Stephen Hough: No phones, please, between bars 123-176; 185-199…
UncategorizedThe pianist has issued the following advisory to musically informed audiences at Birmingham’s Symphony Hall:
I'm really excited to be playing Brahms 1 next season with one of my favourite orchestras: @TheCBSO I'm happy to be filmed on phones by the audience except for the following bars when I really need to concentrate and could be distracted:
— Stephen Hough (@houghhough) May 2, 2024
1st movement: 91-118; 123-176; 185-199; 226-341; 352 to end;
2nd movement: 14-19; 21-27; 29-30; 33-58; 71 to end;
3rd movement: 1-36; 46-98; 122-167; 188-238; 275-333; 337-368; 376-410; 418-426; 434-442; 448 to end.— Stephen Hough (@houghhough) May 2, 2024
The bars he cites amount to the total contributions of the soloist in this concerto.
So basically, no filming!
But plenty of purely orchestral bars for the zombies to film while Sir. S. is “relaxing” at the keyboard.
Bravo Stephen, you speak for all of us.
Not I. I enjoy filming and bootlegging performances to share on social media later. As I see it, I’m sharing the gospel of classical music with others. A still photo just doesn’t carry the same weight in Instagram, and certainly not on TikTok.
How about sharing the gospel of focusing on the sound?
You’re very sad.
A concert pest who will never get it.
I suspect you’re joking. If not, you’re a menace to society.
No matter, whether or not you regard yourself as ‘entitled’ to film and photograph Sir Stephen’s performance, kindly accede to his request not to filming and photograph, and at the same time allow other paying customers to enjoy what THEY have paid to see and hear.
Carl, you are the kind of CBSO audience member she craves!
People like you are the reason I stopped attending concerts. You just don’t get it.
He’s just trolling. Nobody is this stupid.
selfish to other audience members who came to hear the music rather than stoke your ego
What a wonderful sense of humour! This is not only annoying for the artists but also for people in the audience. I hate it when the bright lights of phones come up.
I don’t have the score on hand, but are the bars where the audience is “allowed” to be filming those where he is not playing? If so, his answer is really a great one.
I imagine people in the audience scrolling frantically the score waiting for the right point to start filming…
🙂
Presumably Ms Stelling will arrange for a screen to display a bar count for us to make it clear when we can get our mobiles out – strewth !
You just don’t get it do you?!
I get it fully – we are becoming a laughing stock!
The sound of that woosh was deafening, wasn’t it?
Emma Stenning (she’s entitled to her correct name).
Too detailed – which audience member is going to remember that list? He should have opted for either phones or no phones. Personally, I would always go with the latter. You’re there to listen to the music, not film it as if you were at some dreary festival gig in a muddy field.
Mr. Hough is making a joke. He has written out every single bar that he plays in during the piece. Thus, he is humorously asking people to not film him at all while he is playing.
I think you may be missing the joke.
Sally Did they forget to fit your sense of humour at birth? I think Sir Stephen didn’t intend anyone to pay attention to the specifics of his list but instead to focus on the absurdity of the CBSO’s stance and the sad desire of audience members to use their phones in this way.
We need the other Sally to weigh in.
She’s not that heavy, I have been told.
I’m bloody serious when it’s about humour. I therefore totally disagree with Mr Hough, it should be the other way around: filming the parts when he plays so that we can listen to him finally without all the hollaballoo of all those people interrupting the music! I really prefer nice piano tinkling just before going to bed, it’s so relaxing, and that orchestra is mere pretentious pomp keeping you awake.
Sally
I thought I would make a deliberately provocative comment to let the earnest know-it-alls to have their say. Improves NL’s hit rate as well.
I think you have somehow missed the whole sardonic point. The bars listed account for every second the soloist is playing. So there’s is nothing to remember…
You didn’t get the magnificent irony from that Titan of an intellect.
Oh!
Excellent!! I will follow with my score and have my camera ready! 😉
The encouragement to film and take photos has now been toned down and suggests it only occurs between the music, and not if it is likely to disturb other patrons.
I’m looking forward very much to Stephen Hough’s Brahms First Piano Concerto, and hope that Ian Bostridge can be tempted back to Symphony Hall – we promise to behave ourselves!
Well said Stephen.
The CBSO management is going to have fun controlling this one. It proves how short-sighted (Stupid) their current ‘Dictats’ are.
Quite right ! This obsession with filming everythibg is a pain ! Just enjoy the performance and let the pianist concentrate on bringing us the best they can. It IS hard work performing in public – and with an orchestra – and there are enough distractions from an audience
( coughing etc !) without anything else. Let the music speak for itself !
Good for you Stephen !
Documenting the experience IS the experience now.
That is the truth of the matter. It no longer matters that one attended something, concert, exhibition, whatever. It matters that one can prove one attended. “Pix or it didn’t happen” – the infuriating catchcry of the disbeliever.
Like people at museums who instead of looking at art, take pictures of it on their phones?
Well done Stephen, good man! Sorry it had to take fine soloists to finally highlight this absurd policy!
I wonder what provision for filming, if any, has been made in the soloist’s contract.
Ruled out for sure.
So we’ve now had two world class performers – Ian Bostridge and Stephen Hough criticising this ridiculous policy of the Chief Executive – one in the middle of a concert and the other in jest. I would hope that this combination ought to bring management to it’s senses – just admit you got it wrong and ban the use of mobile phones in the concert hall.
I think there will be some jumping before pushing very soon…
Brilliant!
Stephen is making a joke. I too am tired of all the distracted and distracting behavior at concerts. Phones, video-ing, eating food, drinking beverages, whispering are maybe ok for TV in the living room, but this is a live performance of great music, and I’m there to hear a hopefully great live performance. I put things in my lap or on the floor, I sit slightly forward off the chair, and my eyes and ears are focused entirely on the performance in front of me. It’s an intimate connection between me and the performers. I’ve paid usually around $100 for the chance to hear this music, so I don’t really want to have some clueless boob getting in the middle of that.
I wonder if I can sync my tablet with the score with the score on it to automatically stop filming during those bars? Will need to mount it on a tripod. Too bad for audience members behind. Got to get the film! Probably won’t ever view it but you never know…
Splendid post from Stephen Hough and thank you Norman for sharing it. This has certainly brightened up a dreary day.
What a baby. If you are one of the leading musicians in the world you should be able to concentrate and play with a few folks filming.
Please stay home. A concert hall is not your living room.
You obviously haven’t got the slightest idea how demanding the task is and are obviously not musician.
We attended a play last weekend and the number of phones that went off – alarms, chirps, ringtones – was phenomenally high.
Several very nice moments were ruined, including a sweet old lady a few rows behind us answering her phone to tell the caller, “I’m at the theater now.”
When I have to attend a concert or opera I always make sure that I sit at the back of the hall to be able to chat with my friends undisturbed.
I always find concerts more bearable when they play loud music, like this Brukner or Mahleur type, so that I can’t be overheard.
Sally
Given the number of people here who did not get the joke, how many of those attending the concert will?
Wonder how the CBSO likes it?
Come on folks. Carl is obviously joking. Have your irony detectors been surgically removed?
Absolutely brilliant, Stephen. I’m sure the conductor can also ask for no filming during all the bars which make up the orchestral tutti.. Mind you, when you talk about bars, some might be thinking of all the booze they can swill into the auditorium (PS listening to Brendel playing D960 as I write!)
Brilliant!
I go to a performance to see the performers. I don’t want to see a constantly moving mosaic of lights.
Call me cynical, but I somehow can’t imagine that anyone who would make a video at a concert is capable of reading an orchestral score…
Nevermind filming. Last night at TCO Phones rang no fewer than four times.
Typically brilliant.
Now this is going to present the orchestra with a problem. The policy is now to allow photography so how do you make an exception – an embarrassing announcement from the stage?
Sir Stephen has made it clear that he doesn’t want anyone filming his playing. But can someone explain the position if the horn solo in the first movement is filmed by an audience member? If shared, does this infringe the player’s copyright?
Is there really a horn solo in the first movement of Brahms 1, as well as Brahms 2??
(More) seriously – this fine piece of wit from SH needed saying, and it needs other performers at Symphony Hall to say it too (assuming many of them don’t stop accepting bookings there anyway), until the absurd policy is reversed.
I go to concerts to _concentrate_ on the experience, as do most attenders I know (and I have little enough money that I can’t do so as often as I’d like); those who want to behave selfishly so I can’t make the most of the experience are robbing me of the possibility of enjoying my favourite art form.
When I was at Symphony Hall in Brum last year – for the first time in some while – I was horrified at the “please behave like you’re at Glastonbury” message to concert-goers. I certainly won’t be going to any concerts there again until this policy is reversed.
Haha. Brilliant!
This ridiculous policy is exactly the equivalent of what happens in art galleries. Everybody taking pictures and not actually looking at the art.
I don’t have to concentrate at any bars, and patrons are always welcome to film me.