I have indigestion. I feel like I swallowed an Ikea pencil. I’ve been smashing Tum Tums and Quick-eze all day, and if I boiled a red cabbage and drank the broth, I reckon I’d be pissing blue. Every time I spit on the footpath it comes out thick and stringy. I’m worried I have something worse than reflux, maybe another lung collapse. But I can’t worry cause tonight I got tickets to Chopin by Candlelight.
Up until now, my only experience with Chopin was in year eleven when I downloaded the wrong file from beemp3. I wanted Start Choppin by Dinosaur Jr. and got 9 minutes of classical piano instead. The only reason I kept it on my iPod was cause I wanted the French girl on my bus to think I contained multitudes or something.
I arrive at the government house early so I can walk around the big ballroom. I look up at the balconies, arched windows and curved ceilings and am reminded of the Theed Royal Palace in Naboo. It is all very grandiose. Above me is not just one but five chandeliers. On the stage is a gigantic piano, long black and shiny like a limousine. As promised, the piano is surrounded by hundreds of candles. There are candlesticks on every wall and on the chandeliers. The whole room is a dim yellow glow, but I notice that the glow ain’t flickering. When I squint my eyes and I realise the candles on the light fixtures are just tungsten lights. Becoming concerned, I walk to the stage and bend over the candles on the ground and am shocked to see they are also electronic. I am rather disappointed by the Perth Concert Hall’s use of eCandles, but at least the piano and piano player are real.
The piano man’s name is Piers Lane, voted Australia’s best concert pianist. His artist biography is filled with proper nouns and capital letters. I learn the names of prestigious venues he has played and awards he has won, but I don’t learn anything about the man himself. What’s his hobbies? What’s his pet peeves? What makes him tick? Tonight he is going to play every single one of Chopin’s 21 nocturnes. I am unfamiliar with them, but Mr. Lane tells us that a nocturne is a composition inspired by the night and played with two hands: the left making the rumbling rhythm and the right making the lyrical melody.
Chopin by Candelight. Photography by Artshoot Media.
The first song is Nocturne in B flat minor Op.9 No.1 which is his best song. The song is very moody, going from sad to cheery to sad again. I close my eyes and imagine rain falling on the cobblestone streets of Paris. Every now and then the clouds move away and the sunbeams dry up the water. Then it starts raining again. The French weather sustains me for the duration of the song. For the record, I have never been to Paris but have seen it in an Owen Wilson movie.
The second song, Nocturne in E flat major Op.9 No.2 has a melody that will be very familiar to Australian ears. Go listen to the song and then listen to the children’s choir from the Qantas ad. The song is almost identical, except Chopin does one of his famous twists. Instead of going ‘I still call Australia home’, he goes ‘I still call Australia ho- Mi-Mi-mi-me-mee home’. It is quite interesting the first time he does it, but the flourish does make it difficult for me to sing along.
The next song lacks any hooks. I try to close my eyes and think of a scene, but the problem is, I can’t think of anything outside of movies and tv. This music reminds me of something that’d play at the end of a dull film at the Luna. Picture an office worker sitting at his desk to file pencils, a dead eyed grandma on a bus leaving town, or a stylish villainess walking down a street in high heels, winking at the camera, fade to black. But then I remember. This music was in that dreary British comedy from 2005 starring Tamsin Egerton; a film I only remember because of the brief flash of nudity- the first I ever saw. The movie was a loophole to passing the school’s net-nanny. You could watch a 240p upload on dailymotion and fast forward to the scene and hit pause. Again, I can’t remember what the movie was called, but I remember always hearing Chopin at the start of it.
After the third song the nocturnes start to sound the same. They frolic about like a rabbit in the fields of heaven. Sometimes there’ll be a moment of suspense, a minor chord where the rabbit’s ears prick up and it stands on its hind legs, but the music always returns to sentimentality and the rabbit keeps frolicking. While the songs are very nice, there are reasons why sunsets only last for 15 minutes. If they went for hours we’d get bored.
I know I complained about the e-candles earlier, but I’m starting to think an e-piano would actually liven things up. There are many sound fonts one can choose to prevent things growing stale, and one can even hit ‘demo’ and play with a whole backing band. Some of the best performances I’ve ever seen were when the pianist just hit demo and got up and danced.
Piers Lane, to his credit, sometimes stops playing and gets up and announces the next few songs. He usually tells us some biographical and compositional details– “Frederic Chopin was 34 when he composed his third opus in the village of Brussels. You will notice the irregular use of suspension and…’” But I wish Lane would throw in some jokes or intriguing information about Chopin. What are his hobbies? What makes him tick?
After the intermission, I see that the two young lads behind me have left. Before the show they were talking enthusiastically, calling Chopin ‘based’ and Lane ‘goat’. I look around and see all the young people in the crowd have left. Piers Lane returns and sets to playing the remaining 11 nocturnes. The fifty or so senior citizens in the crowd sit still in rapt attention. I wonder if attention-span is an age thing or a generational thing– will millennials, zoomers and ipad kids also be able to sit and watch three hours of piano in their eighties? Although it’s likely that the elders here are daydreaming instead of concentrating, I find it very hard to do either. Like most people I am out of practice with being bored. I am uncomfortable with my own thoughts, and always have a podcast, book or game to stop me from thinking for too long. But for writing, boredom is much more helpful than entertainment. Said Walter Benjamin: “boredom is the dream bird that hatches the egg of experience.”
The last song Piers Lane plays is one Chopin wrote at sixteen, Nocturne in E minor Op.72 No.1. I am expecting some youthful pop punk energy, but the song is slow and sad and makes me feel very old. I feel my skin coming loose and my tongue turning grey and the crust round my eyes starting to moisten. Before long the Piers man stops and stands up. Everyone claps and some people stand up and clap. I am unable to stand. I am too tired.
Chopin by Candlelight is part of the Music on the Terrace programme by the Government House Foundation. Running all year, there are concerts from renowned classical, jazz and opera performers. The tickets are surprisingly affordable for such high culture in a beautiful venue. Whether you’re looking to impress a hot date, or rise in the ranks to number one grandchild, I recommend putting on your cleanest clothes and buying two tickets for Music on the Terrace.