A round-up of what is happening in the world of the arts
Shoji, St Petersburg PO/Temirkanov
NCH, Dublin
Prokofiev - Classical Symphony. Violin Concerto No 1. Tchaikovsky - Swan Lake Suite
This NCH appearance by the St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra and its conductor of nearly 20 years, Yuri Temirkanov, offered Irish listeners ample evidence of why the work of this orchestra is so treasured.
There were times when the music-making almost purred with the smoothness of a high-powered motor running well below capacity. It was a luxury experience, and Temirkanov sometimes looked as if he almost had the freedom to paint in the sonic detail with his hands.
Prokofiev's Classical Symphony is so clever, so tuneful, so purely what it is - an affectionately mock-classical piece rather than a faddishly neo-classical one - that it seems a shame it should be so demanding to play, so merciless in exposing orchestral weaknesses.
Temirkanov and his players knitted its patterns with such effortless-seeming give and take that it was a pleasure from start to finish.
The second piece by Prokofiev, the near-contemporary First Violin Concerto, featured the Irish debut of the diminutive Japanese violinist Sayaka Shoji, a former child prodigy and first prizewinner of the 1999 Paganini Competition, who is now in her mid-20s. She clearly takes great pride in the quart out of a pint pot effect she can create by generating quantities of violin tone that seem altogether larger than life. She didn't so much play the concerto as parade it like a fabulous shape-changing creature she controlled in almost unthinkable ways.
It was an approach that was at once fascinating, delightful and over-the-top. sometimes ravishing, sometimes grotesque. To take but one example, I doubt if anyone present will easily forget the balletic skills of her featherlight handling of the central Scherzo. At the end, it was one of those performances which left a stronger impression of the performer than of the intrinsic character of the music itself.
The extended suite from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake ballet closed the programme in fine style. Temirkanov found signs of vital inner life in even the most routine of accompaniments, and shaped the already appealing melodies with a pliability that made them even more attractive.
Unlike this orchestra's form for its last concerts in Ireland, at the Waterfront Hall opening 10 years ago, this was a band consistently at the top of its game.
Michael Dervan
The Ideal Homes Show
Graffiti Theatre, Cork
The fact that The Ideal Homes Show is produced by Activate Youth Theatre at Graffiti's new theatre in Blackpool, with the staging set in the chancel of the former chapel of the Assumption Convent, means that the cast can call on a provenance of "God molecules", or on the marketing value of dead nuns recycled as energy-saving light bulbs.
Add Britney Spears, post-structuralism and a surprise guest appearance of Saddam Hussein to this subversive approach and it is no surprise that the play marks a kind of homecoming, in that both writer Ciaran FitzPatrick and director Tom Creed are former members of Activate.
That shared background may be a licence for innovation, and perhaps for just a little self-indulgence, but certainly what the players themselves call "this piece" has a characteristic verve. So much verve, in fact, that critics are warned off by a list of predictable hyperbole which this reviewer hopes to avoid.
A large cast sparkles with sharp individual roles while also blending into an orchestrated ensemble which merges from teenage angst (which is often very funny) into darker and more threatening areas of what is now considered normal life.
Homes, it seems, are there to be broken, and these dissolutions and disappearances are examined against the flowing seductions of estate agency promotions.
Weaving several story strands into a pattern takes a little more discipline than FitzPatrick imposes on himself; the contrasting episodes of dark (as in asylum seekers wearing what look like Jewish prayer-shawls but might be Arab head-dresses) and light (as in the contrasting mating habits of ducks and swans) the play builds along themes already identified in the questionnaires with which the audience were greeted at the introductory sales exhibition.
Cohesion may never have been the intention; in fact the very opposite is possible from this reading, but just a little more script control would have heightened the accuracy of a presentation made even more interesting by the performances of, for example, Stefanie Preissner and Justin Scannell.
Runs till tomorrow
Mary Leland
