU worker protection laws;
• Start to privatise the NHS  or dismantle it; (read the links!)
•  Accelerate fracking;
• Receive a frosty reception in Brussels and are forced to agree to a secretly negotiated, ill considered trade deal which is on worse terms than the EU's current TTIP negotiations because of the urgent need to unblock trade barriers not just with the EU but also around the world ;
•  At the same time Johnson and Gove now have to backtrack on their undeliverable Brexit campaign spending promises such as tax cuts to VAT on fuel and extra NHS spending  whilst implementing more cuts to public services to attempt to plug the funding gap caused by lower economic output and higher unemployment.

Scotland has another referendum after a year or so and votes overwhelmingly to leave the UK and rejoin the EU;

Wales demands more independence;

Northern Ireland is forced to close its borders with Eire to limit migration and thus reneges on a central plank of the Good Friday Agreement.

After a couple of years of spin and fantastic stories from Boris (who is after all a journalist at heart, who made a career as the Telegraph's Europe correspondent, out of writing “funny” EU stories about straight bananas and one size fits all condoms) is finally called to account for his policy U turns, broken promises and the growing economic chaos.  Unable to joke or lie his way through it, he loses a vote of confidence in Parliament and is forced to call an early general election before he is replaced as leader.

Then we are presented with a choice between the left, in the shape of Jeremy Corbyn, the original charisma black hole, and Boris because, although he is a proven liar, he is at the same time the personification of Teflon Man and the UK’s answer to Donald Trump, don't forget that he compared the objectives of the EU to those of Hitler.  To complete the choice, standing on the sidelines will be Nigel Farage, the ghostly reincarnation of Enoch Powell.

So if you want a radical right wing government and a bright future vote Brexit! 

Gustavo Gimeno and the Eroica

If you’ve not heard of Gustavo Gimeno then you probably missed him directing the first concert by a symphony orchestra, the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, in the newly rebuilt “Theatre de l’Usine” at Saint Céré last night.

This is the only concert hall in the North of the Lot and we owe our thanks to Olivier Desbordes, who runs Opera Éclate, and has for decades directed the Festival of Saint Céré from the jumble of buildings that used to be a factory making suitcases.  As a result of his track record he has been able to successfully negotiate the funding necessary to redevelop the site, and as one of the residents of the area I am very grateful.

Perhaps you think that Gimeno is the young assistant conductor for the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, who substitutes for the Grand Chef when they leave their base, but you would be wrong because he's much more noteworthy than such a role might imply. 

In a packed hall Gimeno conducted Beethoven’s Eroica in a fashion worthy of its name.  From the startling opening chords through to the coda it was a performance to remember. The energy and drive that he gave to this long symphony was sustained throughout. In only his second performance with the orchestra he drew playing of superb accuracy and detail from a somewhat reduced ensemble together with some beautiful solos from several of the woodwind principals.

To open the concert he chose Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite and he achieved a delicacy of colour and precision that my partner and I found surprisingly affecting in that rather episodic piece.

The room at the “Theatre de l’Usine” is too small for a full symphony orchestra and has a rather dry acoustic. It wouldn’t be kind to singers, but that same quality is very revealing of ensemble playing and the strings were up to the task.

So who is Gustavo Gimeno and what has he done?

He was the principal percussionist for the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra from 2002 to 2012, when he became the assistant conductor to Mariss Janssons.

He has also held the post of assistant to the late Claudio Abbado working with the Orchestra Mozart, the Filarmonica de Bologna, the Lucerne Festival Orchestra and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. In 2013 he assisted Bernard Haitink with the Orchestra Mozart.  Here in an interview with Classical Music he talks about the experience of working with Claudio Abbado as his assistant. 

In 2014, when Janssons cancelled unexpectedly for medical reasons, he took on a series of concerts with the Royal Concertgebouw . These were a sensational success and heralded the start of his international career.

In less than two years he has established a full schedule of international engagements ranging from Europe, to the USA, to New Zealand and has accepted the post of chief conductor for the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg. Between March and August 2016 he will be appearing with:

Münchner Philharmoniker

Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg

Orquesta de Castilla y Leon

Orchestre National de France

Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra

Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Boston Symphony Orchestra

Chicago Symphony Orchestra

Such a rapid acceptance by the major orchestras reminds me of another Gustavo (Dudamel) who has also had a meteoric career, but he is based in Los Angeles and only visits Europe occasionally.

Looking Forward (English with French subtitles)
In this video Gustavo Gimeno talks about conducting and Mariss Janssons, and some of Gustavo’s colleagues, recall his first concerts with the Royal Concertgebouw.  Don’t miss the snippet of Die Fledermaus at 3:34.

Here he lets Sibelius work his magic, creating the serene image of a swan via the cor anglais solo in The Swan of Tuonela.

And how about a little Tchaikovsky?

Or the wonderful sound he creates in Bruckner's 7th?




I will certainly be looking out for him in future programmes and wish him every success!

Franco Fagioli – Arias from Caffarelli

I spent last week in London, taking some very interesting and helpful singing lessons from Christopher Jacklin. On Friday 13^th November 2015, whilst the horrific terrorist attacks were happening in Paris, I was at a concert in the Wigmore Hall.

The concert was given by the outstanding Franco Fagioli, an Argentinian counter tenor, who was supported by Il Pomo d'Oro, an excellent string and harpsichord ensemble led by Riccardo Minasi.

I have to admit that up to now I’ve not been a great fan of the vocal music from the High Baroque, finding the melismatic passages artificial and wearisome.  But I now realise that this is because they are often not performed well and suffer from the limitations of some contemporary singers concerning the understanding of the idiom.  In some cases the substitution of female mezzo sopranos for male alto roles changes the character of the interpretation, and stylistically the natural way that 18^th century singers created and performed unwritten decoration is partially lost to us; but Franco Fagioli's performance generated no such reservations.

The quality of Fagioli’s voice is both beautiful and clear in the upper register, whilst also possessing a mezzo soprano quality in the lower notes. In this performance well chosen decoration, together with his extraordinary vocal agility, produced accurately executed melismatic passages, which never descended into purely vocal exercises but remained expressive and focussed on the phrasing. His wide range, perfect intonation and beautifully timed trills all supported his artistry and musicianship. 

Fagioli’s programme was inspired by the repertoire of the 18^th century castrato, Gaetano Majorano known as Caffarelli. He was taught at the conservatoire in Naples by Nicola Porpora, who wrote the first item on the programme “Passaggier che su la sponda”.  Naples was at the time the centre of the Italian opera industry and Porpora also taught the more famous Farinelli.

From the end of “Passaggier che su la sponda” the Wigmore Hall audience, which surely must be the most educated group of music lovers in London, broke out into well deserved and spontaneous  calls of “Bravo!” which were frequently to be heard throughout the evening.

The two famous castrati appeared together in the opera “Siroe re di Persia” in 1733 from which the second item on the programme “Ebbi da te la vita” was taken.

Fagioli has made a study of the gestures used by baroque singers from paintings of the period and he uses them in performance.  At first I found this mildly distracting, but soon they became more natural in my mind, and helped me to feel that Fagioli very convincingly both performs and portrays the music of the period, seeming for me to inhabit the persona of a singer like Caffarelli whilst he is performing.

At the end of the concert he didn’t get a standing ovation after his two encores, but in my opinion he richly deserved it! I think that he takes the art of the counter tenor to a new level.

This bravura aria "Odo il suono di tromba guerriera" comes from Fagioli's outstanding debut album "Arias for Caffarelli" and was written by Gennaro Manna (1748) for the opera "Lucio Papiro dittatore".

And finally I have to include this most beautiful and moving aria from Handel’s Ariodante, it's a real gem!  At the end of “Scherza Infida” you can see just how much he invests emotionally in what he is singing.

E vivo ancora?

E senza il ferro,

oh! Dei!  che farò?

Che mi dite, o affanni miei?

Scherza infida in grembo al drudo

io tradito a morte in braccio

per tua colpa ora men vo

Mà a spezzar l'indegno laccio,

ombra mesta e spirito ignudo

per tua pena io tornerò.

Do I still live?

And without a sword,

O gods! What shall I do? 

What do you say, o my troubles?

Enjoy yourself, o faithless one, in the arms of your lover

Betrayed by you,

I will now give myself up to death's embrace

But, in order to break this shameful tie

a sad and bereaved spirit,

I will return to punish you.

Voga Longa - Venice 2015 - Trearchi Bridge

It was the morning of Sunday 24th May 2015 on our last day in Italy. We took a walk to the Grand Canal and all was quiet.  There were no boats chugging along with engines spluttering, no water buses and no water taxis. 

Every now and then a small group of spectators next to the Rialto bridge clapped as a boat went past rowed steadily by a small team.  It took us a while but eventually we realized that there was some sort of festival taking place. We decided to ask at the waterbus ticket office how we could get to the airport at lunchtime.  The rather sharp, but actually quite helpful lady, said that all of the transport in the city was stopped until 15:30 during the Voga Longa, a 30 km rowing race, and suggested that we could leave from Madonna Dell Orto on the North side of the island where there were still boats running.

So we set off, from near the Frari church, trundling our suitcases across Venice.  Needless to say we made a mistake and didn't cross at the Guglie bridge, so we found ourselves at Trearchi. It was a fortunate error because we stumbled onto the amazing scene below, where every rowing boat in Venice seemed to be trying to get under the bridge.  There were water police with boat hooks pushing and shoving. There was even a frogman in an orange suit in the water trying to help the boats through! If we'd taken the right bridge we would have missed it all! 

Venice is full of surprises!

Click to enlarge

The congestion at the Trearchi bridge has to be heard as well as seen!  

Turn up the sound to get the full chaotic effect!

The Mise au Tombeau at Carennac

click to view the image at its original size

Carennac is a small medieval village about ten kilometres south of us in the Lot. It is notable for its Clunisian Priory dating from the 11th Century and its church dedicated to Saint-Pierre.

The remarkable group of sculptures in the photo above, which can be seen in a room off the cloisters of the Priory, is a “Mise au Tombeau”, an entombment of Christ, dating from the end of the 15^th Century.  This beautiful work was done by sculptors from the workshop that undertook the decoration of the cloisters during the tenure of Jean Dubrueilh, the Dean from 1487 to 1507. 

Like other medieval sculpture, originally the figures were  painted but in 1896, on the initiative of the parish curé, they were scraped clean and, although the group has been carefully and delicately restored, it will never be possible to reproduce its original colours. These days, however, we are more accustomed to seeing sculptures in their natural stone, and in this state it has the power to involve us emotionally in a painful, yet pathetic, scene which is expressed with reserve.

The figures are life size.  Jesus is laid out on the shroud, his eyes closed, mouth half open, the wound in his side still bleeding and the crown of thorns encircling his head.
 

The shroud is supported by two of his faithful disciples, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. 

Joseph, on the right of the group, is richly clothed and holds his head high; he is finely featured and full of nobility.  It was he who went boldly to Pilate to claim the body of Christ. 

Nicodemus, on the left, is wearing the pointed bonnet of the Jews; he is also sumptuously clothed and carries, hanging from his belt is a rich sporran.  His shoulders are curved and his face expresses humility and sadness.

Behind Joseph of Arimathea, Mary Magdelene, with her long hair hanging in tresses, a vase of perfume in her hand, cries and wipes away her tears with a fine cloth and a delicate gesture.  She is the only figure in the group who expresses her pain so openly, in contrast to the contained grief of the two other Mary’s.  

Mary-Salome prays.

Mary, the wife of Cleophas, tenderly supports the Virgin who, ready to faint, abandons herself to the arms of John, the much-loved disciple of Jesus. John’s shoulders and his head are lowered under the weight of grief.

This fine work escaped destruction, following the 1789 revolution, thanks to the procureur of the commune who, in his report of 1791, excluded it from being sold with the other goods from the Priory because he considered that it was “a rare and precious monument”.  

Thank you, Monsieur le Procureur, for this act of sensitivity and sanity in violent and difficult times.

Melodious Warblers in our garden

Last summer we discovered that melodious warblers were singing in the garden.  

This year they arrived about two weeks ago from their wintering grounds in sub-Saharan Africa.  At that time there were few leaves on the trees and shrubs and they could be clearly seen flitting from branch to branch, or singing while perched, like the one in the picture above.  They are more yellow than chiff-chaffs or willow warblers, and at this time of year ours have yellow eye stripes which are quite distinct through binoculars. Now they are not so easy to spot through the fresh leaves but their pleasant babbling can still be heard.

You can hear this song below.  It really gets going from about 12 seconds into the video.

This Melodious Warbler was filmed in Corrèze, France. Thanks to Phillippe Facquet for publishing the film on Youtube.

Chartres Cathedral and Malcolm Miller

On our trip back from the UK we stopped overnight at Chartres, in a hotel right next to the cathedral.

Click the image to enlarge

The last time I went to Chartres was in 1972 during a holiday to the Loire valley, which turned out to be a slow and painful break-up with my girlfriend.  In spite of the circumstances I have many special memories of most of the places we visited, but particularly of Chartres cathedral.

Inside the cathedral we cheekily attached ourselves to a tour group which had an English guide in his late thirties.  He wasn't very happy with this, and it’s only now that I realize that we should have paid, but I honestly didn't know that at the time.  

His tour was absolutely excellent.  This man was able to read the stories in the exceptional and magnificent 13^th century stained glass windows as if they were written in English. He then took us outside and did the same thing with the sculptures around the doors. 

The Tympanum above the West Door
Click to enlarge

In the medieval period, when there was no printing and most people couldn't read, the windows and sculptures were used to explain the bible stories to visitors to the cathedral. It was in effect a beautiful public library.

I was extremely impressed by him all those years ago, and very grateful to have had the opportunity to begin to understand the significance of the art and symbolism of the medieval period.  

When he finished he said that he would be there until Judgement Day and invited us all to return before then!

On this visit I wanted to buy a book, in English, which interpreted the exceptional collection of stained glass in a similar way and found this one in the picture on the left. It was exactly what I wanted, since it dealt with both the glass and the sculptures, giving an explanation of many of the windows and their location on a plan. When I read the blurb, and the author Malcolm Miller’s biography, it was soon clear that it was the same person behind whom we tagged along, trying to look inconspicuous, all those years ago.

The Rose Window in the Southern Transept
Click the image to enlarge

There are 175 stained glass windows in the cathedral mostly dating from the 13th century. This example, which represents the life of the Virgin Mary, was restored in 1993.

The Blue Virgin Window
Click the image to enlarge

I was even more impressed with the cathedral this time since, during the last 45 years, I’ve learnt more about the medieval period and I appreciate it much more, but I missed Malcolm Miller’s expertise. 

Malcolm Miller has been granted two of the highest civic honours by the French government: a knighthood in the National Order of Merit, and another in the Order of Arts and Letters. I'm very pleased that the quality of his work, and his devotion to the study and interpretation of Chartres Cathedral, has been recognized.

Here is a much younger Malcolm Miller explaining the structural function of the architecture to a group of students.

Some more research later showed that he is still guiding tours at the age of 81 and he says that he continues to discover new things in the stained glass and sculptures. His tours run daily, normally at noon, from Easter until late October excepting Sundays.   He is also available for private tours if requested, his email address is millerchartres@aol.com. 


Versions of his book are available in several languages : French, German, Japanese