A Jaded Concert Review

It is disappointing when a concert or album reviewer/critic goes into a concert or a listening of a new album expecting things to be a particular way.  When things do not go as expected the reviewer obsesses on what he or she did not like and they end up picking apart the performance.  This is what I found when the other day I read a concert review of Hilary Hahn's recital at Strathmore Hall in North Bethesda, Maryland.  The review was written by Robert Battey and published in The Washington Post.  Upon reading the review it became clear that Mr. Battey is conservative and traditional in his musical tastes.  The headline says it all: Virtuoso violinist Hilary Hahn holds her audience rapt but adds some irritants.

It seems that Mr. Battey's review is all about building up only to tear down.  He talks about being in the presence of a rare instrumental talent only to turn around and say that Ms. Hahn "exudes little star power or charisma onstage."  I do not know about you, but when I go to a classical music concert I am more concerned with great technique and playing in tune than star power.  I have seen performers with great stage presence give mediocre performances.  That is not what I want, but apparently that is what Mr. Battey wants.

The biggest "irritant" to me in this review is his critique of the program.  He called it a program that "uncomfortably juxtaposed old standards with second-tier Americans.  Charles Ives and George Antheil are the two Americans on the program.  Does Mr. Battey infer that all American composer are second-tier or lower?  I wonder because I do not consider Charles Ives as second-tier.

It is obvious that Mr. Battey had hoped for a "more traditional" recital.  He spent about one-third of the review ranting about the Ives and Antheil pieces.  He even attacks the performance of the Beethoven saying that the duo's "accents were wan and Hahn's staccatos were sticky rather than spiky" and claiming that the range of expression was narrow in the slow movement.

In the end, Mr. Battey did give high marks to Ms. Hahn's encore of the Bach B minor Partita.  He called it "simply jaw-dropping in perfection."  Yet he could not leave it there.  True to his build up and tear down form he goes on to claim that a few of the tempos seemed slow and she was inconsistent with the repeats making the piece's structure incoherent.  Though I wonder incoherent to who?  Unless you know the piece backwards and forward, you probably would not even notice the "incoherent nature" of the structure.

All of this really makes me wonder what reviewers like Robert Battey want.