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Roger Norrington: a maverick, an irresistible firebrand and a musical visionary

Roger Norrington: a maverick, an irresistible firebrand and a musical visionary

The Guardian7 days ago
The conductor Sir Roger Norrington, whose death was announced yesterday at the age of 91, remains still the maverick presence that classical music needs. His mission wasn't only to make us hear the repertoire we thought it knew through the prism of the techniques and playing styles of its time, rather than the ossifications of later traditions. He was also an irresistible firebrand in performance, whose energy wasn't only about inspiring his performers to get closer to the music they were playing, it was also an invitation to his audiences that their listening should be involved too. Norrington wanted everyone to feel the urgency of Beethoven's rhetorical power and rudeness, from the radiance of one of his favourite pieces, the Missa Solemnis, to the emetic contrabassoon in the finale of the Ninth Symphony, which was always the richest of raspberries in his performances and recordings.
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Haydn's symphonies, particularly, were pieces of participative performance art in Norrington's hands, in which his delight in sharing the radical humour and jaw-dropping discontinuities of the music was so evident. The conductor would turn round to his listeners - especially in the Prommers in the arena of the Royal Albert Hall in one of his 42 appearances at the Proms - to make sure we all realised just how weird and wonderful this music really was.
The revelations of hearing Norrington's historically informed musical mission in action defined an era, along with his fellow iconoclasts, such as Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Christopher Hogwood and John Eliot Gardiner, all of whom founded ensembles of period instruments, like Norrington's London Classical Players, and took the lessons they had learnt therein to transform the sound world of modern instrument orchestras. Norrington's work with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra is the sound of his later legacy in action, in Brahms, Berlioz, Tchaikovsky, and Elgar, as well as Beethoven and Mozart.
But Norrington's distinctiveness was his unshakeable belief that there was a right way to play Beethoven – and a wrong one. He was also completely committed to his idea that the curse of vibrato was an aberration in performances of all music composed before the early 20th century, whether Bach to Mahler. While his vibrato-free performances brought astonishing moments – listen to the opening of the slow movement of Bruckner's sixth symphony, and connected music from across the centuries, it was an experiment that didn't catch on.
Or at least it hasn't yet. Norrington's many crusades for the right tempo and textures in Beethoven's symphonies, for the clarity and directness of drama in Bach's Passions, for the transparency of sound world in Wagner and Debussy, have had repercussions across the whole of classical music, even with conductors and orchestras who might not think they're working under his influence. Norrington's decades-long mission to wean musical culture off the drug of vibrato may yet have its day.
And his work remains fresh and thrilling. His Beethoven recordings with the London Classical Players - all the symphonies, and the piano concertos with Melvyn Tan, from the 1980s - are as impishly radical as ever. The paradox of Norrington's performances is that what seemed like austerity and ideology was in fact a generous invitation to re-hear the incendiary meanings and power of music that had been taken for granted for too long.
Norrington was associated with what used to be called 'authenticity' in the performance of 17th, 18th, and 19th century repertoires. But he was too intelligent to believe that what he was doing was a mere restoration job or a return to a sound world of Mozart's or Beethoven's time - something that can never truly be recaptured. He wasn't a musician trying to return to the past. Instead he was going back to find a musical future. The sound of his recordings is the sound of the indelible imagination of all those composers he loved being released in all their rapier wit, sublimity and delirium into our time.
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Tragic reason why £3m overgrown mansion was left abandoned with TWO sports cars and rooms full of luxury belongings still inside
Tragic reason why £3m overgrown mansion was left abandoned with TWO sports cars and rooms full of luxury belongings still inside

Daily Mail​

time13 minutes ago

  • Daily Mail​

Tragic reason why £3m overgrown mansion was left abandoned with TWO sports cars and rooms full of luxury belongings still inside

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Love Island star Shakira tells co-stars ‘shut the f*** up' and makes honest confession about feelings for Harry
Love Island star Shakira tells co-stars ‘shut the f*** up' and makes honest confession about feelings for Harry

The Sun

time13 minutes ago

  • The Sun

Love Island star Shakira tells co-stars ‘shut the f*** up' and makes honest confession about feelings for Harry

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A smile and a wave as Uptown Girl blasted from Donald Trump's Golf Buggy One
A smile and a wave as Uptown Girl blasted from Donald Trump's Golf Buggy One

Daily Mail​

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  • Daily Mail​

A smile and a wave as Uptown Girl blasted from Donald Trump's Golf Buggy One

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An entire bush of yellow gorse suddenly moved to the right but it was only a couple of Scotland's Finest blowing their cover – and keeping the President safe. The police – estimated to number 5,000 officers – were less than chuffed at having to work 12-hour shifts to protect POTUS, even if did have Scottish blood in his veins. Still, they had been well looked after by their bosses. As well as food and drink in their goodie bags, those on extended duty at the seaside course had been given tubes of sun cream, midge repellent and even lip balm to cope with the Ayrshire climate. Some on duty didn't crack a smile, however. These were the mysterious pairings of men walking around in wet weather jackets and black skip caps. The giveaway that they weren't casual tourists from Oregon was the earpiece tucked into the collar of their shirts. At Trump Turnberry yesterday you couldn't tell your MI5 from your CIA. But the locals did seem to take it all in their stride. One nice lady living on the edge of the Ailsa course was so good-natured you could imagine her taking out afternoon tea to the two snipers standing on the tower at the bottom of her garden. Few strolled anywhere near the police cordon separating Trump's hotel and golf resort from the outside world. If they did, they could notice the drains on the road had been sealed with heavy-duty duct tape after being searched for explosives. Oh, and the metal barriers were strong enough to stop a Sherman tank. Kay Smith travelled from Liverpool to show her support for the 47th President of the United States. Wearing a 'Make America Great Again' ensemble, the 38-year-old carer dropped her red, white and blue face mask to explain the reason behind her unusual weekend pilgrimage to the shadow of Ailsa Craig. She said: 'We just wanted to get a glimpse of Trump. We love him. We were at the airport on Friday night and caught sight of Air Force One but we've not managed to see him in the flesh yet.' Miles of new 10ft fences with ultra-fine mesh had also been erected to keep protesters away – but most of them were miles away in Edinburgh and Aberdeen. If the reasons behind the huge security presence were not so serious – an alleged assassination attempt was made last year as Mr Trump played golf in Florida – the scenes at the luxury resort on the West Coast of Scotland would be nigh on farcical. The President is known to be impatient on the golf course and hates being held up. No fear at Turnberry as his was the only group on the course. It's handy when you can choose any tee time you want. It is thought Mr Trump went round the course at breakneck speed – and was back at his hotel for lunch. And his score? Well, who knows? 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