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WWhen my book Rough Ideas was published last year I, like everyone else on the planet, had no idea how much and how quickly life in 2020 would change with Covid-19. His chapters on music and composers and practice (and even recording) remain relevant, but the section titled Stage, on life on the go, behind the scenes, in airports, in hotels – in short, life as a pianist – seems scenes from another world.
There would be additional chapters if it were to be written today: playing for a sparse and distant audience whose response to music is hidden behind masks; rules for on-stage and off-stage behavior (“Do not touch the piano except the keys”; “Do not meet with orchestra members”). I am convinced that in time we will return to a full program of concerts and theater, but for the moment there are some adjustments to be made. And some of these may end up as permanent changes.
One issue I wrote about that seems to have struck a chord with readers was the idea of removing the intermission and having shorter concerts, lasting around 60-80 minutes, perhaps at different start times, and even of repeat them in the same night. Since the pandemic broke out, this shrunken format has quickly become the norm, a neat solution to meet the new health and safety requirements … and I loved it.
Since August I have played non-hourly concerts with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Liverpool Philharmonic, Bournemouth Symphony and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra at the Proms and Symphony Hall, Birmingham, not to mention recitals, often repeated to allow a wider and more socially distant audience to participate. He sounded serious, focused and intense, with plenty of time for repertoire variety.
And repeating the concerts, as we did in Liverpool, is not just an opportunity for the public to choose their time of attendance, it is an opportunity for the artists to explore the works further. So often, relaxing after a performance in the past, I wished I could play it again – either because it didn’t go well and I wanted to correct things, or because it went well and I wanted to relive things. In Liverpool, Beethoven’s “Emperor” concert at 4pm was different from the show at 7.30pm; the spearhead in the afternoon seemed to expand into a grander conception by the evening. The Emperor wore new clothes.
At some point in the early 20th century, we settled into a pattern: concerts should start in the early evening and last around two hours, including a 15-20 minute break in which to have a glass of wine or visit the toilet. (A meandering line outside the women’s line is a victim of all the theaters I have attended.) Something shorter and we invite the complaints of the audience; something longer and we risk complaints, as well as overtime costs, by the backstage staff.
This tradition has been beneficial to us in many ways, especially when most people’s working hours were the same and music was less easily accessible in recorded formats. At a live orchestral concert we could hear a great symphony, concert (and its visiting soloist) and an appetizer, often something fresh written by a living composer that was short enough not to scare people, but long enough to allow for latecomers. But this can’t be the only way to listen to live music. And now it isn’t.
There has always been a lot of variety in terms of concert start times, from 6pm rush hour to 10.30pm postprandial, but one thing in common was the intermission. In opera or ballet performances this is understandable: the sets must be changed, the singers and dancers must rest, the works performed are long and contain pauses. But who decreed that an orchestral music concert should last about two hours with an intermission in the middle to make us feel like we’re getting our money’s worth?
It could be argued that the intermission was a time for socializing. But is it really so? Wasn’t it rather time to scramble to the bar and at best start a conversation that needs to be cut off as you get back to your seat before the second half starts? When you play for a grateful and focused audience, there can be a cumulative emotional effect in the hall as you all enter the powerful world of a composer’s mind and heart.
A descent interval to chat can bring everyone down to earth with a jolt, requiring the engines to be restarted all over again. The dressing room is a place to get dressed and undress, so as not to sit and stare blankly in the lamp-encrusted mirror, drum your fingers on a table, trying to stay warm and in the right mood, waiting for the audience to find their way. their places, and to settle again.
There will always be a place for the traditional duration concert, but it is time to embrace several options as well, especially when they are the only options we have for now and when we cannot embrace. While the pandemic-era reasons for avoiding the drink queue or leaving the hall after just an hour of music are new, the principle behind the idea remains the same. We can leave behind the Victorian construct of concert attendance just as we can leave horse-drawn carriages of the same era behind.
• Stephen Hough’s Rough Ideas (Faber) won the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Award for Storytelling. His performance of Mendelssohn’s first piano concerto with CBSO is available on request from 10 December.
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