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Topics - Jim Penn

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16
News and Current Affairs / Lila Kaye
« on: July 11, 2012, 10:33:40 am »
Channel hopping on tv last night, I chanced on an episode of "Murder She Wrote" (  ::) ) featuring that great character actress Lila Kaye - some people may remember her as the landlady of The Slaughtered Lamb in "An American Werewolf in London", or Mrs Squeers in the televised version of the RSC's epic adaptation of "Nicholas Nickleby". I've always enjoyed what I've seen of her work, not least because in my childhood I met her as she played my brother's grandmother in a not-great ITV sitcom with Michael Elphick (when my brother was a child actor). Anyway, seeing her on the telly last night, I thought I'd have a quick look for her online, and found out she died in January this year...

I wonder if Stanley has any recollections?

17
The Coffee Bar / Well, I never knew THAT!
« on: July 09, 2012, 01:10:10 am »
Wasn't sure this was right for the Waffle thread, or off-topic thread, or wherever, so I thought a sort of "you learn something new every day" thread might not go amiss...

Just read that French film/tv actress Eva Green (who played Vesper Lynd in the Daniel Craig "Casino Royale") is the great-granddaughter of composer Paul Le Flem.

18
Cinema / Colonel Blimp
« on: May 27, 2012, 10:06:56 am »
Went to see Powell & Pressburger's "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp" at the NFT yesterday - GLORIOUS new restored print, and such a wonderful film (haven't seen it for a few years, and never previously on film). It's on til May 31st, so well worth a trip for anyone within shouting distance of the South Bank...

19
News and Current Affairs / Petroc behind bars...
« on: May 26, 2012, 08:06:36 pm »
No joke, and one hopes that this all gets resolved as quickly as possible - story here.

20
21st Century / The Guardian's guide to contemporary music
« on: May 01, 2012, 09:38:17 am »
Tom Service has launched a new not-planning-a-book-like-The-Rest-is-Noise-work-in-progress-honest-guv series looking at the major figures in contemporary classical music - starting with Elliott Carter.

He's planning to do weekly blogs covering 100 major figures. It'll be intriguing to see who the other 99 will be, and while I don't normally enjoy Service's work that much, it's good to see a fairly prominent series looking at the field. If you look around the Grauniad site, there's also an introductory piece from a few days ago attempting to explode the five biggest myths about contemporary classical music (it's all squeaky gate, you need to have a beard to listen to it, that sort of nonsense  ;)).

21
Broadcast and Recorded Music / Sorabji - Organ Symphony No. 2
« on: April 19, 2012, 01:24:20 pm »
Sorabji's monumental 2nd organ symphony was mentioned on here a couple of years ago on the occasion of its first complete performance, and it's been announced this morning over at the Sorabji Forum that the work is going to be given a broadcast premiere on a Dutch internet radio station next month...  :o

The station is http://www.concertzender.nl/, and they'll be broadcasting a composite performance in two parts made from three different performances (all by Kevin Bowyer), with details as follows:

Part 1: May 11th (repeated May 18th):

Movement 1 (c. 80 minutes) - performed live at York Minster, 31/07/2010
Movement 2 - theme and variations (c. 270 minutes [sic]) - performed lived at Glasgow University Memorial Chapel, 06/06/2010 (the work's complete premiere)

Part 2: May 25th (repeated June 1st):

Movement 3 (c. 190 minutes) -
          Prelude - performed live at Glasgow Memorial Chapel, 06/06/2010
          Adagio - performed live at Glasgow Memorial Chapel, 06/06/2010
          Toccata - performed live at Berlin Cathedral, 10/07/2010
          Fugue - performed live at Glasgow Memorial Chapel, 06/06/2010

The broadcasts start at midnight and run through the night to 7 a.m., and will be filled out with extracts from Kevin Bowyer's commercial recordings of Alkan's organ music and Sorabji's first organ symphony. It's probably not going to be broadcast (or performed) too many times in the future, one fears, so if you're remotely interested, don't miss this opportunity! Set your recorders...  :)

[edited to correct approx duration of 3rd movement!]

22
21st Century / Total Immersion 2013
« on: March 26, 2012, 09:43:46 pm »
Got a brochure through the post today for the BBCSO's 2012-13 season, including the line-up for the three Total Immersion days in 2013.

First up, Oliver Knussen. So far so acceptable.

Next up, erm, Sounds From Japan. So, not content with the ridiculous notion that a few hours of a single composer's work might be considered "totally immersive", the notion that we might get a similar experience for a whole country is being wheeled out (when there are plenty of composers who, as we've said on this forum, would be really valuable additions to this series!) seems really strange. So, we're getting Takemitsu (he'll have been dead almost exactly 17 years by the time of the concert, interesting definition of "contemporary"!), Jo Kondo, Dai Fujikura ( :facepalm:), Akira Nishimura, Misato Mochizuki, Toshio Hosakawa and Akira Miyoshi (and a little bit of traditional Japanese music).

Then, finally, as if the notion of getting an immersive view of a whole country's contemporary music weren't strange enough, the third Total Immersion will be New From the North (given the subtitle Per Norgard and music from Denmark & Finland). So, that's Per Norgard, Hans Abrahamsen, Jouni Kaipainen, Kaija Saariaho, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Bo Holten, Olli Kortekangas, Jussi Chydenius, Sunleif Rasmussen, Sebastian Fagerlund and Magnus Lindberg.

On the other hand, the 2012-13 BBCSO season does at least include a rare Tippett symphony cycle (and his piano concerto!).

23
Cinema / Julianne Moore
« on: March 13, 2012, 01:30:02 pm »
Right, let's take this off the Shameless Plughole thread...!

Quote from: JSC on March 13, 2012, 01:08:52 pm
She's a bit of an icon chez Castle - I think it started with her role in Paul Thomas Anderson's Boogie Nights, although there was something else around the same time (1998ish?): I can't remember what it was now ...

I even quite like her in The Hours, a fantastically irritating film in most other respects.

I haven't seen (or even, to my shame, heard of) Vanya on 42nd St, though! :-[

I never got on so well with Boogie Nights, but Anderson's subsequent Magnolia would be near the top of my list of favorutie films if I could manage to narrow it down sufficiently, and Moore's in that too. And is as remarkable as anything I've seen her in.

Vanya on 42 St is well worth seeking out. It's a filmed performance of Uncle Vanya (in David Mamet's rendering) as directed by Andre Gregory (he of Malle's earlier My Dinner with Andre, another great piece of work) in the then-dilapidated New Amsterdam Theater on 42nd Street. It's framed as a rehearsal in front of a handful of observers (including Madhur Jaffrey, strangely), and features an extraordinary cast. Moore remains an absolute revelation in the film, where the cast are all performing the play in "civvies". It's a fairly bleak version of the play, not one for those who like their Chekhov to lean towards the comic side of tragicomic, but it's well worth seeking out.

I've never seen Julianne Moore in anything where she's been less than brilliant - though she has made some pretty poor choices of film, over the years (the Psycho remake, Jurassic Park 2, 9 Months....). But at her best (Vanya, Magnolia, Short Cuts, Far From Heaven, The Hours etc...) I'd argue she's one of the very best actos of her generation.

24
The Opera House / MITTWOCH AUS LICHT
« on: March 13, 2012, 12:20:02 pm »
Hell yes.... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-17350688

Count me in!

25
Making Music / Maurice Andre...
« on: February 26, 2012, 05:58:52 pm »
...had died.

26
Making Music / BBCSO appointment
« on: February 23, 2012, 01:26:46 pm »
Sakari Oramo announced as new Chief Conductor of the BBCSO.

27
Making Music / Emerson Quartet
« on: February 17, 2012, 04:52:46 pm »
Didn't see this when it was announced earlier in the week, but the Emerson Quartet are to undergo a first ever change of personnel in their history when David Finckel leaves them at the end of the 2012-13 season.

Announcement here.

28
Making Music / James Gaddarn
« on: February 15, 2012, 01:29:17 pm »
A friend of mine who sings with the Ealing Choral Society has told me this morning that their longtime conductor James Gaddarn has died this week (aged 87 or 88).

Gaddarn had been a professor at Trinity College of Music, founded the London Orpheus Choir (and conducted them for 55 years), had been chorus master of the Royal Choral Society amongst other choral conducting commitments, and retired from conducting less than two years ago with a performance of Bach's Mass in B minor at Southwark Cathedral.

29
Music Through The Ages / Elgar discovery
« on: February 14, 2012, 07:34:48 pm »
Work for carillon discovered in papers...

I particularly like the helpful piece of information that the work was written "for a carillon, a large instrument containing many bells". Wow. Who knew???  :facepalm:

30
Romantic / Round the clock Schubert...
« on: February 12, 2012, 12:42:49 pm »
Radio 3 are going to do another of their 200 hours wall-to-wall marathons dedicated to a single composer, this time Schubert.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16990281


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