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Sunday 20 July 2008

I've said it - it's out there

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There's an excellent interview with Sir Simon Rattle here. Well worth a read.

I make a beeline for his all-too-rare concerts in London - I was at the recent Dvorak 7 to which he refers, which was fasinating in an 'it's Brahms' way. But I have passed on what promises to be a musically stunning Pelleas at the Royal Opera House, with the wonderful Simon Keenlyside. I have a problem with Pelleas: I don't like it. Worse than that, I am bored by it. I've yet to hear or see a performance which hasn't left me screaming in my head for it to be over and done with.

It's not just Pelleas. It's Debussy as a whole. He does nothing for me. A big yawn.

But, I now realise, it's not just Debussy. If truth be told...I don't like most French music. I find it dull and pointless. There. It's out there. I said it. It's a huge generalisation, of course. But  while are there are some French pieces I enjoy, there's not one piece of French music I would call great music - nothing more than first-rate second rank music. I do like Berlioz, but I despair when I read inflated claims about his worth. A stunning orchestrator, composer of some fantastic to hear music - the Symphonie Fantastique, La Damnation de Faust, for instance - but nothing that even comes close to any number of pieces by German or Austrian composers. Even - who'd have thought it a hundred years ago? - a British composer, Elgar, whose Second Symphony is a masterpiece.

I wish I could 'get' it. I know I'm the one missing out (although I'd defend my view about no French composer deserving to ranked alongside the likes Bach, Beethoven and Wagner and no French piece deserving the label of 'great'). I toyed with trying Pelleas again. But life's too short to pay a small fortune to sit in the Royal Opera House and be lulled to sleep by Sir Simon Rattle and Debussy.
 

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