When he sings She Is Beautiful his new single you know he means that she is beautiful
When he sings “She Is Beautiful” (his new single), you know he means that she is beautiful.The infamous sleeve isn’t the only time he’s deliberately drawn blood for a photo shoot, and head injuries at gigs are not uncommon Does he get a kick from it? “I definitely benefit from it. Sometimes when I get into crazy chaos, something as simple as pain will bring me back to sanity really quick I used to have a really bad ear infection My mum would say ‘Go under the pain’ It would work, because pain is a tangible thing. The more you focus it, the more you can contain it.” Can bleeding be a feeling of release? “I guess so. Not as much as from an orgasm, but it’s close.” Rock’n'roll: a bloody historyIggy Pop: The godfather of punk frequently cut his wiry chest onstage. The blades probably broke.Sid Vicious (right): Often misjudged the distance between microphone and nose, with messy consequences.M?y Cr?Like Andrew WK, posed for photos with blood-smeared faces. Theirs, however, was fake.Richey Edwards: Cut “4 REAL” into his forearm to convince a sceptical interviewer, and slashed his chest onstage with a set of steak knives given to him by fans.Marilyn Manson (right): There’s barely any transgression Mr Warner hasn’t attempted. When he moved onto bloodshed, no one was surprised.Casey Chaos: The Amen singer tends to conduct his blood-letting in private, but the scars are there for all to see..
Free-loading dilettante or quirky genius? A talent to rival Britten or a second-rate tunesmith? Judging from the low attendance at the first of this year’s Walton Centenary Concerts, the much-hyped debate over Sir William’s position in the pantheon of British composers has generated little interest beyond the devotees.The few who gathered at the Barbican for the LSO’s performance of Capriccio Burlesco, In honour of the City of London, and the suite from Henry V seemed happy enough But they would. Walton’s chippily tuneful music, with its vigorous choral writing and Tudorbethan charm, has more than a frisson of small island defiance; hence the quiver of tweedy excitement at “Once more unto the breach” and the tapping of hand-tooled brogues during Capriccio Burlesco. For the London Symphony Chorus, it was an excellent opportunity to show off their bright blend and rhythmic acuity. For conductor Marin Alsop, another chance to display her clear, generous beat and unegotistical manner For the orchestra, it was craft rather than art. As one uninspired violinist muttered on his way out, “Oh well.
Another film score.” Exactly.
For my part, the excess of bravura, bounce and bombast left me cold (though trying to imagine the reception of a Lancastrian composer’s cantata on the metropolitan superiority of London at its 1937 Leeds premiere provided some distraction). Walton’s music does have better moments – the sinuous Viola Concerto, the brittle wit of the Three Sitwell Songs – but not enough, I think, to sustain a whole season of celebrations. Which makes me wonder whether this is knee-jerk programming on the parts of the various orchestras involved. Do we have to honour the centenaries of composers regardless of the quality of their work? Will next season’s brochures be covered with Khachaturian, for instance? I do hope not.
Duty calls, so this won’t be my only evening of wall-to-wall Walton, but I can’t say I’m looking forward to it.Pity the poor singer in a damp climate. You can wrap your neck in the finest cashmere, take every herbal remedy known to man, spend days inhaling steam, sipping hot lemon and avoiding the pub, and still you get a cold. Pity poor Werner G? whose recording of Schubert’s Die sch?M?rin earned him the soubriquet of successor to the late, great Fritz Wunderlich, and whose windpipe rattled like a cartoon skeleton throughout his packed Wigmore Hall recital Gosh, it’s a lovely voice Gosh, it was in trouble last Saturday. But whether G?s fresh simplicity – even in rudest health – is suitable for Schumann’s much darker song cycle Dichterliebe is another question.On the basis of this performance, even allowing for vocal compromise, I’d have to say not Or at least not yet. The contrast between G?s fluent singing of Beethoven’s An die ferne Geliebte and Schubert’s Goethe settings, and his Schumann was less to do with music than text.