Day #55 — An Elegant Sufficiency

I began the day by posting the sixth of my “most influential album covers” on my FB page, having been prompted to this daily challenge by an old WI friend, Betty. It’s been fun choosing the ten covers, starting with my very first LP (The Monkees) given to me by my Auntie Jean and Uncle Ray for passing my 11+ and working through the 1970s via Cat Stevens and Elton John.

It’s been a fun project - and actually, I’ve still got four days to go.

The cover today was the Classics for Pleasure recording of Tchaikowsky’s 4th Symphony and I was careful to find and post the cover of the actual recording I bought all those years ago. It’s prompted quite a few memories and several hours later, my hero and I are still chatting about this and that arising from that post.

You see, coincidences have been remembered along the way. Not only was Tchaikowsky’s 4th my first classical LP purchase, it was also my hero’s - different circumstances, different parts of the country, different timescale and different versions, but still the same piece of music! And of course, it’s got us both thinking and remembering.

For me, it was the symphony on the programme of the first concert I played in with the Hull Youth Orchestra in, I guess, 1969 or 1970. I remember being totally overwhelmed by the whole thing, especially in the third movement which goes at quite a lick and is played pizzicato - the strings are plucked, not bowed. I fear I caught fewer than half of those notes, but the experience of being part of a large orchestra was unforgettable and for the next ten years or so, I was hooked, hopefully becoming more confident with practice!

As I cooked lunch today - roast chicken - I was remembering some of the memorable events I’d been part of, because a couple of years later, my music teacher Mary Goodman suggested I audition for the Hull Philharmonic Orchestra, where she was principal viola. I joined the ranks of the second violins and played with them until I left for college a couple of years later and those concerts are some of the most fondly remembered musical experiences I have. As the chicken roasted quietly in the oven, I was remembering a concert featuring Paul Tortelier playing….well, was it Elgar? Or was it Dvorak?

Of course, I had to work that one out. I put his recordings of both cello concertos on the Sonos playlist and reached the conclusion that it was Dvorak - beautiful music I hadn’t heard in a while and as my hero came upstairs for lunch, we agreed, it was stunning. Surely, the programmes would be online…maybe I could find out for certain?

Sadly, not….though I did find they form part of Alfredo Campoli’s archive, for he was another of the great musicians who featured in the concerts of the Hull Philharmonic during those years, playing Max Bruch’s Violin concerto. I have clear memories of an elderly gentleman arriving and sitting at the back of the hall during a rehearsal. Totally unassuming, he shuffled towards the stage at some point, revealing himself to be the great violinist no less. I added Max Bruch’s first violin concerto to the playlist as we cleared up the lunch things before coming downstairs to have a bit more of a serious internet search.

On occasions though, the internet doesn’t have the answer. I sat at my desk and gazed up at the bookshelves. There was a folder with the label “Gill’s stuff” and a little closer investigation revealed two programmes which I’d completely forgotten about. Not any old programmes either, but the one from the concert I’d been thinking about, from Thursday 22nd November, 1973.

With Paul Tortelier!

I remember how he appeared at the afternoon rehearsal, somewhat aloof and with a real “aura” about him. He sat, prepared to play and as he did, entered a kind of trance, distancing himself from the goings on around him and totally absorbed in the music. His playing was magical and I will never forget how we all responded to his performance.