A Longborough Diary 2024
Share
12 April: String Rehearsal, Chipping Campden
It’s a pleasant drive down to the Cotswolds. We’re a long way from the Rhine, to be sure, but we’ll be among those crags and castles in spirit. There’s always a buzz about the first rehearsal for a Ring cycle, even if we don’t have the full orchestra present. Indeed, perhaps the excitement is greater when it’s just the strings: although we’ll be more exposed, we’re all part of the same team, battling together with (or sometimes against) Wagner’s score. As folk arrive and find their seats, Anthony Negus greets each player individually: five seconds that each musician quietly appreciates. Outside, there seem to be some parking issues; school buses are arriving but can’t get to their allocated spaces, and before they’ve played a note half the orchestra have to down instruments and move their vehicles. But no one minds. Philip Head, the orchestra manager, still energetic in his 80s, calmly sorts everything out. Players have brought homemade cakes and biscuits to share, and there’s a sense of camaraderie, of setting out on a long, shared journey together. A few of us will be here through to the end of Walküre; others are on board for the whole cycle, till the end of the world.
We begin with Rheingold, and someone cracks a joke about ‘starting at the deep end’ of the river – it’s not particularly funny, but everyone laughs. And yet we only play a couple of bars before it all has to stop. There is some complex divisi writing in the violins, and some players have got the wrong part. It takes a while to sort out.
Eventually we’re back up and playing again, and when Anthony finally stops he gives us pithy words of encouragement. He wants more sense of line in our playing. ‘Not too short!’ he insists. ‘It’s always melodic. Whether it’s staccato, daggers, it’s always melodic.’ Our first efforts sound rather ragged to me, but Anthony shows no impatience. He knows things will improve. We keep plugging away. From time to time he gives some rapid asides about other conductors such as Horst Stein, though sometimes at the back of the first violin section we struggle to hear them.
I manage to grab five minutes with the maestro during one of the breaks; typically, he asks generous questions about what other projects I’m involved in, but of course my mind goes blank. I spit biscuit crumbs while I listen to myself mumbling something banal about Sibelius 5, and Anthony shares his wisdom on the original version of that astonishing work.
We’re soon back in the Rhine, though occasionally the various string sections seem to be swimming in different directions. Occasionally Anthony’s beat loses its lateral movement, and there’s a moment of gentle hilarity when it becomes clear that the violas have been counting in two when the rest of us have been in four. The atmosphere is mildly but constructively chaotic. As soon as Anthony stops to sort something out, players start to practise the corner they just messed up, or chat sotto voce to their desk partners, sorting out bowings or fingerings. On one hand it’s rather disrespectful to the conductor, but on the other it’s indicative of the collegiate, friendly, collaborative style which Anthony fosters. At one point he ‘shushes’ us, and then immediately apologises for doing so. He is utterly gracious; there can be few stick-wavers who engender such affection. What a contrast to those monsters who are abusive and even violent in a vain attempt to cover their own personal inadequacies.
13 April: String Rehearsal, Chipping Campden
It’s a beautiful spring day. ‘Du bist der Lenz!’ Perfect for another drive down the Fosse Way into the Cotswolds. The last of the cherry blossom; the first of the bluebells. I did some good practice on Act I of Walküre this morning, and as we get started I feel it has paid off, though there are still plenty of passages which elude me.
Anthony is lavish in his praise. ‘It was so thrilling to hear that fugato.’ We assume he’s talking about today rather than about some other occasion. Which Marx brother was it who said at a dinner party, ‘I’ve had a delightful evening. Unfortunately, this wasn’t it.’? But Anthony also has a clever way of pointing out errors without apportioning blame, except maybe to himself: ‘I don’t really get an in-tune G there.’ Or, ‘You’re quite right, it’s not a triplet.’ And he’s capable of poking gentle fun too: ‘And the violas take over … if they’re ready.’ After some painstaking work he’s able to say, ‘I’ve heard more detail there than I’ve ever heard before.’ There are some appreciative foot-shuffles from the players, but also a few chuckles, as perhaps the detail he heard was not that which Wagner intended.
In the break I can’t resist sneaking back into the rehearsal room to eavesdrop on the two harps (not six, sadly) practising the Magic Fire Music. While they strum and gliss I do some left-hand practice on that notorious passage. Walküre really is ridiculously difficult. My desk partner thinks that if you can play this first fiddle part perfectly, then the Tchaikovsky violin concerto holds no terrors. I wish I had practised my diminished sevenths a little more when I was growing up.
It’s quite draining playing this music; it’s difficult not to become overly emotionally involved. Clearly we need to play with passion and commitment, but didn’t Carlos Kleiber say to an orchestra playing Tristan, ‘gentlemen, only the audience must cry’? In the lunch break, Anthony tells us that actually that was Wagner’s instruction to Felix Mottl et al. ‘It’s not for you!’ he told his musicians. Certainly, if I let myself get carried away, as I want to, my technique will suffer and I won’t be an effective member of the section, where everyone must blend, playing as one. Being part of a violin section can be confining, but it also enables one to be part of something bigger than oneself, subsuming the ego into the collective.
24–5 April: Full Orchestra Rehearsal, Cirencester
Finally we have the wind, brass and percussion with us, the latter armed with an array of steel hubcaps of various sizes, the anvils of preference for any modern percussionist. Anthony begins by remembering the conductor Andrew Davis, who died a few days ago. We start at the beginning once more, and I find myself tearing up hearing the opening of Rheingold, even in this Alphonse Abbas arrangement with four horn parts instead of eight. Anthony’s overriding concern is once again the sense of line. ‘Keep the flow; go over the barlines.’ ‘Enjoy it over a big span, not this bar here and this bar there.’ It’s this bigger picture which he really seems to understand so much better than most conductors of Wagner. We work up quite an appetite during the morning, and Anthony eats lunch with the players, taking a genuine interest in their activities.
There’s some dry humour once again. ‘It’s always nice if we can get the chord straight away.’ Others might have said, ‘come on people, your ensemble is really poor’. Or ‘I can’t tell you how exciting it is when things fall into place’, meaning ‘as you well know, you’ve been all over the place for the last twenty minutes’. But we don’t mind. He’s right. Perhaps as a reward for our improvement, Anthony tells us the story of Act II of Walküre, and we can sit back and relax for a few minutes. Later, as we do our best with the Annunciation of Death Scene (and Anthony is pleasantly surprised at how well the Abbas arrangement works, despite the lack of Wagner tubas), it’s clear to all how much this music means to him. At times he’s holding back the tears. But then the mood lightens when he gently chides us: ‘It’s so difficult to do this bit without slowing down!’ Other conductors would have crossly said ‘don’t drag!’
Driving home I’m listening to Wagner all the way, but I don’t need a recording. It’s all in my head on a loop.
5–6 May: Walküre Sitzprobe, Blockley
Emma Bell is singing Sieglinde! I am able to tell her how much I enjoyed her Venus in Salzburg, though there are some moments of confusion when I misremember the location as Vienna. Madeleine Shaw, new to me, makes a wonderful Fricka. But it’s all so loud! We’re packed in to a small village hall, the players on the floor, with the singers assembled on the tiny stage which is more used to pantomime dames than international sopranos. The back desks of the first violins are just a few feet from the Valkyries. We have earplugs, but using them means I can’t hear myself properly. Anthony reminds everyone that forte does not mean fortissimo, but I have to leave the room once all the warrior-maidens get going at the start of Act III. It’s simply not safe. One of the horn players does the same. He’s not happy. I resist saying anything to him about a dose of one’s own medicine.
Partly because of the acoustic difficulties, we’re released early. Cheers resound through the hall, not because we don’t enjoy our work, but because it means we get to sleep/eat/practise/see our families sooner; many of us have a long drive home.
11, 13 May: Walküre Stage and Orchestra Rehearsals, Longborough Festival Opera
We’re in the pit! There’s nothing quite like it. Most of us are here very early, wanting to get used to the acoustic, examine the lighting, check sight-lines, rearrange the acoustic shields (luckily I’ve got some protection from the horns next to me), and most importantly, fill our flasks with tea. It’s not glamourous down here; there are plenty of wires and pipes and bare concrete, but an opera pit is still a magic space. As at Bayreuth, we can’t be seen by the audience. We’re enclosed in semi-darkness, with little lights on the stands illuminating the notes. It feels cosy, intimate, almost secretive. Relationships have been formed down here, and not just with the music.
Once we get going, Anthony’s attention is on the stage, and from time to time he gently cajoles the singers; they need to take a little more time here, or move along slightly more there. He knows precisely what tempi he wants, and this is helpful for the orchestra as we can be prepared for each new passage. Yet a conductor is only human, and sometimes, especially under pressure of time or the influence of adrenaline, speeds can change. Anthony has said that it takes two bars truly to establish a tempo, and so for our fingers to work, we must keep on our toes.
15 May: Rheingold Sitzprobe, Longborough Festival Opera
Something of a luxury to be in the pit for this Sitzprobe; we can hear what we’re doing and not be deafened by the wonderful singers. Having said that, it’s a tricky acoustic, where one can’t always hear the other strings as much as one would like, and I have to concentrate hard to stay with my section, especially as I’m the back marker, much closer to the horns than to the leader. It’s far easier at the front, near the other principals, or in the middle of the section where you can hear lots of people playing (or getting close to playing) the same notes.
It’s a delight to see the Rhinemaidens at the back of the pit, from where they sing their final bars. They have to contort themselves to see Anthony, but he knows just how to get the sound he wants. One word suffices: ‘Schubert!’
18 May: Rheingold Stage and Orchestra Rehearsal, Longborough Festival Opera
Orchestral players are hard to please. They don’t want to play constantly, but neither do they like to be idle for too long. A stage and orchestra rehearsal requires patience on the part of the instrumentalists, and occasional moments of frustration are difficult to avoid. The longueurs where the conductor’s attention is on stage allow me, sitting at the back, to observe players in all the other sections. There is a more than a grain of truth in most of the orchestral player stereotypes.
6 June: Rheingold Dress Rehearsal, Longborough Festival Opera
There’s a sizeable audience in for the dress – friends of the cast, patrons of the Festival, invited guests; each member of the orchestra gets to bring one person too. There’s a brisk trade in tickets (for goodwill, not money) between players, as some of us have several guests wanting to come, while others wouldn’t dare subject anyone they know to Wagner!
145 minutes without a break. Is Rheingold the longest single-span piece in the standard repertoire? Sometimes each of those minutes seems to take forever, even for an afficionado. But not today. All four scenes seem to fly by. It's been nearly three weeks since we played this music together, and at the beginning Anthony appears slightly on edge. But it goes pretty well, and by the end he seems much more relaxed. He speaks warmly to the horns afterwards. ‘We got the right tempo … from the second bar.’
8 June: Walküre Dress Rehearsal, Longborough Festival Opera
Heartfelt compliments from Anthony – on his birthday – about the previous dress. Then we plunge in. Later, he gets slightly frustrated by a problem that arises on stage, but it seems to be resolved without too much difficulty. There are so many moving parts in a Ring cycle. It would be surprising if a conductor didn’t show the tiniest bit of annoyance on occasion.
13 June: Götterdämmerung Dress Rehearsal, Longborough Festival Opera
I’m not playing in the Siegfried or Götterdämmerung performances, because sadly I couldn’t make all the dates work. Back in 2013 I did play the whole thing here at Longborough; doing so remains one of my most cherished musical experiences. So when the orchestra manager called yesterday and told me that one of the second violins had fallen ill, and asked me to jump in to play in the Götterdämmerung dress, I was thrilled, because I am actually free today. For many of us, Götterdämmerung is the most satisfying Ring opera to play. The way the motifs wind in and out of each other, the richness of the orchestration, and of course that tune at the end … For this dress I’m sitting next to a colleague whom I’ve known for a while – a fine player, which makes sight-reading much easier. And I ‘know how it goes’, which helps.
There’s a different feeling in the seconds than in the firsts. The notes are easier, and so there’s slightly more time for humour. It’s like a big happy family over here. The principal second violinist gives me a card and gift as a thank you for jumping in. You don’t get that in many orchestras.
After Siegfried’s death, as Gutrune is listening for the hunting party, distant horn calls are marked in the score. For some reason the horn player misses the last one today. Gutrune asks ‘War das sein Horn?’ Without missing a beat, Anthony mutters ‘No, it wasn’t.’ I almost mess up my next entry from laughing too much.
By the first performance of Götterdämmerung – for which I would actually be available – the poorly player has fully recovered. I’d be lying if I said part of me isn’t a little disappointed.
16 June–14 July: Performances, Longborough Festival Opera
Three complete cycles, for those playing the complete tetralogy, plus two extra performances of Walküre, one of which is conducted with understated expertise by Anthony’s assistant, Harry Sever.
No time to record thoughts in most of these sessions; intervals are taken up with eating, catching up with folk in the audience that I know, doing last-minute practice, running from the sudden rain, or just finding a quiet corner to recover. But a few memories stick:
4 July:
There are plenty of opportunities today for jokes about the corrupting nature of power, or about leaders who can’t live by their own rules, or can’t keep their pants on. George Bernard Shaw would surely relish the parallels. But actually a lot of the players have only a passing knowledge of the plot of the Ring. Most of the orchestra is under the stage, with not even a surtitle in sight; they see the singers at the Sitzprobe, and thereafter only on their way to the portaloos in the interval, though of course there isn’t one today. So the politicians get a free pass.
A
There were a couple of ragged moments, but the effect on the audience was astonishing – never have I heard such a prolonged silence at the end of a performance, even at performances of War Requiem. One unfortunate tried to clap but was roundly hushed, and the silence which re-enveloped us seemed to go on for ever. As performers we live for moments like these. I certainly find it a struggle to re-enter the real world after a Wagner performance, and this communal, meditative minute suggests I’m not alone.
A
Something happened about two-thirds of the way through Act I. I’m not sure what. Some kind of electricity came through the pit, and the music took off. Suddenly we were playing better than we had before. Occasionally this happens in an orchestra, and usually there is no obvious reason for it. Maybe one person nails a particular passage, and inspires her neighbours, or something of the conductor’s passion ignites a fire in the sound of a particular section, which soon sets a flame elsewhere. Perhaps it’s best not to know, not to analyse. But we live for such moments.
Again in Act II Anthony is visibly and profoundly moved. It seems to me, though I can’t quite see onto the stage, that Emma Bell’s anguish at Siegmund’s death is particularly harrowing to witness.
Coda
The intervals are long, but I can’t resist coming back into the pit well before the rest of the orchestra. There’s a very special atmosphere down here. Between acts it is quiet, though there’s a sense of countless notes embedded in the walls. After a while the harps begin to practise; a lone violinist returns, positions his mute and quietly, slowly, tries to articulate the Magic Fire Music. Gradually other players wander back, discussing weather, cricket, pets, cars, wine. But rarely music. And yet there’s a shared, unspoken sense of being engaged in something unusual, something rare.
What a privilege to be involved. Next year Pelleas and Tristan, and in 2027 Meistersinger. I’d better start practising …