Bétuhune et L'Opéra Bastille

Today David, Alec and I took a TGV ride of just over 1 hour to Béthune up to the north of Paris where David thought the organ at St. Vaast may be up to speed for a Bach CD.

We enjoyed the town's 14th century square where we had an excellent coffee (trés importante!) before walking on to St. Vaast where we met two of its organists who were tuning for a recital tomorrow; David was scheduled to test the organ at 2pm so we went back to the square for lunch.

Its clock tower had delicate-sounding bells that rang on the hour, a tune bearing a striking resemblace to that of 'The Scottish Soldier'! The entire centre of the square is fenced off for restoration work, and were it not for the gate which allows access to the tourist office in the bottom of the clocktower, the high fences would prevent you seeing inside at all.


David played some Buxtehude and some early Bach on the organ; it sounded very well, though didn't have the 'guts' (to quote David) of the Abertin organ in Paris. I worked out where to place microphones in the event that we record here some time.

That journey complete, Alec went off to meet friends for dinner while David and I went to Opéra Bastille to see the Paul Hindemith work, Cardillac, a psychodrama which premiered in 1926 based on the whodunit 'Das Fraulein von Scuderi' by E.T.A. Hoffmann.

It was in German with French surtitles and I got the gist most of the time. Basically it was about a goldsmith who couldn't bear to part with his creations and went around murdering those who had bought them. Of course once you understand the language, there's the further hurdle of understanding the symbolism - we thought it might be about the society's conflict with the artistic process.

Kent Nagano was the musical director of the work which played for 90 minutes without intervals and was stunning - no problem hearing anything in there. The orchestra with lots of wind and percussion also featured a piano, and just 18 strings, 4 of them double basses. I'm looking forward to seeing Rigoletto here next year.

I really am enjoying being in France. I have to pinch myself when I wake up in the morning - I'm beginning to bruise!