Page 263 - Media Coverage Book - 75th Aldeburgh Festival 2024

10 June 2024

Classical music’s past is more radical than we

think

Far from preserving music in aspic, recreating classic concerts is an act of living heritage
Roger Wright10 June 2024 • 7:00am

Rostropovich rehearses Britten's Cello Sonata in Aldeburgh, with the composer (right) CREDIT:
Erich Auerbach/Getty Images

“I wouldn’t want to hear recreations of my works’ first performances, as they were mostly
dreadful.” So said the French conductor and composer Pierre Boulez to me, in a typically wry
fashion, when we were discussing the art of historically informed performance.

Nevertheless, historical recreations fascinate me. Concerts are, by their nature, living things, but
these recreations add context and insight to performances which were created in the moment.
They offer ways of telling stories to audiences about how programmes are shaped and tastes have
changed over the years.

This is not preserving music in aspic – recreations are an act of living heritage.

For example, at the 2019 Aldeburgh Festival, the tenor Mark Padmore recreated Schubert’s
famous benefit concert of 1828 which required chamber groups, solo singers, instrumentalists and
a choir. It was a fascinating experience to have the concert put in context by accompanying talks
and articles and hear the juxtaposition of famous and less well-known works, selected by Schubert
himself, and given new life by some of today’s leading musicians. The experience allowed us a fresh