Andy Fletcher RIP

This feels like a turning point for the blog and possibly my music fandom.  It's the day I have to eulogize a member of my favourite ever band.  Every generation reaches the point where the bands you grew up with gradually fade from relevance, and then fade away forever.  

Tributes have been pouring in for the past two days, praising his contributions to the band.  But prior to this week, you probably had to be a die hard Depeche Mode fan (fortunately there are tens of millions of these) to appreciate what Fletch brought to the table.  He wasn't the singer, or the songwriter, or the lyricist, and wasn't much of a musician.  He wasn't the hidden hand who guided the band aesthetically or ideologically.  Watch the "101" documentary and you'll see shot after shot of a smiling Fletch, looking proud yet awkward in skin tight spandex, dancing behind his keyboard, surveying the crowd, not doing much of any importance.  In recent promo shots, Gahan and Gore still have rock star swagger to spare, whereas Fletch is the grumpy uncle who crashed the photo shoot.  

The best longform Depeche Mode article I ever read is a very famous two parter from the NME, written by Gavin Martin and published on September 18 and 25, 1993 during the Devotional tour.  It's the definitive document of DM's most debauched period.  Gahan's brush with death a few years later is cruelly foreshadowed.  A theme of the article is the open speculation that Gahan wouldn't make it through the tour (he did, and IIRC, didn't miss a single show).  Near the end, a DM insider speaks about the frontman's troubles, while flatly stating that "[Gahan] must know that if it wasn't for Martin there'd be no songs, if it wasn't for Alan the records wouldn't sound the way they do, and if it wasn't for Fletch there probably wouldn't be any money."  

That basically sums it up.  Fletch had settled into a manager type of role (although he hated the word and wouldn't use it to describe himself), handling a semi-infinite list of minute yet crucial details, not the least of which was keeping the peace between the band members.  He took a leave of absence from the band and sat out the Summer 1994 leg of the tour, but was otherwise a constant presence for over 40 years.  But look again at that quote.  Alan Wilder left the band and what happened?  They continued making great albums and toured even bigger stadiums.  Martin Gore's monopoly on the songwriting was later broken and the band still thrived, they still sounded exactly like Depeche Mode.  But without Fletch?  As of this writing, most observers are pessimistic about the band continuing.  He was the glue, the stabilizing presence.  He was the legitimizer, when he was around DM was a band and not an interlude between various solo projects.  

He was the steady hand through it all.  An unlikely teen idol in the 80's, steering the band through the troubled waters of the 90's as they reached the zenith of their coolness, and ensuring they stayed on as a commercial powerhouse well into the 21st century.  By all accounts he was a loyal friend with hardly a trace of a rock star ego, even though he'd toured the world many times over.  How many teen mag regulars from the 80's survived that decade, without ever breaking up, while remaining relevant, and without gloryhogging their way into a reunion tour years later when the 80's because cool again?  Depeche Mode's career was a black swan, and we'll never see the likes of it again.      

Colin Davis' Boston Symphony Orchestra Sibelius cycle

Long considered one of the very finest Sibelius symphony cycles, I recently picked this up and wanted to share my thoughts on it.  Until now, I owned only Symphony #2 on a single disc, and had heard #5 separately via streaming.  In both cases, I thought they were solid and very well played, but neither really moved me.  

Symphony #1.  This immediately summons thoughts of swirling winds and heavy snow, conjuring visions of cruel nature that usually don't appear until later in Sibelius' career.  Normally, this comes off as Sibelius' most fiery, romantic symphony, with frequent comparisons to Tschaikovsky.  Davis attempts to thematically connect this early symphony with later ones, and while he certainly succeeded, for me the music is sorely underplayed, with winds and horned suppressed and an over-reliance on (admittedly stunning) strings sonority.  Full points for the inspiration and execution, but very much lacking in excitement.

Symphony #2.  I can't fault the technical work by the orchestra here, but once again I find this to be much underplayed and lacking in excitement.  The first two movements are played relatively quickly, which is a good thing because nothing drives this symphony into dreadful tedium more than lagging tempos, particularly in the slow movement.   But the fourth movement stagnates out of the gate with a brutally slow tempo, and the horns fail to bring the piece to life near the end.  There is little sense of urgency or hard won triumph that usually concludes the piece.  Some might prefer to hear Sibelius 2 with its more patriotic aspects toned down (this is also true of Davis' very ho-hum "Finlandia"), but it's not for me.  

Symphony #3.  This is Sibelius'  most classical symphony, and in my view, the cheeriest and most  difficult to reconcile stylistically with the rest of the works in the cycle.  But Davis drags it into the swirling void and it actually works.  This is a hefty, weighty version that perfectly bridges the bombast of the second with the melancholy of the fourth.  A very pleasant surprise.

Symphony #4.  Considering the bleakness of the third, I was expected total devastation from Davis with the fourth.  Vanska would eventually get there with his Lahti cycle a couple of decades later.  Vanska understood how to pull out all the gnarly, gritty details in this symphony.  Davis' version, like everything in this cycle so far, is wonderfully played but a bit too polished for the mood the music demands, and for what I was expecting based on his interpretations to this point.   

Symphony #5.  The unique vibrato achieved by the BSO's brass section is supposedly an acquired taste. I found it shrill and distracting in the first movement, which takes forever to get rolling and is then rudely interrupted by the piercing tones of the brass.  Fortunately, things get much better from there.  The second movement is unsentimental, perfectly paced, and nicely balanced within the orchestra.  In the third movement, Davis drives the orchestra at a blistering tempo.  This is how Sibelius wrote it, but most conductors and orchestras don't try (or can't) sustain the pace.  It's a heart-pounding start to the finale and barely slows down leading into the swan theme.  Clearly Davis wants the entire finale to sound breathless almost until the end, and while overall it's quicker than I'd like, again I can't fault the vision and execution.    

Symphony #6.  Oddly enough, this comes off as the cheeriest symphony of the bunch, mainly because it's blazing fast, clocking at around 25 minutes whereas most conductors take around 30.  Instead of starting out light in the first movement and gradually slowing to a crawl as the symphony proceeds (with a respite in the third movement), Davis gradually accelerates as he goes.  The final movement is unexpectedly bouncy and light, with nary a touch of grimness even in the final minutes.  Much like the third symphony, Davis conceptualizes the work as a bridge between the sweeping grandiosity of the fifth and the taut efficiency of the seventh.  Davis' sixth comes across very much like a single movement piece with its uniformity in phrasing and tempo.  This symphony way overdelivered for me.  

A major reason why I became so attached to Sibelius' symphonies is their malleability.  The same work can be happy or sad, patriotic or grim, delicate or heavy, containing a menu of polar opposites that can expressed within the same piece of music.  There is no better justification for collecting multiple versions or cycles by the same composer, and Davis' version of the sixth is a perfect example of this.    

Symphony #7.  As I expected after hearing the sixth, this symphony flows consistently and energetically, and the momentum never lags.  I found it a bit lacking in dynamics range -- the highs are never too high and the lows never too low, the climaxes are a bit underplayed, and the softer parts aren't given enough room to breathe.  It's a strong effort but not in the upper tier of sevenths I've heard, although once more I can't fault the playing or the execution.

Overall, this is an inspired cycle, and even though each interpretation isn't to my taste, Davis' vision for each symphony is clearly on display.  He has a concept for how the cycle should evolve, sticks to it, and executes it flawlessly.  For comparison, Berglund's Bournemouth cycle is still my favourite, as it represents the apotheosis of these symphonies played in a wide range of styles by a large, overpowering orchestra.  The bulk of Davis' cycles is great, but lacks moments that send chills down my spine, something that Berglund does repeatedly.      

"Bohemian Rhapsody", dir. Bryan Singer, Dexter Fletcher

Many biopics are just an excuse to place the viewer in the moment.  Elements of great moviemaking such as character development and engaging dialogue are tossed by the wayside in favour of providing a big budget immersive "fly on the wall" experience for the viewing public.  "Bohemian Rhapsody" is all that and more.  Rami Malek's performance is electrifying and thoroughly believable, even though he has hardly any memorable scenes or lines in the entire movie.  Essentially he won the Oscar for being the best possible Freddie Mercury impersonator.

The first half of the movie is perfectly fine, if a bit simplistic.  Freddie is presented as a fairly run of the mill rebel who rejects everything that his parents stand for.  The truth is more complicated but it's the simplified Hollywood version, and that's OK.  His relationship with Mary Austin is beautifully explored and is by far the best thing about the movie.  Mike Myers makes an amusing cameo as an EMI executive, complete with the obligatory tongue-in-cheek "Wayne's World" reference.  The second half descends into every "Behind the Music" episode and cliche that you're ever seen, and frequently insults one's intelligence.  The most egregious scene is where Freddie brings Jim to meet his parents and brag about doing Live Aid.  The tears flow on camera and every running conflict in the movie is resolved in preposterous fashion in the space of a few minutes.  Freddie triumphantly declaring that he's doing good deeds and helping to heal the world (thus earning his father's acceptance) is simply grotesque in its arrogance considering the oft-cited criticism of Live Aid, i.e. that the real benefactors were the mega-rich musicians who got even richer thanks to the publicity they received from playing at the concert.  The movie goes out of its way to (unintentionally, I assume) prove those critics right, seeing as the Live Aid set is the climactic scene that the whole movie builds toward, and is firmly presented as Queen's finest moment.   

The CEO plays Chopin

An article on Bloomberg about a recently founded for-profit orchestra really rubbed me the wrong way.  It's a free advertisement masking as journalism, with absolutely no analysis or attempts to dig even slightly below the surface of its subjects.   

At first glance it all sounds very exciting.  In contrast to orchestras that survive thanks to arts grants and donations, all while struggling to retain their relevance in an exceedingly crowded entertainment market, here is an orchestra that is refreshingly run like a actual company, with stockholders and everything.  And they plan to turn a profit right from the start!  

How is it possible?  You have to read between the lines to get even a semblance of how it will work.  What do these people know that hundreds of top orchestras in the world have yet to figure out?  The JNO will offer a subscription-style membership service and a premium membership tier to enhance the fan experience.  That's a great way to bring in money, and is presented in the article as something remarkable and novel, but plenty of other orchestras also do that.  The key, I believe, comes from this line: "...operating an orchestra is relatively simple because most of the expenditures are labor costs."  So there you go, as much as they want to present themselves as fair employers paying out "millions of yen in annual remuneration depending on [the musicians'] contribution", the business model is simply to underpay the players compared to what they'd earn from a publicly funded orchestra.  

Presumably the musicians' could also supplement their income through the one-on-one or group tutorials that the JNO will offer its subscribers.  There may be some innovation there, but it could also be little more than a glorified Cameo for classical music fans.  Either way, the JNO will be sure to take its cut out of every appearance.