Attending the Berliner Philharmoniker’s 2020 virtual concert of Symphonie Fantastique

Christina Jones

Field Notes: 03/19/2020 at 12:42 p.m.

Attending the Berliner Philharmoniker’s January 31, 2020 virtual concert of Hector Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique, op. 14, Conducted by Maestro Paavo Järvi 

1. Let it be known that I chose this piece for I myself have performed it several times and adore it. 

2. I almost instantly feel this warm sensation come over me with the rich string color in the opening of the first movement. 

   1. When the celli and bassi come in with the held open-G, I almost cry, which surprises me. I suppose this piece brings such deep and personal associations and memories for me. It is almost heartbreaking just how beautiful this opening movement is. 

3. I notice the last-chair violist smiling as the principal flutist plays the solo at about 3.5 minutes into the first movement. 

   1. This makes me smile → the pure happiness and deep social connections one gets from playing and hearing wonderful music. 

4. White bowties worn by male-presenting orchestral members. 

5. Many more non-male-presenting members than there were during the 1997 concert I attended virtually. 

   1. None of them sit in the front row/ principal positions in any instrument group. 

6. Not a single brown person in the orchestra (and this was this year!) 

7. Pretty thrilling camera angles → primarily shot from the point of view of the player, looking intently at the conductor. Maestro is captured smiling, delicately raising his finger to his lips as if to gently shhh the orchestra during delicate moments, and sort of mutely singing/ miming the sounds that he wants to hear. High engagement. 

   1. It feels like I’m in the orchestra. Incredible ensembleship. It is thrilling. It also really makes me miss playing in a symphony!!!!!!! I miss it so much already, and it has only been two weeks :( 

8. Unbelievably varied dynamics. 

   1. !! It’s wild. During this concert, I honestly feel as though I am on stage with the orchestra, sitting and playing somewhere in the cello section. I see tiny movements as string players take their bows off the string and watch Maestro in order to be able to achieve a perfectly timed pizzicato in unison. I see a long hair on the bow of a first violinist flying. It’s so raw and real. I almost want to look down to look for my bow to check how the hair on my bow is holding up! Insane. 

9. You can see the deep reds on the cheeks of wind players as they so calculatedly and carefully play their lengthy solos, using their endurance and breath control to match up with the fortississimo high-register playing in the strings. 

10. Timpani, bless you. 

11. One of the percussionists is smiling, without teeth but with visible glee, at the rich and fiery string sound at the end of the first movement. 

12. I feel the sadness, the energy, the intensity, the deep emotion, the heart, the fear but adjacent confidence, and trust as the orchestra ends the first movement. 

13. I feel a smile twitch across my lips as I hear the cello soli passage which opens the second movement with tremulo.

    1. I instantly think about the seating auditions, sectionals, and heated/ scary rehearsals we had at the Fisher Center when rehearsing this string opening of the second movement. I actually chuckle. I think of my friends and I feel a sense of company, attending this concert through the screen of my laptop alone in my kitchen. 

14. I start humming along with the first violins. 

15. I start moving my head around involuntarily in the same way that I do when I play cello. The way that prompts my teachers to yell at me, might I add. 

16. You can see a few of the audience members sitting in the first two rows - the expensive orchestra seats - moving gently as the entire orchestra is joined for a glorious two phrases in unison. The absolutely glorious A-Major passage that is so characteristic of this movement. 

17. Not a single Asian member. 

    1. This is shocking to me. 

18. Maestro looks around carefully with his nose high in the air and seems to take a silent, deep breath with the entire orchestra before beginning the third movement. 

19. !!!******!I find myself singing along with the English Horn solo. I cannot help myself. I love it too much. And now I actually can sing along! I am neither playing onstage nor in the audience! They can’t hear me!!!!!

20. I feel really sad and alone when I hear the violins sing sweetly. It makes me miss my friends terribly - all of my best friends have always been violinists, everywhere I go, for some reason…. → It makes me re-remember just how alone we all are right now, and how far I am from all of my friends. … :((

21. I find myself feeling deeply grateful for music. Grateful to have, play, listen to, watch, experience, crave, devote myself to, stay home because of, music. It is spiritual for me.

22. The glorious trumpet soli in the fourth movement makes me feel like they’re serenading me, a VIP guest attendee, all of the way from Berlin. Pretty cool. !!*  A lot more majestic than a conventional attendance would allow me to feel in all likelihood. !!*This feels more personal and private somehow, as if the trumpets and tuba are playing for me. ! :)

23. There’s a pan out shot before the fifth movement begins. 

24. !! *As the principal oboist and the principal flutist play their dramatic descending slides from a high C, the last-chair violist sitting directly in front of them chuckles and smiles to themself. Cute to witness - something that I would only see this way. I wouldn’t see it from the point of view of the conventional audience member because I would be sitting too far away from the stage to see this tiny interaction. → I also probably would not see this from the stage from the vantage point of a player in the orchestra, for I would be too focused on my own part and on counting the rests properly to look around the stage during a concert. 

25. For the last five or so minutes of the last movement, I asked my mother to come and watch with me because it was so amazing that I wanted her to witness it too. Admittedly, I also stopped taking field notes at this point because I was so entranced by the performance. I found myself in complete awe of the Berlin Phil. The synchronicity of the bows moving, the ~*grins* on the faces of the players (particularly the percussionists), the tight, deferential, and respectful way that section players watch their principal players drew me in so much that I wanted to watch without taking my eyes off of the screen to write. Truly breathtaking. I feel honored to have witnessed this performance.