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13/02/08 : Crashes and bangs

Well, my resolution to blog more often started well . . .

I seem to have picked up some new readers via Sarah. So, hello, welcome, stick around - I'm bound to write something fascinating one day soon.

In the meantime, here's something a little different from my usual musical offerings. This is a poke in the eye to the people who continually market all "classical" music as beautiful, relaxing etc. (Classic FM I'm looking at you).

Go on, just watch it . . . it's only four minutes long . . .

This was from one of last years more interesting proms, featuring a youth orchestra from Venezuela. Apologies for sounding racist, but they're a weird looking bunch who I'd guess spend almost as much on hair gel as instruments. The second half of the concert featured music from Venezuelan composers and they dressed up in traditional costumes. Entertaining, but not what I'd programme after Shostakovich's intense tenth symphony. Still, this performance of the violently dramatic second movement is possibly the best I've heard.

It's a shame there isn't a video of the last bit of the finale, where old Shosty goes around the orchestra defiantly banging out the notes of his initials, almost as if he's metaphorically jumping up and down on Stalin's grave. Fantastic stuff.

Sarah just dismisses it all as "crashes and bangs", the philistine.