Tenor halts concert in row over phone use
Singer distracted by audience cameras following new policy
ARENOWNED tenor halted his performance at Symphony Hall to attack a new policy allowing the public to take phone pictures of City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO) performances.
Ian Bostridge stopped after the third piece in Britten’s Les Illuminations to request that people turn off their phone cameras, saying they were “extremely distracting”.
It came after CBSO chief executive Emma Stenning laid out a more liberal audience policy, stating the orchestra was “very happy” for people to take photos during concerts.
But the ruling was condemned by Birmingham Post music critic Norman Stinchcombe, who questioned why “a performance by one of the finest British singers of the last 50 years, and a world-renowned interpreter of Britten, was interrupted by a handful of ... mobile-obsessed dimwits?”
His thoughts were echoed by readers of Slipped Disc classical music site, with one commenting: “It strikes me as extraordinary that Ms Stenning, the CEO, comes from a theatre background, and yet does not seem to know that phone cameras etc are the bane of actors’ lives. Why might she assume that musicians are different?
“I would not be at all surprised if Mr Bostridge never returns to Symphony Hall. Bravo him for standing up on this one.
“But one cannot be surprised at this absurd situation if the CBSO management positively encourage this.
“Audiences are now getting mixed messages... Surely it would have been better to have left it as things were. It is the CBSO management who have caused this upset. Poor leadership here.” A CBSO spokesman said: “Tenor Ian Bostridge briefly stopped last night’s performance as he was distracted by a member of the audience using their phone. “The CBSO’s current guidance around mobile phone usage states: ‘We are very happy for you to take photographs and short video clips at our concerts, but please refrain from recording the whole performance.
“We do ask that you are mindful of disturbing other audience members and therefore ask that you dim the
brightness on your phone, take pictures during applause breaks and do not use your flash’. The CBSO remains supportive of audiences being able to use their phones at appropriate moments during our concerts.”
Mr Stinchcombe said: “Did the CBSO’s chief executive Emma Stenning attend this concert? One hopes so because she would have been able to see the early fruits of the silliest of her new innovations.
“The orchestra and soloist Ian Bostridge were about a quarter of the way through Britten’s Les Illuminations when the tenor motioned to conductor Gergely Madaras, raised his hand and halted the performance.
“He addressed a small group in the audience who had been filming
him on their mobile phones and said: ‘Their lights are shining directly in my eyes – it’s very distracting. Would you please put your phones down.’.
“A performance by one of the finest British singers of the last 50 years, and a world-renowned interpreter of Britten, was interrupted by a handful of intellectually challenged, mobileobsessed dimwits.
“Their antics are positively encouraged by the orchestra’s administrators who print this in the concert programme.
“Perhaps Stenning will castigate Bostridge for encroaching on the liberty of the officially sanctioned mobile movie makers?
“One feels that anything is possible under this barmy new dispensation.”
I would not be at all surprised if Mr Bostridge never returns to Symphony Hall. Music fan