Symphony No. 9 in d-minor “Choral”

Now I talk about the classical concert on December 18. the main program was Symphony No. 9 in d-minor “Choral” composed by Ludwig van Beethoven. Before that, Masayo Katsuyama played the pipeorgan: Paraphrase sur un Choeur de “Judas Maccabée” de Handel composed by Alexandre Guilmant, Chorale Prelude on “Silent Night” composed by Samuel Barber, and “Toccata” from Symphonie pour orgue No. 5. It was the first time that I heard the real sound of it. In the hall of Tokyo Geijutsu Gekijo (Tokyo Metropolitan Art Space), there is a huge pipeorgan. I had been to this hall a few times and I always wanted to hear it. The sound was sometimes powerful and sometimes soft and sensitive. It was like an orchestra although she plyayed alone. I was overwhelmed throughout her playing. After a short break, we came to listen to Symphony No. 9 at last that I had been waiting for with excitement. Last year, I listened to Symphony No. 9 for the first time on TV on New Year’s Eve. Somehow, it became a tradition to play Symphony No. 9 of Beethoven the end of a year in Japan. And it is one of the most famous works of classical music, some melodies were familiar even though I did not knew the melody was from Symphony No. 9. When I first listened to it, I studied German a little. So I looked for the lyric of the fourth movement and tried to sing with my mother who studied German when she was a university student. We enjoyed to listened to it, however it was impossible for us to sing with TV. It was difficult to sing in German. Since then, we have been fans of Symphony No. 9 and we have looked forward to go to the concert and listen to live performance since we bought the tickets in October. The conductor was Kenichiro Kobayashi and played by Japan Philharmonic Orchestra. The first movement starts with unstable tremolo and develop into solemn theme. In the second movement, I especially like the rhythm and timpani of the first part. Between the second and third movements, the chorus came onto the stage because the fourth movement starts as soon as the third ends. The third is my favorite. Opposite to me, my mother says it makes her sleepy. Because it is in B flat major, it has tender and bright sound against the two previous movements. The biggest reason that I like the third movement is that I can hear bassoon than any other movements. The first sound of it is bassoon and it is easier to find the sound of bassoon because it is quieter than other three movements. Although I said my favorite is the third movement, I like the fourth as well as third. It starts only with orchestra first and three motives of previous movements appears and motive of the fourth appears at last. Contrabasses play this motive first and others start to play it gradually. And when the strings and some woodwinds play the main motive, bassoons play obbligato. It is not the main melody but it is said to be the most beautiful obbligato in the history and I think it is true. People usually hear the main melody but I try to listen to this obbligato carefully. If you have chance to listen to this you would satisfy of this. The chorus of the fourth is also attractive. Not only the sound of instrument, I like human voice, too. Bass leaded the chorus first and it is very overwhelming. By the way, soprano was Emiko Suga, alto was Yumiko Kan, tenor was Ken Nishikiori, bass was Satoru Aoto and the chorus was Tokyo College of Music. I have heard Ken Nishikiori’s singing voice on TV, but the live voice was far different and stunning than on TV. I was so surprised knowing that there was not microphone. And the large chorus was also amazing. The chorus was very beautiful, let alone it was powerful.
The concert was great but there is one thing I want to say at the end. There were people who did not turn off their cell phone and speak during the performance. It was very annoying to hear telephone ringing middle of the play. If you go to classical music concerts I ask you never forget to turn off your cell phone. Please!!!