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Susan’s Bookshelves: Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens

Whenever I return to Dickens, I wonder why I don’t reread him more often. All that glittering irony, rich characterisation and accurate observation as if he were sitting with a sketchbook. Yes,  he probably is the greatest novelist in English and Dombey and Son (1848) is one of his best.

It’s the story of a London based shipping magnate whose whole life is focused on his thriving business and the acquisition of a son to work with and ensure the future. There is a son but he’s tubercular like his mother who dies giving birth to him. An older child, Florence, who becomes effectively the novel’s central character is ignored and despised for being both alive and female. Of course – and I don’t intend to give away too much plot here – Mr Dombey is eventually punished for his unthinking cruelty and then redeemed so that, after 900 or so pages, we get a satisfying happy ending. Like most of Dickens’s novels, Dombey and Son comes with moral underpinning.

When Philip Larkin produced the unforgettable line “They fuck you up, your mum and dad” in his profoundly pessimistic, 1971 poem This Be The Verse, he was writing nearly 130 years after Dombey and Son, but Dickens is making the same point. Parenting is a major theme. In addition to the dysfunctional Dombey family we get flawed Edith and her appalling “mutton dressed as lamb” mother along with grasping Mrs Brown and her chilly daughter Alice who comes with a history which is, for a long time, mysterious. In contrast Dickens gives us the delightfully happy Toodles family, producing and nurturing lots of children and Sol Gills, uncle to Walter who acts as a very loving father to his nephew. And when Florence meets Edith they bond immediately as mother and daughter although it does not end happily. By the end of the novel Florence has a child of her own who, of course, is getting all the affection he deserves. The happy parents and children highlight the unhappy ones.

James Carker, who is Mr Dombey’s right hand man in the office, is the villain of the piece. And we know that he’s up to no good from the moment he appears. His teeth are the giveaway. They are large, white, gleaming and predatory. And for hundreds of pages Dickens never mentions Mr Carker without a reference to his teeth – it’s witty in a sinister sort of way and clearly signals that a man with such teeth is not to be trusted. That’s why reading a book is always better than any TV version such as the BBC 1983 Dombey and Son.  Irony disappears in adaptation and you lose elements like those evocative teeth.

It is often said that Dickens was no good at virtuous women. And it is true that Florence (like Agnes in David Copperfield, Rose Maylie in Oliver Twist and  Harriet Carker in Dombey and Son) is a bit saccharine although considering how badly she is treated by her father, we sympathise with her in horror. I’m not sure, though that it’s plausible, for someone so starved of paternal affection throughout her childhood to go on loving him unconditionally. She’s sad and puzzled – but never critical which somehow makes her too saintly to be believed. No teenage hormones in 1848?

What Dickens is utterly brilliant at are the individualists. Susan Nipper, Florence’s devoted maid and friend, is a gorgeous creation. She has flashing dark eyes, a forthright manner, will not suffer fools and would do anything for Florence. When something finally flips and she beards Mr Dombey in his study and forcibly tells him what she thinks of him, you want to cheer her on.

Captain Cuttle, is eccentric and sometimes misguided, but he’s very decent and most of us would be honoured to have him in our lives. And we’ve all met people like the irritating, pompous Major Bagstock, when we couldn’t find a way of avoiding them.

Dombey and Son is set in the 1840s as the railway lines north of Kings Cross were being developed. The detailed, graphic, colourful description of Camden Town under very disruptive reconstruction would have been very current in 1848 when the novel was published. Mr Toodles, who lives nearby, works on the building site and later becomes a soi-disant well-paid engine driver. It really conveys what an era of dramatic change this was when suddenly you could get from London to Birmingham in a couple of hours. Nothing equalled it until the commercial airlines were developed nearly a century later. In some ways railways are thematic in Dombey and Son. No prizes for guessing how a certain toothy gentleman gets his comeuppance.

As so often in a Dicken’s novel there is also an education theme although this time it doesn’t relate to cruelty and abuse. Doctor Blimber’s school in Brighton, where the ailing Paul Dombey is sent to board aged 6, is all about being crammed with the classics. The boys (including Toots – another quirky, loveable but troubled character who lasts the whole novel) are well fed, treated kindly and live quite comfortably but Dr Blimber, his daughter and the gloriously named Mr Feeder force feed Latin and Greek relentlessly. Dickens, of course, is jokily sceptical about the wisdom and usefulness of all this. Florence, meanwhile, is lodged with another whacky, self-interested character called Mrs Pipchin round the corner so that she can visit her beloved, but delicate, little brother at weekends.

As an artistic trait, the Dickensian coincidence is up there with the Rossini crescendo or the Reubens fleshy female. So of course there are lots of them in Dombey and Son when all those minor characters and subplots turn out to be linked and he ties up all the loose ends with a flourish and maybe a tear.

In short I loved it to bits and admired it – again. And I think this is the third time, or maybe the fourth, that I’ve read it. It improves with age like good claret. Warmly recommended.

Next week on Susan’s Bookshelves: Fyneshade by Kate Griffin.

Philharmonia Orchestra

Jakub Hrusa (conductor)

Stephen Isserlis (cello)

Royal Festival Hall

24 March 2024

This was an all-Russian concert which had you pretty much on the edge of your seat throughout. As soon as Jakub Hrusa started Mussorgksy’s Night on a Bare Mountain at an electifyingly fast tempo, it was clear this was going to be something quite special. No chance, or need, of a “warm up” for this orchestra in this fired-up mood.

One of the best things about the opener was the excellent double bass section, all eight of then leaping from pizzicato to arco so fast that one could barely see their right hands moving. It underpinned the excitement, as did the growling tuba counterpointed so deftly against the piccolo, the sensitively managed contrasts and the beautiful melody first introduced by the violas.

 Photo by Mark Allan

Now, I have to confess that Kabalevksy’s 1964 cello concerto was new to me but I now agree with soloist Stephen Isserlis who played the UK debut in 1981. He says in his programme interview that he can’t understand why it isn’t played more often and better known. It’s full of the sort of soulful anguish which dogged Russian artists in the 1960s and very reminiscent of Shostakovich. Isserlis played the startling opening pizzicato section with dramatic freshness and treated us to a great deal of passionate and energetic virtuoso playing thereafter – keeping  an occasional eye on his music stand, presumably because he doesn’t get the chance to play this intriguing, compelling piece all that often. It’s performed seamlessly without movement breaks so it felt pretty intense. Eventually, though Isserlis and Hrusa steered, through the anguish, towards the hesitant but beautiful melody at the end: a resolution of sorts.

Then, Isserlis told the audience that “ While we’re in Kabalevsky mode” he would play the composer’s Study in Major and Minor as his encore. It’s short, witty and good fun – and very different from the concerto.

Everyone who entered the hall via Door G stopped to look at the four huge, cathedral-size, cast bells at downstage left, each engraved with its provenance. This was clearly going to be Pictures at an Exhibition with a difference. Most of us are used to Ravel’s orchestration of Mussorgsky’s piece so to hear Stokowskii’s exuberantly exhilarating arrangement, played with all the panache the Philharmonia can muster, was quite an experience.

The opening Promenade is, in this version, given to the strings who are then allowed to build to a lush American sound. There were really too many high spots to mention but I particularly liked the beautifully played bassoon in duet with the saxophone, the quality of horn and brass work in the Bydio section and the chickens sounding really avian – lots of glissandi –  in the Ballet of the Chickens in their Shells along with the arresting grotesqueness in Baba Yaga. And so, finally,  to the grandiloquence of The Great Gate of Kyiv, those evocatively sonorous bells and a hugely exaggerated rall which worked a treat in this context.

The orchestra required for this work was enormous: two piccolos, two harps, double brass, celeste, organ and big string sections. That’s probably why we don’t hear it very often in this arrangement. So all credit to the Philharmonia for pushing the boat out so powerfully.

 

 

Maidstone Symphony Orchestra

Brian Wright (conductor)

Iyad Sughayer (piano)

Mote Hall, Maidstone

Written late in Schubert’s tragically short life, his Symphony No 9 is “Great” in every sense. It is long, intense, hugely challenging and stunningly beautiful. And MSO delivered a very pleasing performance. The opening is every horn player’s nightmare but the performance soon settled into a warmly musical rendering.

I admired, among many other things, the precision of the string vamp in support of the woodwind melody in the andante. It is always good to hear string detail crisply articulated. There was delightful work from the trumpets and principal flautist Anna Binney excelled herself – as ever. Wright stressed the dynamic contrasts across the landler and the trio in the third movement and really brought out that exquisite little homage to Beethoven in the finale.

To perform a work of this scale and complexity as well as this must have taken a great deal of rehearsal and I’m not surprised that everyone looked tired at the end.

The first half of the concert comprised Mendelssohn’s attractive, programmatic overture The Fair Melusine which deserves to get more outings, followed by Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No 3.

Pianist Iyad Sughayer is an exceptionally charismatic, communicative performer. He plays with his face as much as his hands, clearly adores the music and feels every note and nuance. The bright, opening allegro came with plenty of the brio the composer stipulated with Wright ably managing a businesslike accompaniment from the orchestra. Rarely have I heard the cadenza played with more electric drama which made for a real contrast with the ensuing andante with its muted strings and impassioned – but never mannered opening. It was played, palpably, with love. Sughayer’s infectious enthusiasm – and very evident communication with the orchestra – ensured rippling insouciance and joix-de-vivre in the final movement as he launched it out of the pregnant silence at the end of the andante.

Sughayer, who comes from Jordan and has Jordanian/Palestinian heritage, then played a very short lyrical Khachaturian piece as his encore: a complete contrast to the Beethoven. And I was, incidentally, delighted to see him in the interval chatting very naturally and engagingly but unassumingly to some admiring children.  Yes, the next generation needs to be encouraged and brought to concerts!

 

 

China Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra

 Daye Lin (conductor), Jiaoneg Nie (cello), Tamsin Waley Cohen (Violin)

 Fairfield Halls, Croydon 22 March 2024

Tan Dun has a long association with China Shenzhen Symphony Orchestra which was established in 1982. He is currently principal honorary conductor so it made sense to start this concert with what is probably his best known work. The highly atmospheric, vibrant theme music for the 2000 film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has been reworked by the composer as a three movement piece – effectively a cello concerto.

Jiapeng Nie is a passionate cellist who really leans on the glissandi. High spots included a fabulous percussion interlude in which the cello eventually joins – almost inaudibly. I also liked the delivery of the melody-rich, lyrical middle movement with all five percussionists playing different sorts of drums with bare hands and outstretched fingers, as if playing pianos. The passage in which string players play percussive pizzicato, stopping the sound with a tap of the hand came off effectively too.

Then came the arrival of most of the woodwind section (only flutes in the Tan Dun piece), the brass section and the departure of four fifths of the percussion because Poème by Ernest Chausson (1896) needs only timps. Tamsin Waley-Cohen is an accomplished soloist whose double stopping and poise is a masterclass in how to do it. It’s a difficult piece which requires a great deal of sensitive control which it got in this performance from both Waley-Cohen and conductor Daye Lin who packed it with high levels of both elegance and eloquence. Then, as her encore, Waley Cohen treated us to  Recitativo and Scherzo-Caprice by Fritz Kreisler: a showpiece which allowed us to enjoy more of that excellent double stopping.

But the real meat in this concert came after the interval in a glitteringly arresting performance of Mahler’s Symphony Number 1 (1889). The requisite huge forces assembled (including eight horns, three bassoons and a contra, double brass and so on), it was compelling almost from the first note with three off-stage trumpets in duet with the horn and I’m not quite sure how you make that first subject melody sound as mysterious as Chinese film music but that’s what Daye Lin does – his right hand more or less beating time while he signals with his extraordinarily expressive left hand, every finger conveying a message.

The second movement – based on an Austrian Landler – was very exciting with terrific oboe work and as for those sumptuous slides in the “trio”, players were clearly relishing them as much as I was. The third movement, which famously riffs on Frere Jacques in a  minor key as a funeral march, is always glorious and this performance more than did it justice with some unusually colourful tempo changes. Moreover, this was the first time I had ever noticed the Klezmer sound in the accelerating sexy brass section but it makes perfect sense. Although he later converted (expediently?) to Catholicism, Mahler’s parents were both Jewish.

The rousing finale packed  lots of drama and dynamic contrasts and it was a nice touch to bring the eight horns to their feet for their big moment just before the end. I suspect it will be long time before I hear this symphony played with such joyous energy. Mahler has to be played with feeling or it doesn’t work – and this certainly was. And if it was a bit exaggerated in places then it just added to the excitement.

It’s a pity, therefore, that this concert was so sparsely attended. Many people missed what turned out to be quite an experience, especially in the second half.

This 2024 publication presents eleven short stories which look at woman’s experience from a range of angles. Some of the eight characters characters feature in more than one story and they’re rather neatly all under one roof  in the last one “A Wedding in Full Swing – like a kaleidoscope shaken into its final pattern.

They are stories about everyday life rather than about anything dramatically contrived thus, for example. the account of Rey going to Cyprus, her mother’s birthplace as part of mourning and meeting her cousin for the first time feels very truthful and authentic.

In other stories we encounter the friendship between Ash and Han, the broken relationship between Mel and Rey, pushy Magenta trying to get her daughter Ruby to do things she doesn’t want to do and much more.

Several of the stories feel very play-like:  two characters who could easily double the peripheral ones and I’m not surprised to learn that Tutku Barbaros, an alumna of the Royal Court Writers’ Programme has written prizewinning  plays and taken work to the Edinburgh Fringe. She is also – clearly –  a poet because in places the stories become blank verse narratives which pound along engagingly. For example this is from “Dia is a Leader”

She has so much to say now that her rage has changed shape.

Now that it’s no longer brittle,

Now that she’s soft

A something flexible with motion, that she can channel

and has channelled

and will channel.

It enables Barbaros to be very direct and to express some profound thoughts and ideas on behalf of her characters without the clutter of, for instance, too many speech tags, Even her prose is like this.

Tuktu Barabos is a South Londoner of Turkish Cypriot heritage and I’m sure that much of the inspiration for these engaging stories has come from her own life experiences. I could have done, though without the rather bossy, didactic list at the beginning telling me which themes underpin which stories – a cross between a trigger warning and a reading lesson in case I missed the point.

You can order this book direct from its publisher Dear Damsels  https://deardamsels.com/product/all-the-women-she-knows-stories-growth-change-sisterhood/

Next week on Susan’s Bookshelves: Dombey and Son by Charles Dickens

 

 

 

 

Frank’s Closet continues at the Union Theatre until 30 March 2024.

Star rating: four stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ✩

Stuart Wood’s tenderly affectionate 2009 show fits the shabby chic of Union Theatre perfectly. It’s all layers of tulle, red lights and painter pillars thanks to the appropriately retro designs by Catherine Phelps (set) and Ben Bull (lighting).

It’s a drag queen show in which five of seven performers are male and cheery campness is what makes it work so well. Sasha Regan, as ever, works wonders with her cast.

The eponymous Frank (Andy Moss) is about to marry his partner Alan (unseen until the final scene). The problem is that Frank has been collecting theatre costumes all his life and now they have to go – to the V&A.

So we are treated to an exposition of the costumes and the people who wore them while he explores his closet one last time. Gentle, witty nostalgia is what this is all about.

Not that there’s anything self-indulgent about this show which pounds along with zippy energy and some fine singing, often in harmony, and although there was a slight issue with sound balance (band louder than singers) at the start on press night, it soon settled.

Moss is rueful, engaging and appealing as Frank …

Read the rest of this review at Musical Theatre Review: https://musicaltheatrereview.com/franks-closet-union-theatre/

Philharmonia

Pablo Heras-Casado

Nicola Benedetti

Royal Festival Hall

14 March 2024

Louise Farrenc (1804-1875) is at last getting the recognition she deserves, I have,  for example, spent most of this term learning the second violin  part of her third symphony and her work is frequently aired on Radio 3.  And now comes a performance of this fine overture in E minor (Op 23) which starts with a solemn intro followed by appealing work with lots of semi-quavers and a colourful dynamic range – all brought out  by Pablo Heras-Casado who is business like and unshowy and doesn’t use a baton. The performance included some  attractive clarinet playing.

On this occasion the Philharmonia was ably led by Marika Faltskog who had to move at this point in the concert.  The harp was wheeled into place between first and second violin front desks for Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy  from which position harpist Heidi Krutzen could duet with violinist Nicola Benedetti,

Benedetti gave us a very sweet sound in the first movement and some resolutely incisive double stopping in the second which ended with a stunningly beautiful segue into the andante. The whole piece is folksong-inspired but this is the most folksy movement of the four. Benedetti and Heras-Casado made it sound both natural and affectionate without self-indulgence. Then in the fourth movement we got Benedetti almost dancing through all those demanding virtuosic passages interspersed with lyrical contrasting moods underpinned by the harp.

Now, visibly and comfortably pregnant, Benedetti radiates friendliness on stage –  and not only with her fellow players. A teenage boy presented her with flowers from the front row and I was moved to see her crouch to his level and engage him in a proper conversation. She’s a communicator in every sense.

And so to Beethoven’s Fifth. Like anyone else who has spent her whole life standing firmly on the classical music square, I’ve heard this symphony, literally, hundreds of times. Yet I never cease to marvel at the magic old Ludvig weaves with piccolo and timp in the final allegro. And Heras-Cabado (now without score) ensured that we heard and appreciated every beat of that joyous excitement.

 

He also treated us to a nippy, nicely modulated first movement, a silky grandiloquent andante and a dramatically robust scherzo with some splendid work from lower strings and woodwind. And my goodness, Heras-Cabado is good at coaxing contrasting dynamics. His pianissimos are magical.

Another enjoyable evening with the Philharmonia –  who must have been gratified to see the hall packed almost to capacity.

The Barber of Seville

Charles Court Opera Company

Wilton’s Music Hall

When Rossini (aged only 24) wrote the Barber of Seville in 1816 it was intended to entertain the masses and make him lots of money. It did both.  It was nothing to do with elitism, audience dress codes, handwringing, subsidies and wokeism.  And that’s exactly the spirit of Charles Court Opera Company’s two hour take on it. I smiled so much that I left the theatre with my face aching because this highly accomplished production is such enormous fun.

First – of course – the music. Musical Director, David Eaton has worked closely with director Joohn Savourin throughout the development of this show and that cohesion is palpable. He sits at an old fashioned upright piano below stage left and directs as much with his eyes as with what he plays. He and the cast of seven time time every note almost perfctly – and that’s quite an achievement, given the amount of recitative in the mix to drive the story telling.

That slightly tinny piano is a deliberate choice with Eaton in a Stetson and denim shirt because this Barber of Seville is set in the Wild West where Bartolo (Matthew Kellet – splendid) runs, or tries to, a saloon bar. Rosina (Samantha Price, mezzo, who role-shares with Meriel Cunningham) is his wealthy ward whom he makes work in the bar and plans to marry as soon as possible. Then a glamorous “bandit from Texas” ( tenor Joseph Doody, role-sharing with John Gyeantey) turns up although of course his real name is Count Almaviva. And so the daft plot, which transfers cheerfully to this context, wends its wacky way. And visually it sits almost integrally in the arty shabbiness of Wilton’s Music Hall.

The real star of this show is Jonathan Eyers as Figaro. He has enormous on-stage charisma. He uses his mellifluous bass voice with warmth and delivers beautiful chocolate-rich notes in the lower part of the register. He brings exceptional rapport – both musical and dramatic – to duets and other shared numbers. He’s also an immensely talented actor who grins, gestures, communicates with his fingers and commands the stage for every second that he’s on it.  Because of his willowy body shape and considerable height he looks wonderfully funny too especially when he’s gesturing or dancing.

This show is characterised by outstanding singing – whether it’s a full blown aria such as Price’s solo in which she laments her predicament and makes a puppet of her mop, or a sextet in which everyone is expressing a different point of view. And most other opera companies could learn a lesson or two about clarity of diction and precision from the way Savourin and Eaton have directed these performers.  Every syllable lands impeccably.

So what of the transferred plot? Well, Eaton is a lot more than a musician. He has written a hilarious libretto which gets a lot of humour from anachronism as well as weaving in lots of references to the Wild West including film and show titles. Because, however, Eaton is a musician, literally to his finger tips, every word fits the music because – presumably – he hears in his head the music that the words have to fit as he writes them. Bravo!

This is definitely a show not to be missed. I beamed all the way home.