Even if I had been present at Kyung Wha Chung’s recital in London - which I admit I was not - I would perhaps have been wrong to take on trust the statement made by the critic of The Times about what the violinist said to the parents of the coughing child between movements of a Mozart sonata. John Duffus, though he was not there either, presents the picture somewhat differently in his reply to my earlier blog on the subject. The Royal Festival Hall is a big, acoustically imperfect auditorium. The Korean violinist was unlikely to have spoken very loudly. How many people in a packed house actually heard what she said? Enough to turn the atmosphere, as The Times put it, instantly “toxic “?
Some people who say that they did hear what Chung said have suggested that the violinist asked the parents to take the child out for a glass of water, and not that they should wait until she was older before bringing her to a concert. It sounds possible. But, on a night of generalised concert-hall coughing, was the perhaps highly-strung player right to single out the child in any way at all? Was Kyung Wha Chung not simply giving an intimate sonata recital in the wrong surroundings? Does a performer have any right to draw attention publicly to one innocuous member of the audience?
As a long-established critic, I am aware that audiences often behave badly. For a performer to answer back when irritated is nothing new. I can recall an occasion when Sir Georg Solti had a cougher ejected from a seat immediately behind the conductor’s podium at Covent Garden. And I can remember an occasion during a Ring cycle at Bayreuth being personally chided by a fellow member of the audience for persistently being the last in row H to return to his seat after the interval. But at least I could reply with a smile, since the orchestra had not yet started playing - though you cannot at Bayreuth see whether the conductor is present or not.
6 December 2014
A final word! As mentioned in another musical blog site, the Daily Telegraph carried a thoughtful article on the Chung incident by Ivan Hewitt on December 5.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/culturenews/11275515/Kyung-wha-Chung-was-right-to-shush-a-toddler.html
The confusion over what happened and what some THOUGHT had happened is illustrated by two illuminating comments from patrons who attended the recital. One, Dave Hanrahan, estimates the child was around 6 or 7. Mother and child were of Asian origin, probably Korean. Hanrahan, mother and child were all seated in the front row. He had not noticed fidgeting and thought the child had been well-behaved. But something happened as Chung prepared to start the second movement of the Mozart. She first made some sort of signal to the child that something was wrong. Eventually she made her comment. Seated just two seats from them, the only word Mr. Hanrahan could distinguish was “child”. On this basis, the Times critic must have been in error and, I submit, should not have stated as fact what she could not possibly have heard clearly.
Yet another poster with the name ‘musiclover’ was sitting relatively close by in Row 3. He did hear the child making noises. He also clearly heard Ms. Chung say, “There is a child. There is a child.” He reckons the immediate cause of the problem was the timing one of the child’s coughs. “KWC had waited for at least one full minute for the coughing to die down and was about to resume, and that was when the young one’s chesty cough came out.”
So, two very different versions. Yet the writer of the Telegraph article has another version. Even though seated much further away, he “could hear this particular child from right across the other side of the hall, for some minutes. Chung was actually very patient, and although her tone was pretty icy when she finally lost it, she was perfectly polite.”
It’s not at all unusual for witnesses to an event to have several different interpretations. Much obviously depends on what they are concentrating on at the time an incident occurs which then diverts their attention. If good is to come from this particular episode. I hope concert promoters, venue managements, artists and the public start a debate about the presence of very young children at concerts and also where they should be allowed to sit. For example, is it not wiser to ensure they are seated very close to an exit rather than in the centre of the front row of the stalls?
In the meantime, the Telegraph writer and most of the 100+ readers’ comments are agreed that - in general - it is “just idiotic to take very small children to concerts.”