Brian Dickie

Rugby fever

Oh dear, that once exclusively amateur sport, Rugby Union football, has gone commercial with a veangeance and transformed my local pub, the much loved White Horse, into the Pink Lion!  Well I think that it is only for a day, today - and it is really noisy out there.  And the party will not be over much before midnight, if even then.

It looks like a lot of fun, and the British and Irish Lions Rugby team selected for the 2013 tour of Australia appears to be downing pints with the best of them........

I am going about eight miles out of town this evening down to Hampton Wick - a nice family reunion with my Somerset based daughter and her boys.

Royal Academy Double Bill

I was there at the Royal Academy this evening.  Primarily for Peter Maxwell Davies' The Lighthouse.  This piece is now something of a classic.  A production by Peter Sellars in Boston around 1984 brought further attention to this brilliant young director.  Indeed it was the reason for my becoming interested in him and subsequently bringing him to Glyndebourne.  And The Lighthouse was also produced by COT 23 years ago to great acclaim.  COT's founder Alan Stone was a brilliantly innovative producer - this should not be forgotten.

The performance of The Lighthouse this evening was the Royal Academy of Music Opera at its best.  The small cast, of just three men, was remarkably accomplished in every department and made the most of this extremely disturbing but effective One Acter.  So hats off to Iain Milne, Samuel Queen and Andri Björn Róbertsson, and the distinguished and authoritative Lionel Friend in the pit, for bringing this piece off so well.

We had a "curtain raiser" (well there was actually no curtain) in the form of Dido and Aeneas.  This is a pretty tricky piece to pull off.  it may have been first performed at  a girl's boarding school in Chelsea - but for the full effect it needs the strongest forces of an established  opera company both on the stage in in the provision of technical resources.  But we had some lovely performances, notably from Rozanna Madylus (Sorceress) Sónia Grané (Belinda) and Tereza Gevorgyan (First Witch).  And yet another former Glyndebourne music staffer from the 1970s/80s vintage, Iain Ledingham, conducted.

Meanwhile back in Chicago COT has announced its 2014 season.  This is a further development of a completely new direction for the company.  Some interesting stuff there - but nothing written in the distant past of the 17th 18th or 19th centuries.  But I am sure that it will be an appealing program for people passionate about music theater in all its manifestations. However I do hope that, when they have run out of 20th century pieces deserving of revival, the older reaches of the opera repertoire will be mined again.  All in good time!

I have a busy family weekend about town and in Sussex. 

The Thames from Hungerford Bridge 7:15 pm May 16 2013

One side effect from going to concerts in London on a fine spring evening is the pleasure to be had from walking across Hungerford Bridge from Embankment station to the Royal Festival Hall. And it was such an evening.  So there you have it above!

It takes me 30 minutes door to door - I was home by 10:15 this evening from a concert of which the last dying note was at 9:45.  This was a stunning performance of Shostakovitch's 4th symphony with the Philharmonia in cracking form under their Principal Conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen.  It may be invidious to single out an individual for notice - but exemplifying the across the board excellence of this great orchestra this evening was the first bassoon, who is tested to the limit in this piece. This is the astonishing Amy Harman, the young joint principal bassoon of the Philharmonia - knockout playing.

But the real raison-d'ȇtre for this concert had been for me the Orango about which I wrote yesterday.  Here was a huge success with loud cheering - its so great that these things can be discovered and displayed, and displayed by such distinguished performers.  And of course it was a pleasure to see Gerard McBurney, in London only too briefly from Chicago.  And all his great family who turned out in force.  He was the inspiration and energy behind all this.  As I predicted yesterday - a wild evening of really exciting music making.

Back into London life

I have been taking things quietly today, replenished my Nespresso pods, picked up my new glasses with very difficult to get used to varifocals (its only been three hours!), and collected packages from the post office. And a good deal of housekeeping here both of the paper and cleaning variety!

But its all go tomorrow with lunch with my old friend Robert Rattray at the Garrick, and later to the Royal Festival Hall for the first London performance of Chicago treasure Gerard McBurney's orchestration of Orango, an unfinished opera by Shostakovich.  Click the link for more info.

Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts the Philharmonia Orchestra, and we also get Shosty's 4th symphony after the interval.  It should be a wild night out!

Meanwhile the Royal Academy of Music opera department has a double bill of Dido and Aeneas and Peter Maxwell Davies' The Lighthouse.  I will be at that on Friday.

Long day

I am back in London after a slightly delayed ten and a half hour flight from Beijing.  I will be here for two weeks before setting forth again on May 29 – first stop Cluj-Napoca.  That is in Transylvania, home of Dracula.  This will be a first for me – I have never been to Romania.  It will then be a winding pilgrimage taking in Munich, Tbilisi, Kiev, Vilnius………as always you can read about it here as it happens!

But now it is time to reflect on Asia.  It was a good ten days ending with a slightly disappointing turn out in Beijing where there was only one finalist.  But there were two in Shanghai so China is not losing out.  But they were all low male voices – baritones and a bass-baritone.  Japan did better – another baritone as well as a soprano, mezzo, and tenor (from Korea).  We might get them to do the Rigoletto quartet at the last night party!

British Airways brought me safely home, very comfortably in a 747 – I haven’t been on one of those lovely jumbos for ages.  I fear that they are being phased out – four gas guzzling engines must make it a pretty tricky plane to keep in the air these days.  When the last one lumbers out of Heathrow it will be a sad end to a golden age. 

Whatever other criticism one may have of BA the fact is that their cabin crew, on the international long haul routes, are the best of the best.  They were as cheerful and helpful after a 10 hour flight as at the beginning.

London has reverted to cold and wet.  I will have to go out and buy milk.

Day off!

I went off to the Summer Palace this morning at 7:30 hoping to avoid the crowds.  And I may have done so - but there were still hordes of people there and I guess it is like that year round.  When I was last here it was in February, maybe 1983, and in those days there were few tourists, few Chinese visitors, and no trinket stores and fast food stations.  It was pure and simple, a little paradise of calm.  I guess that has gone for ever. 

It turned out to be a grey cloudy day - bad for nice pictures!  But I spent three hours there and even found a spot on the Long Corridor that was comparatively deserted. For much of the way there is massive "footfall" and I wonder how long this can go on.  It really takes a bashing.

I took a little ferry up a back water alley towards the North Gate rather that retracing my steps - and so I found the so called Suzhou Street, another example of commercial enterprise, or exploitation (take your pick).  The crowds on the top of that bridge are those flowing in as I was about to flow out.  Good timing!

And so I returned to my hotel on the excellent Beijing subway and got all my reports from the Beijing auditions sorted out and sent off to headquarters for processing!  My evening was spent with friends from Toronto who happened to be on a holiday trip the Beijing.  They arrived last night and were somewhat feeling the effects of the long journey.  But we had a good Beijing duck dinner.

I now feel completely unburdened and greatly looking forward to returning to London tomorrow.

Asia is over

Department of Art and Communication, Beijing Normal University May 12 2013

So I have finished with Asia for 2013 (if you exclude Tbilisi, Georgia which is technically Asia) - I finished the second day of Beijing at around 4 pm and returned to my hotel to find that my room had been flooded by a burst pipe.  (No I had not left anything running......) The management of this Crowne Plaza did an exemplary job of customer service failure management, I was moved to a higher and better room and was minimally inconvenienced.

It seems that it is the men who are excelling here in China, and the lower voices rather than a tenor as was the case last year.  So I am suffering somewhat from baritone overload with a good few appropriate candidates for membership of Barihunks.com........

Once again we had a good few defectors today together with a handful of folks who were not prepared to sing arias requested that were on their lists. That is a bad mark.  So all of you future candidates, if you happen to read this, be prepared to sing anything on your list.  Do not assume that I won't ask for Menotti - there is always a first time!

I have a free day tomorrow before flying to London on Tuesday.  I will certainly get to the Summer Palace, and probably downtown for some shopping.  The latter is a complete nightmare here and I am not good at it the best of times.  We shall have to see whether there could be fun in store.

Beijing Day 1

One of the oddities when I was here in 2011 was how many of the singers decided not to show up for the auditions.  Notwithstanding the defections we found a remarkable young man at the end of the day, a 20 year old tenor, who went the whole distance and won third prize.  He is now a member of the Vienna State Opera company. This was Jinxu Xiahou.

One might have thought that this story would be an inspiration to his fellow young singers and that it would encourage them to show up this time.  Well it encouraged other very young singers to apply perhaps, but he was a one-off.  Many older ones, of say 25 or so which is still very young, did indeed apply but we had a defection rate that is quite remarkable.  Of the 61 singers scheduled for today as many as 33 were no shows!

In Shanghai we had four absentees and in Japan none, although a couple took the trouble to report their apologies.  In Beijing an additional problem -  one singer, rather a fine voice actually, was not prepared to sing either of the two additional arias she had chosen for her list and which I requested.  Enough ranting for now!

Tomorrow I have a full schedule again - starting at 9:30.  There are 35 scheduled - with the same defection rate I will be done by lunchtime......maybe the last singer will be another Jinxu Xiahou!

We are on our way in Beijing!

The auditions have begun this Saturday morning at 9:30 in the auditorium of the School of Art and Communication at Beijing Normal University.  The first singer was to have been a bass but he did not show- not a good start! So we had a soprano instead......at 9:40.

And as you can see above we have a nice team of wranglers!

Training to Beijing

 

Customer Service at Shanghai Station

The ride to Beijing was pretty well like Eurostar but further......and I was in first class, a bargain at £90.  With trolley service and free drinks and snacks.....

The stations at both ends are spectacular new affairs - clear demonstrations of the Chinese economic growth of recent years.  They are buzzing with people and appear to be throughly well organised.  Customer service here is now an example to the rest of the world with everyone only too anxious to be of assistance.

All in all a great travel experience - and at 300 kph!

Tomorrow I start my day with the first audition at 9:30 am.  Ok for me but pity the poor singer..........we go through to 6pm with the same again on Sunday.  I am cramming everything into two days so will be able to have a bit of tourism on Monday - and shopping too.

It appears that Facebook does not function reliably here so my posts are not getting on line there as far as I can see (which I can't!)

 

Shanghai auditions

I completed the Shanghai auditions by 4:00 this afternoon - after a good well organised session at the East China Normal University which has the most charming campus around the corner from the Changfeng Park Marriott.  It rained all morning but I was able to grab this shot above on my way out an hour ago.

Professor Cao Jin has been responsible for the auditions here since 2011 and she and her team do an exemplary job.  So it has been a pleasure - and there are two finalists emerging from the process.

Next stop is Beijing. I am taking the new High Speed train tomorrow morning.  It started service just after I was here in 2011 and has been a huge success it seems. We will be flashing over the country at speeds up to 180 mph - but this is rather less than on the Maglev train to Shanghai airport that I took in 2011.  That peaked at 268 mph - over 400 kph.  I am addicted to using public transport wherever I go!

I will hosting an informal dinner for Professor Cao and her colleagues this evening.  They have earned it!

Back in Shanghai

I am really delighted to be back in this city.  I was first here more than thirty years ago and came a couple more times in the 1980s.  Then not again until 2011 when of course it was completely unrecognisable.  Nevertheless it had kept much of its charming character of the old days in the more preserved parts of town, notably in the French Concession.

My hosts here are a delight and they have put me up in one of the better branded hotels that have sprung up here over the decades.  This is the Marriott Changfeng Park.  I had wanted to return to my old friend the Donghu but it is really inconvenient for the university where I have my auditions, and alas this time I am here for less than 48 hours.  But the Marriott is a real find.

I have a full day of auditions tomorrow and no time for much fun I am afraid.  There will be room for that I hope in Beijing. But for here the pressure is on!

At Narita

Tokyo's international airport is an oasis of courtesy and consideration.  I am here for an hour or so waiting for my flight to Shanghai.  The gentle polite, almost poetic, ritual of security screening is so far from the barbarity of the regime at Heathrow - oh I am so ashamed........

I am enjoying dumplings and a glass of wine for lunch.  It is 1pm.

Mount Fuji!

Mount Fuji 10:30 am Tuesday May 7 2013

Yes, I managed to get him without cloud cover this morning, but just in time - for by the end of the morning the mist and clouds intervened. My hosts have gone to huge trouble to make my stay here comfortable and enjoyable.  So following our sighting of the great mountain we went off to lunch at a famous hotel the Otawa No Mori in Hayama.  This is a short drive from Yokosuka and is a delightful seaside town perfectly positioned for the usual summer recreations of sailing, windsurfing and swimming.

The hotel's kitchen claims to be French.  But as last evening in the "Italian" restaurant at the museum, the food is unquestionably Japanese, and of superlative quality with the irresistible Japanese attention to detail in both the preparation and the presentation.  Wonderful!

We then made our way to see the Great Buddha at Kamakura where as you can see we were not alone.

The Japanese learn how to be inexhaustible tourists as schoolchildren.  They seem to spend as much time on trips as they do in the classroom.  And they are impeccably behaved - many of them as young as five without any harassed adults needed.

From there we made it to the comparative calm of a garden devoted exclusively to peonies at the Hachimangu Shrine in Kamakura.  And then back to Yokosuka for a little rest, doing this blog, and now out to have a real Japanese dinner in the shopping center opposite!  But below enjoy the peonies and imagine the fragrance all around this beautiful garden.

Japan done!

We eventually heard 71 here - about the same as I heard in New York, Toronto, and Chicago put together.  And the hit rate was about the same - so we have to think in terms of about 5% moving on to the finals.  Here I had three or four, subject to final calculations which I have to disccuss with headquarters in Gütersloh. 

One of the four best here was a spectacular Korean - the others were of very high standard, Japanese singers who are really making huge strides. 

This evening at last thte Italian dinner took place.  And spectacular it was - at a wonderful restaurant called Acqua Mare attached to the Yokoskuka Museum of Art. - Link more useful if you read Japanese.

They call it an Italian restaurant - I would say its a fabulous Japanese restaurant, influenced by the shape of Italian meals no doubt, but entirely unlike anything you would encounter in Italy.  Each dish, each morsel indeed, was a work of Japanese art - certainly to look at, and so seductive to the taste buds that you might swear that Botticelli had a Japanese Venus behind it all.  The restaurant is baby sister to Acqua Pazza in Tokyo where the scenery would hardly match this, but if we assume that the food does then go there. Again the link needs Japanese I am afraid.

It is south of Yokosuka on the east coast of the Miura Peninsula.  The view over Tokyo Bay is stunning.

I have a tourist day tomorrow before leaving for Shanghai on Wednesday morning.  I hope to see Fuji-san.

Day One Yokosuka

We had an intense day from noon until 6 - with 40 singers in very quick succession.  They were all beautifully prepared thanks to the outstanding team of accompanists always provided by the Yokosuka Arts Foudation for these auditions.  And they are led by the exceptional nationally and internationally renowned Miyuki Kotouda.  My regular readers know the importance I attach to this aspect.  And we are really well served here in Japan.

I there is one definite qualifier from today, and a good number of special young singers on my waiting list.  We will see what happens tomorrow - but I expect to have three from Japan so we are on target for that.

I was mistaken - the Italian dinner is tomorrow not this evening - so I went shopping and then had a quick Sino-Japanese supper in a restaurant next to my hotel, the Yokosuka Mercure, part of the French Accor group. 

My endless fascination with supermarkets drew me to a large one in the shopping centre by the harbour.  They say so much about the culture of a country.  This is something British supermarkets fail to understand so they fall flat on their faces when they enter foreign markets.  Likewise Whole Foods made a complete hash of their entry into the British market. Interesting......?!

This whole mall where the super market is is a riot of colour - as long as it is pink. This would not play in Peoria - but does very well here.

Glorious morning!

How nice to be greeted by this sunny morning view from my hotel window when I awoke just now.  It is 9 am here on Sunday, 1 am in London and 7pm last night in Chicago! 

I am feeling ready for anything - we will get started at noon. But I then went out for a short walk after breakfast - including the usual hard fried eggs.  The roses are out, and so are the gardeners, the painters, and the families.

And this evening I will get a Japanese take on an Italian restaurant.

Thirty one hours later.........

Yes, it was 31 hours from the moment I left Parsons Green until I walked into the hotel here 37 minutes ago.......so you will understand I am not awake for much longer.

We begin the auditions here in Yokosuka at noon tomorrow and we have more than 80 singers to be heard tomorrow and Monday. I will report in full - but for now Good Night - and have a great weekend.

So far so good.......

I am at O'Hare after a comfortable incident free flight from London, on time, no immigration delay. I take off on my 13 hour flight to Japan in two hours time.  Meanwhile time for lunch!

I was sitting next to a nice ophthamologist on the way to a conference of 15,000 of them in Seattle.  He is delivering a learned paper there.  It turns out that he was a student of a childhood friend of mine, now retired from the eye surgery business at Moorfields, the great London eye hospital.  Small world........

 

Mad week!

It has been a joy to be back in London this week - but now, with the prospect tomorrow of a 24 hour journey to Tokyo via Chicago I am beginning to wonder what madness I have subjected myself to.  Never mind - it will happen so I must just put my head down and get on with it.  This is the result of having this mixed blessing of a Round the World ticket at a bargain price.......

Yesterday was a day of getting my eyes tested for new glasses, a routine visit to the dentist, and a happy evening at the Garrick Club.  Today I had lunch with Tod Machover who was passsing through on his way to Monaco.  He is no less crazy - he flies back to Boston on Saturday.

Meanwhile spring seems to have well and truly arrived in London.  And my Japanese friends tell me that Japan is basking in gorgeous spring weather as well.  Maybe at last I will see Mount Fuji.  I have a free day on Tuesday so I will get as near as I can to it. Keep logging in to see how I am getting on.  I arrive at my hotel on Saturday evening at around 6pm Tokyo time.  That is 10 am London and 4 am Chicago........I will let you know what it feels like.

Meanwhile my noisy neighbours here in Parsons Green are having the time of their lives at the White Horse - spilling out onto the road, and there is a barbecue smoking away with luscious smells wafting through my windows flung open!  Forgive the imperfect iPhone picture.  There is really no adequate substitute for a proper camera!

ENO 2013-14

As I have from time to time indicated I am an great admirer of the work of the English National Opera.  Which is not so say that I admire the Royal Opera less - just differently!  This is one of the many things that make a city great -  two wonderful but different opera companies live side by side.  And both flourish - and there is a huge crossover of the audiences so many of which appreciate both kinds of work.

ENO has just announced its 2013-14 season.  And they have produced an excellent promotional video to tell us about it.  This is worth ten minutes of attention!

And of you do not have those minutes to spare they have produced a full news release which you can download here

I am already looking forward to next year - but there is a lot of water to pass under the bridge before then.

Full Monday - and a late night

I did not get home until somewhat late last night after an exceptionally entertaining evening at the Garrick.  But let's first give you a tip for a rather unusually good pub lunch in an out of the way place - certainly worth a detour.

This is The Lord Stanley in Camden Park Road, north of Kings Cross.  I had a lunch date with Anthony and Camilla Whitworth-Jones and we went to their "local".  And what a find - really delicious food, untypical of what one normally finds in pubs, and incredibly reasonably priced.....this is definitely worth going the extra mile for.

After lunch I had a short meeting with Fiona James - the excellent Australian mezzo who is a trustee of the foundation Elizabeth Connell set up to support the award that will bear her name.  I think that this annual award will be a huge opportunity for actual or potential dramatic sopranos under the age of 35.  The first "contest" will be in 2014.  It was greatly disappointing to me not to have been able to be at the Memorial event at St John's, Smith Square last Saturday evening.

And yesterday evening we had a fun time at the Garrick with Tony Pappano charming everyone in his interview with Jim Naughtie.  There was a packed house - including those celebrated characters from the movie Quartet, John Rawnsley (a typically ebullient Garrick member) and his wife Nuala Willis whom I have known since we were 20 year olds together at Glyndebourne in 1962.  Nuala worked in the wardrobe - and then developed into a magnificent character contralto - which trade she continues to ply 50 years later!  And what fun they had with Dustin Hoffman in the making of the movie......

It was a late night. And today the sun is shining again.

If you love singing you have to hear this.......

 

Just a little fun to start the week......

Quiet London Sunday

The White Horse, Parsons Green - 25 paces from my front door

My lovely little neighbourhood of Parsons Green started out the day bright and sunny - but I was locked inside processing my results from the last week of auditions in North America.  It is matter of getting all the scores into the computer database in Germany so that the correct messages can be sent to the competitors - by an automated process of course. Perish the thought that there would be much human intervention!

By the time I eventually emerged of course it had clouded over.  Maybe it will clear up, in which case I will go down to the river this evening.  It is a bare half mile away at Putney Bridge.  Otherwise I might just manage those 25 paces to the pub!

I have a full day tomorrow ending up at the Garrick where Tony Pappano (one of our members) is being interviewed by another of our many distinguished members Jim Naughtie.  That will be fun.