A Concert

The "ResidentieOrkest" is one of the better-known symphony orchestras in Holland and its home base is The Hague, the Residence of the Queen and of Parliament (hence the name, I suppose). For years I had a season ticket, but after my husband died, I gave up. Anyway, from this year on the orchestra will not limit itself to The Hague, but give concerts in Leyden as well, which they apparently stopped doing some 20 years ago. The "Stadsgehoorzaal", the concert hall in Leyden is smaller than the one in The Hague. The advantage is that one is much closer to the orchestra, so it is a far more intimate experience. This evening Christian Zacharias was the conductor, as well as the soloist in Mozart's Piano Concerto (nr. 27). Because of his double function, the grand piano was placed in such a way that the keys were facing the audience, and the soloist was facing the orchestra, sitting with his back towards us. It was amazing to see how seemingly  effortlessly Zacharias changed from being the soloist to being the conductor, even doing two things at the same time, using his head, and his shoulders to conduct. And probably his eyes and facial expressions as well, but we could not see that. It was a marvellous performance. Christian Zacharias seemed happy to be able to share his joy of music with us and also inspired the orchestra by his enthusiasm and beautiful performance.

Because this was the first concert of this orchestra in Leyden, apparently organised after the programmes for this season had been printed, there was no programme available. Instead the conductor introduced each piece to us personally. Unfortunately there were no flowers either, which Christian Zacharias clearly deserved. A bad omission of the organisers? We tried to make up for it by applauding till our hands hurt! And to top it all I got my ticket at half price, since this was a new venture and not everybody was aware of this concert. I hope this will become a tradition. (the concerts, not the half price although I would not mind that either).

Schubert, Entr'acte nr. 1 from 'Rosamunde' and his Symfonie nr. 8 'Unvollendete',

were played as one piece, without a pause, being written in the same key. Zacharias said that he considered the Entr'acte from Rosamunde to be the third movement of the Unvollendete, although it came first! It is a way of looking at it. But I must admit it worked very well indeed.

The progamme began with Ravel, Le tombeau de Couperin. Here is a recording of that piece, played by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Pierre Boulez.