Sublime Symphony of Passion

With the benefit of the distance of days, I can now being to consider my response to Prom 24 last Monday - a concert that began oddly but finished with magnificence. 

The first half kicked of with Bach's Toccata & Fugue, but for Orchestra with Organ accompaniment (arranged by Sir Henry Wood - the instigator of the Proms at the Royal Albert Hall). This seemed a waste; when the organ at the hall is cranked up, you realise that this strange building with its acoustically idiosyncratic design was actually constructed as part of, and an extension to, its organ. The organ is the pulsing heart of the building, which is why under-utilising it in that monument to the organ - Bach's Toccata & Fugue was a wicked abomination.

This was followed by a further abortion - a Violin & Horn Concerto by a raving Victorian lesbian. Tokenism at its worst. There's a reason there are no Violin & Horn concertos in the standard repertoire - it doesn't work. The horn drowns the violin. Its pointless. Its not worth the tube fare. Its a waste of everyone's time, patience and earwax. Add in the fact that there is no discernable melody for the orchestra (the inimitable BBC SSO) to get their teeth into, and my irritation overflows. But the second half - oh the Gods of passion smiled down upon us lucky souls in the hall that evening. Euterpe melded with Erato to produce an experience that will live with me til my dotage. 

My spies tell me the 29 year-old conductor Stefan Solyom was so hyper before the start of his proms debut he threw up, but focused his mania into a stunning, tear-jerkingly mature performance of Rachmaninov's 2nd Symphony. The third movement in particular, when he discarded his baton in favour of naked-handed direction produced sublime, synaesthetic out-of-body moments. He understood that nothing should come between bare skin and the sound. He pulled the music from the air, phrase folding over and in on itself as the orchestra danced to the hypnotically sensual sounds that was so much more than the sum of the parts. The music swirled around the hall like a tangible thing - almost glimpseable in its profound physicality. Like ripened corn swaying in the breeze; as the band swayed forward into each phase the audience, like mesmerised odalisques continued to echo that motion under the direction of the the devilishly powerful Svengali Solyom. He controlled the thoughts, the actions, the attention, the life-force of thousands, sending us flying on the zephyr of passion-made-sound until he brought us back safely to land and the spell was broken by shouts of bravo.

I make no apology for the use of the term synaesthesia. Good music should, must be experienced by all the senses simultaneously with erotic, angry passion. Violins should stroke the neck, brushing finger-tips extended by cellos teasing down and round to the breasts, the nipples. Clarinets should caress the backs of the knees, up and down the rear and inner thighs. Oboes and bassoons should be breathed in - the smell and taste of their sound internalised. Lower brass resonates in the bones, the pelvis, the spine. Good music, be it classical or rock should be visceral. It should lift you from the moment you are in, far above the Earthly concerns, liberating, freeing, making all things & dreams possible. For that experience on Monday evening, Solyom & the BBC SSO, I thank you.