I have followed the Darbar Festival for some time thanks to the broadcasts on Sky Arts 2 but this was the first time I had been able to attend any live performances. While it is difficult for those of us raised within the western classical tradition to follow the nuances, the sense of joy, excitement and exceptional professionalism is overwhelming. The Festival had run from Thursday 27 September and I caught up with it on Sunday, with a sarod and tabla recital from Pratyush Banerjee and Sanju Sahai. They opened with Raga Patdeep. Against a gentle drone the first notes from the sarod seemed to creep out of a warm haze, the slow vibrato at the end of a note leaving it to disappear back into the silence of the drone. Gentle intakes of breath from the audience around me as the raga continued made me realise that I was obviously missing the subtleties, even though I was mesmerised by the beauty of the line being spun before me and the delicacy of the musical invention. Sometimes a brief melodic invention would flower, only to be as gently subsumed into the continuing melos.

The structure of the raga becomes easier to follow once the tabla enters with its more extrovert approach to rhythm. The interplay between strings and drum provides ever more emotional excitement , mixing stunning technical finesse with the joy of creativity.

As the raga came to an end I was amazed to note it had lasted over an hour and a quarter. It felt like little more than a few minutes.

Pratyush Banerjee announced that the second piece in their performance, Raga Sindhura, was less popular than the opening work. It felt darker toned, with a plaintive quality, retaining its introspection even with the entry of the tabla.

One the radical differences from any western concert was the realisation that the performers are able to continue playing even while retuning their instruments, as happened quite frequently. There is no fuss here; they simply let the drone and possibly their fellow players continue while they adjust their own tuning, even if that means hitting the tabla pegs quite noisily!

In the evening we heard Thevarajah Pirashanna on mridangam, Bangalore Prakash on ghatam, Aravindhan Baheerathan on flute, and Kandiah Sithamparanathan on morsing. They opened with a piece which is used to draw the statue of a deity back into the temple. It was light, fresh and dancelike throughout, with an exquisite flute solo at the opening. This was followed by a composed piece in sixteen beats for flute solo, which, if anything, was even more ravishing that the first. Krishna played the flute, and hearing this stunning performance one can understand why the instrument was associated with the deity. It was like hearing a lark in paradise. As a total contrast the section that followed was given over to an elaborate set of variations for percussion, led by Thevarajah Pirashanna on the double headed drum, the mridangam, which impressed with the subtlety of rhythms produced.  Anyone who has heard Stomp will realise that any object in the right hands can produce music and Bangalore Prakash’s playing of the ghatam – a large unglazed pot – was a case in point. The ability to change dynamics and tone within such a limited object were remarkable. The word morsing may be unknown in the west but surprisingly the instrument is not for it was soon clear this is a Jaw’s Harp. Kandiah Sithamparanathan played the morsing as a virtuoso instrument, changing the pitch and tone as well as providing intricate rhythmic variations. All three ended the session passing invented lines to each other for elaboration, copying or embellishment. It was a joyous way to bring the piece to an end.

Their concert concluded with a Tamil hymn in seven beats which allowed all the players to be involved in an exhilarating dance. These young players are based in London and deserve to be snapped up with enthusiasm.

All of the concerts have been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and will later be shown in Sky Arts 2. The Festival now has a new website www.darbar.org from which downloads are available. It is hoped that Festival DVDs will soon also be available. We do hope so! BH

Bohuslav Martinu is better known in reputation than performance in this country so it is not surprising that this was the first performance of Julietta to be staged in London. Richard Jones’ production was widely praised when it opened on the continent and it is here staged with all of the aplomb which we expect of his work. So far, so good. The difficulty comes with the work itself. The score allows the text to come through with clarity – for once there was hardly any need for the sur-titles – but rarely makes any profound impact. Where characters are indulging in fantasy there are long stretches of lyrical writing which are pleasant without being memorable but for too much of the rest of the work the musical line rarely lifts above the level of accompaniment to the voices.

The very clarity of text is also something of a disadvantage. Hearing the words we necessarily engage with them. When they make little sense, we are left confused, as are many of the individuals on stage. That the presentation is a theatrical expression of a dream is convincing, but has the effect of leaving us uninvolved in the action. Peter Hoare’s finely sung Michel has to carry most of the narrative weight but his confusion leaves us unmoved. Some fine moments in act two with the Julietta of Julia Sporsen do not go far enough to captivate us. Yet if we are meant to be at some sort of Brechtian distance it is unclear how we are being led to respond.

A fine cast, often doubling parts, bring moments of humour and the surreal. I particularly liked the horn player in evening dress who wanders through the action like something from Magritte. Edward Gardner and the orchestra do their best to convince us that all is well but, for all the efforts on stage and in the pit, I can’t help feeling rather short-changed. BH

Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra

The Dome Brighton, 22 September 2012

With the proms only just over we are already launched into the winter orchestral season on the South Coast. The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra under Rory Macdonald brought a popular programme of familiar works, but started with one which was less known to most of the audience – Dvorak’s The Noon Witch. The composer’s late tone poems are so easy on the ear it is surprising they are not better known and one has no need of the underlying story to enhance one’s enjoyment. Not that we were encouraged to do so on this occasion, as the conductor gave as a finely honed, if somewhat tongue-in-cheek rendition of the fairy-story before the orchestra started playing.

The dance rhythms and strong Czech feel to the score are immediately appealing and there is little sense of the final tragedy even when it arrives. The range of tonal colour Dvorak requires was well found both by soloists within the orchestra and the deft handling from the podium.

If the Dvorak had seemed swiftly moving this was to be true of the whole evening. In the second half we had a highly extrovert reading of Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony. The first two movements seemed to be looking back to stricter classical lines with the crisp clarity of phrasing and dance-like underpinning. There was little sense of the listener being able to idle away his time by the brook – which seemed to be in full flood in this reading and alive to the possibilities of creation.

If the final three movements were more conventional in approach, they continued the sense of extrovert enthusiasm and thanksgiving which had been engendered from the start. This may have been a young man’s reading – it will be interesting to note Rory Macdonald’s timing for this symphony twenty-five year hence! –  but it was none the less very welcome.

Between the two works we heard Bruch’s first violin concerto. Though enthusiastically received by the audience I had ongoing problems with the soloist Barnabas Kelemen. That he has a sound technique is not in doubt but the intensity of his vibrato and the constant sense of strident attack became unpleasant. Even the introspection of the slow movement was not allowed to flower, as the tension from the soloist was every present. The other problem I had was the constant tapping of his feet, sometimes to the point of stamping out the rhythm as if the concert was for violin and tap dancer. I was sitting towards the back of the stalls and could hear it clearly; it must have been overpowering for those sitting at the front. A great pity, for the orchestral colour and phrasing throughout was impressive in what should have been a memorable performance.

Surprisingly, for such a popular progamme, there were many empty seats.  The next concert will be the opening of the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra season on Sunday 21 October. BH