The concert

This concert for the ‘Original Four Seasons’ tour was a classical concert for which Vanessa-Mae only used her acoustic Guadagnini violin. She was accompanied by her mother Pamela Nicholson on piano and by the ‘The Laureates’ conducted by Vasko Vassilev. ‘The Laureates’ ensemble consists of about 15 awards winning musicians and it was somehow awkward to realise that Vanessa-Mae as the high profile soloist of the evening was the only musician present on stage who never participated in any contest. 

The concert was an impressive event and Vanessa-Mae’s physical presentation and violin play were superb and absolutely magnificent. I could notice it all very well because she was standing right in front of me the whole concert and the lights in the hall were not dimmed completely. Vanessa-Mae had short hair with blue decorative stripes in it; her face was very much made up to a perfectly smooth complexion, with pinkly lipstick, blushed powdered cheeks and expressive eye make-up with lots of blue shadow from her upper lids all up to her brows, and dark liner, all more or less in the style of the cover of her ‘Original Four Seasons’ album and tour brochure although a little less excessive in use of colours. Vanessa-Mae wore a wonderful long blue silver dress that is also shown in the tour brochure. She looked superb and extremely gorgeous.

Since I don’t have photos of myself, I placed a few photos in this review that show Vanessa-Mae is a more or less similar style as at the concert. The photo above was made end 1998 at a concert in Munich. Although. Vanessa-Mae had a hair cut in the year 1999, her face shows the same style of heavy make-up as at the concert, only the glittering eye ornaments were omitted in Hamburg. The two photos below are cuttings for the ‘Original Four Season’ tour brochure  and show the wonderful glamorous dress that was especially designed for her.

During the second part of the concert after the break, Vanessa-Mae changed into a black pair of trousers with sleeveless black T-shirt and a red belt around her waist. The expressive blue eye make-up was changed into less descriptive soft colours, but everything else was again perfectly in place. To get an impression, see the collage in of 4 photos shown below. 

As already explained, I could observe Vanessa-Mae very well during the complete concert, not only her physical looks but also her style of playing and the expressions on her face. I consider a few aspects interesting to comment on.

Vanessa-Mae was very relaxed and completely at ease during the whole concert. She was standing right up, only her upper body sometimes moved very quietly on the rhythm and mood of the music. Vanessa-Mae looked very concentrated and her face showed almost no emotion or change of expression as sign of the technical and physical efforts that she had to deliver. Intensive training for numerous hours over many years rendered Vanessa-Mae her perfect and fluent technique that enables her always to play as if it costs no effort at all and as if it all comes to her very naturally. This particular evening, she played with this masterly perfection, and I was in the lucky position to observe it all. Nothing else mattered to her than the music, although she obviously was very much aware of the reactions and emotions in the audience. She was constantly in control of herself and everything around her; nothing could distract, hamper or annoy her: not the rumours in the audience from time to time, nor the heavy make-up that covered her face or the expensive dress she was wearing during the first part of the show. I found it striking that the whole evening she very consciously avoided touching her face, and when she had to pull some hair away it was carefully done with only her fingertips, because she realised that everything of her make-up had to stay perfectly in place the whole concert.

Vanessa-Mae received standing ovations from the audience many times during the concert after finishing a piece of music. At all those ovations, a grateful and relaxing smile appeared on her impressive visage indicating how thankful and joyful she was with the signs of appreciation from the public. Noticeable was also that she immediately involved her mother Pamela, Vasko Vassilev and the other musicians into these eruptions of public gratitude.

The concert opened with a piece of Vitali that I had never heard before and I have not been able to find out the title of this composition. Vitali was an Italian contemporary of Vivaldi and Tartini  and the piece matched the concert nicely. It was a quiet moving piece and I liked it very much.

After the opening of the concert, Vanessa-Mae addressed the audience. She told with her soft and pleasant voice no program for the concert was given because she simple asked the people to trust her that the evening would be rewarding for them.

Next Vivaldi’s ‘Four Season’ in Vanessa-Mae’s own original arrangement was played. I was very curious whether the combined play of Vanessa-Mae and the ensemble would be perfectly synchronous, or that I could notice some mistakes. Whatever it may be, I didn’t hear any failures and mistakes. All parts of the ‘Originally Four Seasons’ were played perfectly and it was a pleasure to listen to it. All the movements were concluded with standing ovations. In between the various movements, Vanessa-Mae told stories to the audience and explained how the different stages and images of the natural seasons could be recognised in the music. All in all, it was a spectacular event to watch Vanessa-Mae and her ensemble to play this music. Because it was played very well, all the excitement and thrill that is present on the album was adequately conveyed to the audience. The ovations were well deserved for all the musicians.

After the ‘Original Four Seasons’ were concluded a break was scheduled. The second part of the concert started with Vanessa-Mae speaking to the audience and she narrated the story of how the devil appeared in a dream to Tartini and how this dream inspired him to compose ‘The Devil’s Trill Sonata.’  Then ‘The Devil’s Trill Sonata’ was played with equal perfection as ‘The Original Four Seasons.’

Although classical in nature, the remainder of second part of the concert was more modern and crossover oriented. For this, an electric guitarist, a percussionist and base guitarist joined the stage. Vasko Vassilev played violin now too and about the half of ‘The Laureates’ had left.

‘A Poet’s Quest’ was next and this modern piece has so much classical character that it suited the concert very well. Then Vanessa-Mae played Bach Street Prelude only accompanied by the percussionist. This piece is one of my favourites when she plays it live: it is sheer joy and Vanessa-Mae obviously enjoys playing it for live audience. She played it full of passion and very energetic, and during the piece Vanessa-Mae and the percussionist inspired each other in whipping the other up to incredible heights of artistic expression. The audience loved her for this and gave both a long lasting standing ovation.

Next followed two pieces composed by Paganini: ‘Cantabile’ and ‘Moses Variations On G-string to B-Flat’ Especially the ‘Moses Variations’ belong to my favourites. ‘Cantabile’ is very nice too but quiet and not so spectacular. Next Vanessa-Mae played her own composition ‘Happy Valley,’ now performed in a special arrangement suited to the reduced ensemble and with only two background singers who joined the stage for this song. ‘Storm’ and ‘The Devil’s Trill’ concluded the official program of the concert.

‘Storm’ was familiar and always wonderful in all her concerts, but ‘The Devill’s Trill’ was really spectacular. Especially the mid section of the piece where Vanessa-Mae’s violin was silenced and she started clapping her hands and moving – almost head banging -  with her head while she walked to the edge of the stage in order to cheer up the audience in joining her in her enthusiasm with a big smiling expression on her heavily made up visage, was a contagious and impressive moment. The whole audience now joined in standing, dancing, moving and clapping, all ending in a long lasting standing ovation as sign of appreciation and gratitude for a great and spectacular concert.

Vanessa-Mae ran off the stage, but returned shortly thereafter for some encores. The encores started with Ravel’s ‘Tzigane’ played by Vanessa-Mae solo on her violin, only to be accompanied by her mother Pamela on piano. ‘Tzigane’ is a master piece and well suited for any solo violinist to show technical ability and technique. Vanessa-Mae did so adequately. ‘Tzigane’ is a wonderful piece and I definitely hope that she will record it one time on cd. Next ‘Devil’s Trill’ and ‘Storm’ were played once more as final of the concert and were received by the audience again with great enthusiasm and excitement.    

copyrights of the text © VMSPOS @ http://www.vanessa-mae.nu, Groningen, The Netherlands, 2004