Israel Phil to make diplomatic debut in Turkey
NewsTurkish media are reporting that the Israel Philharmonic will pay its first visit to Istanbul at the end of October.
Lahav Shani will conduct.
Swiftly-arranged visits of this sort come under the category of what Henry Kissinger used to call ‘cultural diplomacy’.
I look forward to seeing this young maestro make it all about this young maestro. He’s good….at doing that.
Thank goodness turkey is kosher and halal.
More than that, he’s got a PR machine behind him to make sure “Das Wunder Shani” is the prevailing message.
This past season he performed a concert cycle in Boston with the Boston Symphony of Prokofiev’s Symphony #1, Saint-Saens 5th Piano Concerto (Thibaudet), and Rach’s Symphony Dances. It wasn’t a successful concert – and we weren’t the only ones who thought this, but also a friend and his companion heard a different concert in the cycle and had the same reaction. And the BSO was completely muted during the applause, not one orchestra member applauded Shani (and it was clear there was not good chemistry between the conductor and the orchestra).
So notwithstanding the fawning “official” reviews, on the local classical music website that is beyond the reach of official forces, I shared my objective opinion of the concert–that it wasn’t a strong debut in Boston, that Shani’s approach overall was heavy-handed and did not serve the music particularly well, and that it seemed there was no real chemistry with the orchestra.
Out of nowhere a bunch of first-time “reviewers” whose names have never graced that site before rapidly appeared, with a variety of comments all designed to negate what I said. Not only was the message the opposite of mine, but there was enough volume to in effect seek to “drown out” what I had to say.
I was thoroughly impressed!! It seems Mr. Shani is getting his money’s worth from his PR agency, whoever that is. It’s a beautiful thing to see the machine in motion.
Lahav Shani may well be a formidable conductor one day. Maybe he already is somewhere else. And I certainly hope he becomes one, because we need more outstanding conductors. But in my opinion his BSO debut in 2023 was unsuccessful. Yet saying such things goes against what the machine wants to see out there.
That’s the world we live in I’m afraid.
I have been listening to the IPO for 50 years, it had its ups and downs. Lahav Shani had been doing a great job there. Perhaps he and the BSO are a bad match, but that doesn’t reflect on his performances in Europe, where very good orchestras like to make music with him. Also, he is a very nice person, which seem to help.
He did the same program with CSO, except instead of SaintSaens we did Paganini variations, our experience was incredibly similar, no chemistry, I felt incredible disappointment and to a degree certain disgust by the last concert, I simply couldn’t understand how it was possible to make a piece like Symphonic dances so stale and boring, but he was assuredly achieving it every single night. Prokofiev was just a mess, lacking flair, lightness, heavy handed is probably the best description I’ve heard.
CSO player, thank you for sharing your comments. VERY interesting. I re-read my review of that concert, and with regards to the Prokofiev symphony, I described the performance as “joyless” – which was exactly what it was, and just as you are describing. It’s a joyful piece – light, swirling, joyful, fun – when well done, it’s just a very uplifting work that can’t but help to make one smile. Shani’s performance of it was the opposite – leaden, joyless, no smiling. I’m not sure how one can take a piece like that which seems to have the effects built into it, and drain it completely of all that makes it special. But Shani sure did. The Rach Symphonic Dances suffered less from Shani’s heavy hand, but it was there nonetheless. His performance seemed to lack spirit and went through the motions. Surfical, not heartfelt. In my ears I still remember an over the top performance of the work from Dutoit and the Philadelphia Orchestra live at Saratoga in August well over a decade ago, and it was RIVETING and just completely grabbed you by the shoulders and shook you. Shani’s performance on the other hand was boring and uninvolving emotionally. Exactly as you described in Chicago.
This is not to say that Shani has no talent or is not a good conductor. We heard an unsuccessful concert in Boston for sure in 2023. It may be that Shani just had no chemistry with the BSO (or perhaps the CSO as well) and can do perfectly fine work elsewhere. But the other thing I always keep in mind is that I’m interested in hearing the work of conductors in their 50s, 60s, 70s, etc., and not generally in their 20s and 30s. So who’s to say what Lahav Shani may become with time, experience, and life perspective?
Not long ago I heard a recording of Karajan in his first recording of Beethoven 3 from the 1930s or early 1940s (can’t remember the exact date). It was pretty lousy, and for sure Karajan could not sustain any sort of line through the performance, and even within the 2nd movement. Why anyone would want to hear it now is beyond my understanding, except as a reminder that great conductors take time, even the best of them. Karajan gave us some very memorable performances of that symphony later in life. But his earliest attempt at it was unsuccessful.
Heavy-handed is an understatement. I was also in the front rows of the CSO concert and those symphonic dances nearly deafened me.