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AND HEARD FESTIVAL REPORT
An Evening at The Henley Festival 2009: an
appreciation by Jim Pritchard. Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire 10.7.2009
(JPr)
In the opera Ariadne auf Naxos in the salon of ‘the richest man in Vienna’ various artists are preparing for a new opera seria based on the Ariadne legend, with which the master of the house will divert his guests after a sumptuous dinner. The Music Master confronts the pompous Majordomo, having heard that a foolish comedy is to follow his pupil's opera, and warns that the Composer will never tolerate such an arrangement and indeed is outraged when he learns Zerbinetta and her troupe of comedians are to share the bill with his masterpiece. There is a confrontation and as it reaches its height the Majordomo returns to announce that because of limited time, the opera and the comedy are to be played simultaneously, succeeded by a fireworks display.
Such an amalgam of fine dining, high art and popular culture is The Henley Festival and its high point on most nights at 10.15pm was a display of circus acrobatics, music from a folk fiddler and percussionists, lighting effects, all culminating in a barrage of spectacular fireworks called ‘… in the sky with diamond’.
The Henley Festival, annually follows the world famous Regatta and this year featured over its five days Katherine Jenkins, a Puccini concert, a concert of cinema music with John Barrowman and guests, Three Mo’ Tenors, Arthur Smith, Jo Brand, Jan Ravens, The Bootleg Beatles, and many more on the Floating Stage or in other tented venues.
There is street theatre of infinite variety from Henley’s Resident Company of Roving Eccentrica described as ‘a collection of eccentrics, daredevils and absurdists’ who you encounter all over the Festival site to entertain you and enhance your festival-going experience. There are the Festival galleries with artworks in all media from leading artists. Other sculptures are on display (and for sale) everywhere you turn and in the Towpath Marquee this year was a special exhibition of some of the creations of the master of surrealism, Salvador Dali. Then there is the food; sausages, Tex Mex and toasted sandwiches for the less well-off but superb cuisine for those on unlimited personal or corporate budgets, including ‘Roux at the Riverside’ where I am informed on order for chefs Albert and his son, Michel Roux, was something like 4,000 bottles of champagne, 10,000 bread rolls and 2,000 portions of smoked salmon. The Riverside Restaurant, where the majority of these were served, is probably the biggest a la carte restaurant in Europe, with up to 1,000 covers per night. If you can afford to go to The Henley Festival then it is a must on the social calendar, like Royal Ascot, Chelsea Flower Show, Royal Windsor Horse Show and the Henley Regatta, of course. You really wouldn’t come for the music and entertainment that is not any more special than you would find at your local town theatre or stately home open-air concert. It is worth mentioning that all net proceeds from The Henley Festival and all related income from the Friends of the Festival scheme do go to charity. The Henley Festival Trust supports the Arts in the Community working with the ‘groups of young, young at heart and the disadvantaged alike’ and as such I am not adverse to people spending their own money how they want to if there is a worthy cause at the end of the enterprise such as this. The night I went I chose John Suchet’s illustrated lecture entitled Beethoven – the last Master and Pure Gold from the Silver Screen a concert with songs and music from the movies introduced by Sir Michael Parkinson and featuring John Barrowman, Kerry Ellis, Cantabile who are a vocal quartet, and Capital Voices. John Suchet drew a large audience to Club Marquee for his Beethoven lecture that was accompanied by musical excerpts performed by the accomplished Simon Mulligan at the piano. Mr Suchet has been a reporter and newscaster for ITN for many years but published an acclaimed trilogy of books on Beethoven in the late 1990s and has since performed his show on the composer in many theatres and concert halls throughout the UK. He knows his Beethoven but (not surprisingly for a journalist) did not seem to know when to edit his own material and some of the anecdotes went on too long - as did the show in the circumstances - and many of his audience with dinner reservations or seats at the movie music concert drifted away leaving him with just a few dozen to hear the end of his ninety minute presentation.
He gave me a few new insights into Beethoven and his eccentric personality and problems with women that I did not know. I agreed totally with him when he said that it is ‘one of the true miracles of art’ that as Beethoven’s deafness increased his works became greater. It was interesting how the composer’s dedication of his famous Bagatelle ‘Für Elise’ was probably misread and should be ‘Für Therese’ - as ‘for’ Therese Malfatti a student of his that he proposed to but who turned him down. We learnt how Beethoven never did find a wife and there was ‘only one woman who returned his love’ the ‘Immortal Beloved’ whose name we do not know. We were told about Beethoven as the ‘great improviser’ and the piano challenges he won most notably with Steibelt and about his relationship with his nephew Karl van Beethoven whose guardian he became later in life. Suchet concluded with an extract from Grillparzer’s famous oration for Beethoven read at his funeral on 29 March 1827 that in the opening lines has ‘The last master of resounding song, the gracious mouth by which music spoke, the man who inherited and increased the immortal fame of Handel and Bach, of Haydn and Mozart, has ceased to be; and we stand weeping over the broken strings of an instrument now stilled’ going on later to add ‘He was an artist, and who shall stand beside him?’ Maybe not the ‘last Master’ – perhaps that was Wagner? - but Beethoven was indubitably a ‘great Master’.
Top price tickets for the Pure Gold from the Silver Screen concert were over £80 and this was a concert that would otherwise have been put on by the BBC in one of its venues such as at London’s Mermaid Theatre or elsewhere for an audience given tickets for free. Indeed the concert can be heard for free in the BBC Concert Orchestra’s regular ‘Friday Night is Music Night’ BBC Radio 2 slot on 28 August. Stewart Collins, Henley Festival’s artistic director, informally introduced the concert noting ‘How we are all a trifle p**sed off about the weather’ as despite the forecast of a fine evening there was light rain falling on those sitting in front of the floating stage in deck chairs. Those of us further back in the Grandstand had the benefit of a canopy. Sir Michael Parkinson, John Barrowman and Kerry Ellis were driven over to the stage area in the splendid ‘Sheila the Boat Car’ that I was subsequently told was designed by a local boatbuilder.
Sir Michael Parkinson was the genial host to the proceedings. He seemed to have enjoyed Henley’s pre-concert hospitality and was very relaxed and diverted from his script on several occasions. He referred to the audience in the open area in the white plastic macs that were protecting them against the rain as looking like ‘a field of snowdrops’ and when a sneeze from someone interrupted the proceedings he said ‘God Bless You Lady – that was a musical sneeze – a Gershwin sneeze!’ The very experienced conductor of the exemplary BBC Concert Orchestra was the American, Larry Blank and we were given songs and incidental music from famous movies down the years from the Gershwins’ ‘I’ve Got Rhythm’, Rodgers and Hart’s ‘I Could Write a Book’, Cole Porter’s ‘Anything Goes’ to Dolly Parton’s ‘Nine to Five’, Tim Rice/Lloyd Webber’s ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina’ and Jan Kaczmarek’s ‘Impossible Opening’ from Finding Neverland.
Kerry Ellis has just finished playing the role of Elphaba in the London production of Wicked, stunningly blonde and beautiful she has a clean and bright musical voice but is lacking just a little in colour and expression. The highlight of her individual songs was a sparkling rendition of Don Black/John Barry’s ‘Diamonds are Forever’. Also present were the vocal quartet Cantabile who Sir Michael said had first been on his Parkinson show in 1981 although he later said only two of the present line-up were there with the other two claiming they had not been born then! Their a cappella contributions had an end-of-the-pier variety show feel to them and although their ‘Strangers in the Night’ as sung by Frank Sinatra as one of them ‘heard on an old 78 and wrote down note for note’ was funny with all the pops, crackles and stuck needle effects, it went on too long and their version of ‘Anything Goes’ misfired.
Announced as ‘Fresh from saving the world in Torchwood’ because that Sci-Fi show was at the end of a week’s residency on BBC1 and had been compelling drama mainly because of a tremendously emotional central performance from John Barrowman as Captain Jack Harkness. Here the self-styled ‘hardest working person in showbusiness’ was displaying another of his rich talents as a refined vocalist of popular music. On TV John Barrowman’s personality can be over-bright in toothy smile and charm but that should not deflect from what a fine singer he is in this sort of music. He has a wonderful way with the words of a song and gives everything he sings the respect it deserves. His personal best moment was an impassioned performance of Julie Gold’s ‘From a Distance’ and the high point of the concert in its entirety was at the end when he joined with Miss Ellis to sing David Baerwald and Kevin Gilbert’s ‘Come What May’ from Moulin Rouge.
It had been nice – as Sir Michael Parkinson – earlier remarked ‘to be reminded that this wonderful repertoire of music exists’. As the audience bayed for an encore there was to be no more because, of course, it was getting late and it was time for the fireworks!
With the image of the constant flotilla of motor boats, small yachts, row boats, punts and even a paddle-steamer passing up and down behind the floating stage as the concert went on, as well as, my collective thoughts about the whole evening – I could only agree with Sir Michael Parkinson who later told a small audience in a brief post-concert interview that there is ‘something quintessentially English’ about The Henley Festival and something ‘harking back to Edwardian times’. That indeed sums it all up well – though what may sum it up even more is that for that ‘Barnsley lad’ - who lives in Bray not far from Henley - it was his very first time at The Henley Festival.
The Henley Festival is undoubtedly a terrific five days of music, art, comedy, street theatre, food and spectacle. Do go sometime if you have the chance to!
© Jim Pritchard
Details of the 2010 Festival will appear nearer the time on the website http://www.henley-festival.co.
Photo of ‘Sheila the Boat Car’ by John Spence courtesy of The Henley Festival.