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A night of wonders...
Jun. 1st, 2008 06:46 pmLast night was absolutely fantastic. I've never had the chance to go to see anything live before, much less seeing a professional orchestra or professional actor in person and I can definitely say that no matter how many times you see these sorts of things, e.g. plays, concerts, etc. on TV, Youtube, etc, it can never ever match up to the pure thrill and excitement you get when you're really there and seeing everything unfold before your eyes.
We decided not to wear formal clothes last night -- I don't really have much experience in going to concerts such as this (plus my feet had not yet recovered from the agonies of the day before during the Awards Ceremony [at the moment, they still haven't] =P and so my heels were overlooked in preference to my sandals, lol) But I did manage to wear the formal shirt I wore during Graduation to balance out the informality of the jeans and sandals I wore so hopefully, it looked okay. By accident, we stumbled down to the Sheraton Shopping Arcade during our 2 hour wait before the concert (we arrived 2 hrs early in TST since they said that if we came late we wouldn't be admitted until after the interval) and got us a pair of powerful binoculars since we were going to be sitting in the balcony directly before and overlooking the stage below (the price paid for such a view was two tickets costing $380 each, which was v.v.v. worth it =D).
Afterwards, we sat awhile in the Peninsula Hotel opposite the Cultural Centre, having a bit of coffee and cheesecake before setting off. It had started raining slightly when we set off [and we hadn't brought an umbrella] and there were a whole load of annoying people blocking our way as we made out way to the centre so that annoyed us immensely since although we had set off from the hotel at around 7:40ish, it takes at least 10 mins to get across the road, etc to get to the centre...and plus the immensely slow, snail-like pace that everyone seems adopt on the weekends didn't help at all. Thankfully we arrived on time, around 7.50ish for the 8pm start time, and waited for about 5-10 mins before the lights were dimmed and the conductor, Edo de Waart entered the hall. Surprisingly although I've never been to a formal live concert before, I seemed to know instinctively that you're supposed to applaud when the conductor or 'maestro' comes in...and thankfully that was what everyone was doing, hahaha. Since it was a concert named 'Orchestral Shakespeare', the first piece played was Mendelsohn's 'A Midsummer's Night Dream'...I was amazed at how the HKPO were so 'together'...they were playing totally as a group and with full cooperation with each other under de Waart's guidance and I was mesmerised by how even the cellists' bowing (there were at least like 10 of them onstage) was synchronised perfectly, the music rising wonderfully and filling the hall. Absolutely fantastic. My mum was particularly excited about 'The Wedding March' which was the last movement of the piece and the orchestra played it beautifully and with perfect cohesion. What I found amusing was that every time a movement finished [both in this piece and 'Henry V'] and the orchestra had to play the next one; each and every one of the orchestra put down their instruments and flipped their music scores on their stands to the next page...even that was sychronised...XD and that people in the audience usually seized the time to cough or sneeze or clear their throats at the same time while being entirely silent when the orchestra was playing.
There was an intermission of 15 mins and my mum said: 'If an orchestra is this exciting live, I wonder how Phantom will be!' I shared her sentiments...Phantom will probably be like 10x more exciting due to all the acting, etc! XD
The piece that everyone was waiting for, Henry V, started at around 9.00pm. At first, de Waart entered, like he had done so in the previous piece, and took up his baton and the orchestra started to play. I think everyone was wondering when Samuel West was going to come in since they had obviously put a chair next to the conductor's podium and logically, the seat was for him. He entered as the trumpets announced the starting of the 'play', coming through the same double doors on the left side (from our perspective) of the stage as the conductor had done and immediately going into the Chorus' famous prologue: 'O , for a muse of fire that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention...' as he walked through a small gap between the first violins and the cellists towards the front of the stage.
I thought he was going to wear evening dress, e.g. suit, bow tie, etc but in the end he wore a black dress shirt, trousers and shoes just like de Waart had done. I was surprised at how comfortably loud his voice was (due to the microphone that he wore which then transferred his voice to the speakers looming above on the ceiling of the hall) and was relieved that his voice wouldn't be drowned out by the swell of the music behind him. Admittedly, he has gained quite a bit of weight since I last saw him in films such as Howards End and Persuasion and now he looks more like his mother than his father now but that doesn't really matter since we were entirely blown away by his vigour and enthusiasm during the whole performance. He was every bit the professional English actor, getting into every part he played completely -- he talked directly towards the audience, gestured towards the front of the house as well as the balconies as the Chorus, looking quizzically as he looked about and wondered as the Chorus always does: 'Can this cockpit hold the vasty fields of France?' and then bowing pleasantly as he asked us 'humbly to ask, kindly to judge our play'. Though West is still rather young, I was impressed by the accents and voices he could make effortlessly, from the old, beseeching voice of Henry V's old friend, Falstaff to the Cockney accent of an English soldier, Pistol bidding his friends farewell as he sets out to war. While not saying any lines, West usually sat down on the chair prepared for him (drinking what looked like a bottle of Vita water), hands clasped together on his lap as he contemplated the next scene while looking seriously at the floor or sometimes looking up at the balconies...it was eerie seeing him make eye-contact with me (not really since I was using the binoculars but still...) and my mum also had the same experience as well. I can only imagine his reaction at seeing us using binoculars...and whether it was a good one or not, I'll never know! Probably thought we were nutters or something, lol. XD
Although he wasn't in costume and this wasn't the full play, West got into each character entirely -- especially Henry V. His famous speech of 'Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more!', his enthusiastic cry of 'Cry 'God for Harry, England and Saint George!' with his right arm upraised and his face totally drawn up into a determined expression, brow furrowed as if really leading his men into battle, looking and gesturing back at the orchestra as if they were Henry's invisible army, his rolling up of his shirtsleeves (presumably to get even more into the part of Henry V and later using this as a device during Henry's later speech at Agincourt 'We few, we happy few, we band of brothers') and later, memorably, the sight of him kneeling on the stage, illuminated by a single spotlight as Henry, praying to God to 'steel his soldier's hearts' and even crossing himself all made us believe that we were indeed in the midst and action of it all...the sensation of it being absolutely extraordinary. You can imagine how happy we were being able to see his expressions, etc, up close with the help of our binoculars...it made it feel all the more real. I was even leaning over my seat, spellbound and thinking about nothing at all apart from what was unfolding on stage. I don't think I have ever felt such a thing before in my life, I even felt like crying at some points (no idea why but all I know that they weren't tears of sadness but of joy or something like that)...and it's amazing to think that such a reaction was caused only by an extremely talented actor combined with efforts of an equally talented conductor and orchestra. The battle scene caused a tingling sensation up and down my spine, with the percussion section hard at work beating hurriedly on drums, cymbals etc while the string and brass sections swelled up into a mighty crescendo while the epilogue was the same, only this time with the organ, harpsichord and choir (which were used at the prologue as well)...it was definitely magical and I think I didn't even want it to end and the rest of the audience shared my sentiments, I think, as seen by the reaction as the music ended.
There was only a tiny moment of astonished silence after the final crescendo of the orchestra and everyone simultaneously burst into loud, hearty applause -- a man behind us somewhere shouted 'Bravo!', the American couple sitting next to me raised their hands up high in enthusiastic applause and we did the same, raising our hands high and shouting 'Bravo!' loudly as West and the conductor bowed gratefully, first individually and then both of them bowing together, hands joined. The ovation was continuous...I have never seen such a genuinely affected reaction from an audience after a performance...there were four curtain calls for West and de Waart, they exited offstage then came back again three times, all the time bowing while on the fourth, West came out by himself, acknowledging the excited crowd, while gesturing de Waart to come out of the doors and join him for a final ovation, which only became louder when they appeared on stage. I have never clapped so much in my entire life and had not my arms been exhausted by the continuous clapping that might have lasted 5 minutes, I might have applauded longer (I think the rest of the audience would have done the same) and there would have been more curtain calls. I think Samuel West was genuinely pleased and gratified by the response of the audience and he was beaming all the while...I only hope that the audience response while we were there at the second and final concert was better than the concert the day before.
It would have been nice to have got an autograph from him but then we only found out about the backstage door (I didn't even know there WAS one in HK!) about 30 mins after the concert (concert ended around 10 pm) and presumably, he had gone by then. =( But autographs aren't everything...and I'm already grateful that I actually was there watching him act/narrate a live concert and being in the same room with him...it's not a thing that happens often in ones life! Plus hopefully if I go to London and watch plays in the West End, I might one day watch a play with him in it while I'm there and get an autograph then. =)
An absolutely unforgettable night! Absolutely, bloody fantastic!
We decided not to wear formal clothes last night -- I don't really have much experience in going to concerts such as this (plus my feet had not yet recovered from the agonies of the day before during the Awards Ceremony [at the moment, they still haven't] =P and so my heels were overlooked in preference to my sandals, lol) But I did manage to wear the formal shirt I wore during Graduation to balance out the informality of the jeans and sandals I wore so hopefully, it looked okay. By accident, we stumbled down to the Sheraton Shopping Arcade during our 2 hour wait before the concert (we arrived 2 hrs early in TST since they said that if we came late we wouldn't be admitted until after the interval) and got us a pair of powerful binoculars since we were going to be sitting in the balcony directly before and overlooking the stage below (the price paid for such a view was two tickets costing $380 each, which was v.v.v. worth it =D).
Afterwards, we sat awhile in the Peninsula Hotel opposite the Cultural Centre, having a bit of coffee and cheesecake before setting off. It had started raining slightly when we set off [and we hadn't brought an umbrella] and there were a whole load of annoying people blocking our way as we made out way to the centre so that annoyed us immensely since although we had set off from the hotel at around 7:40ish, it takes at least 10 mins to get across the road, etc to get to the centre...and plus the immensely slow, snail-like pace that everyone seems adopt on the weekends didn't help at all. Thankfully we arrived on time, around 7.50ish for the 8pm start time, and waited for about 5-10 mins before the lights were dimmed and the conductor, Edo de Waart entered the hall. Surprisingly although I've never been to a formal live concert before, I seemed to know instinctively that you're supposed to applaud when the conductor or 'maestro' comes in...and thankfully that was what everyone was doing, hahaha. Since it was a concert named 'Orchestral Shakespeare', the first piece played was Mendelsohn's 'A Midsummer's Night Dream'...I was amazed at how the HKPO were so 'together'...they were playing totally as a group and with full cooperation with each other under de Waart's guidance and I was mesmerised by how even the cellists' bowing (there were at least like 10 of them onstage) was synchronised perfectly, the music rising wonderfully and filling the hall. Absolutely fantastic. My mum was particularly excited about 'The Wedding March' which was the last movement of the piece and the orchestra played it beautifully and with perfect cohesion. What I found amusing was that every time a movement finished [both in this piece and 'Henry V'] and the orchestra had to play the next one; each and every one of the orchestra put down their instruments and flipped their music scores on their stands to the next page...even that was sychronised...XD and that people in the audience usually seized the time to cough or sneeze or clear their throats at the same time while being entirely silent when the orchestra was playing.
There was an intermission of 15 mins and my mum said: 'If an orchestra is this exciting live, I wonder how Phantom will be!' I shared her sentiments...Phantom will probably be like 10x more exciting due to all the acting, etc! XD
The piece that everyone was waiting for, Henry V, started at around 9.00pm. At first, de Waart entered, like he had done so in the previous piece, and took up his baton and the orchestra started to play. I think everyone was wondering when Samuel West was going to come in since they had obviously put a chair next to the conductor's podium and logically, the seat was for him. He entered as the trumpets announced the starting of the 'play', coming through the same double doors on the left side (from our perspective) of the stage as the conductor had done and immediately going into the Chorus' famous prologue: 'O , for a muse of fire that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention...' as he walked through a small gap between the first violins and the cellists towards the front of the stage.
I thought he was going to wear evening dress, e.g. suit, bow tie, etc but in the end he wore a black dress shirt, trousers and shoes just like de Waart had done. I was surprised at how comfortably loud his voice was (due to the microphone that he wore which then transferred his voice to the speakers looming above on the ceiling of the hall) and was relieved that his voice wouldn't be drowned out by the swell of the music behind him. Admittedly, he has gained quite a bit of weight since I last saw him in films such as Howards End and Persuasion and now he looks more like his mother than his father now but that doesn't really matter since we were entirely blown away by his vigour and enthusiasm during the whole performance. He was every bit the professional English actor, getting into every part he played completely -- he talked directly towards the audience, gestured towards the front of the house as well as the balconies as the Chorus, looking quizzically as he looked about and wondered as the Chorus always does: 'Can this cockpit hold the vasty fields of France?' and then bowing pleasantly as he asked us 'humbly to ask, kindly to judge our play'. Though West is still rather young, I was impressed by the accents and voices he could make effortlessly, from the old, beseeching voice of Henry V's old friend, Falstaff to the Cockney accent of an English soldier, Pistol bidding his friends farewell as he sets out to war. While not saying any lines, West usually sat down on the chair prepared for him (drinking what looked like a bottle of Vita water), hands clasped together on his lap as he contemplated the next scene while looking seriously at the floor or sometimes looking up at the balconies...it was eerie seeing him make eye-contact with me (not really since I was using the binoculars but still...) and my mum also had the same experience as well. I can only imagine his reaction at seeing us using binoculars...and whether it was a good one or not, I'll never know! Probably thought we were nutters or something, lol. XD
Although he wasn't in costume and this wasn't the full play, West got into each character entirely -- especially Henry V. His famous speech of 'Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more!', his enthusiastic cry of 'Cry 'God for Harry, England and Saint George!' with his right arm upraised and his face totally drawn up into a determined expression, brow furrowed as if really leading his men into battle, looking and gesturing back at the orchestra as if they were Henry's invisible army, his rolling up of his shirtsleeves (presumably to get even more into the part of Henry V and later using this as a device during Henry's later speech at Agincourt 'We few, we happy few, we band of brothers') and later, memorably, the sight of him kneeling on the stage, illuminated by a single spotlight as Henry, praying to God to 'steel his soldier's hearts' and even crossing himself all made us believe that we were indeed in the midst and action of it all...the sensation of it being absolutely extraordinary. You can imagine how happy we were being able to see his expressions, etc, up close with the help of our binoculars...it made it feel all the more real. I was even leaning over my seat, spellbound and thinking about nothing at all apart from what was unfolding on stage. I don't think I have ever felt such a thing before in my life, I even felt like crying at some points (no idea why but all I know that they weren't tears of sadness but of joy or something like that)...and it's amazing to think that such a reaction was caused only by an extremely talented actor combined with efforts of an equally talented conductor and orchestra. The battle scene caused a tingling sensation up and down my spine, with the percussion section hard at work beating hurriedly on drums, cymbals etc while the string and brass sections swelled up into a mighty crescendo while the epilogue was the same, only this time with the organ, harpsichord and choir (which were used at the prologue as well)...it was definitely magical and I think I didn't even want it to end and the rest of the audience shared my sentiments, I think, as seen by the reaction as the music ended.
There was only a tiny moment of astonished silence after the final crescendo of the orchestra and everyone simultaneously burst into loud, hearty applause -- a man behind us somewhere shouted 'Bravo!', the American couple sitting next to me raised their hands up high in enthusiastic applause and we did the same, raising our hands high and shouting 'Bravo!' loudly as West and the conductor bowed gratefully, first individually and then both of them bowing together, hands joined. The ovation was continuous...I have never seen such a genuinely affected reaction from an audience after a performance...there were four curtain calls for West and de Waart, they exited offstage then came back again three times, all the time bowing while on the fourth, West came out by himself, acknowledging the excited crowd, while gesturing de Waart to come out of the doors and join him for a final ovation, which only became louder when they appeared on stage. I have never clapped so much in my entire life and had not my arms been exhausted by the continuous clapping that might have lasted 5 minutes, I might have applauded longer (I think the rest of the audience would have done the same) and there would have been more curtain calls. I think Samuel West was genuinely pleased and gratified by the response of the audience and he was beaming all the while...I only hope that the audience response while we were there at the second and final concert was better than the concert the day before.
It would have been nice to have got an autograph from him but then we only found out about the backstage door (I didn't even know there WAS one in HK!) about 30 mins after the concert (concert ended around 10 pm) and presumably, he had gone by then. =( But autographs aren't everything...and I'm already grateful that I actually was there watching him act/narrate a live concert and being in the same room with him...it's not a thing that happens often in ones life! Plus hopefully if I go to London and watch plays in the West End, I might one day watch a play with him in it while I'm there and get an autograph then. =)
An absolutely unforgettable night! Absolutely, bloody fantastic!
