“My Mother was a stalker. As a family we have tried to keep it quiet but on days when his schedule was known, she admitted to waiting as a student behind Harvard Yard’s ivy-covered pillars until he appeared, subsequently following him out of youthful admiration bordering on obsession.” Target of her affections: T.S. Eliot.
His resonance is alive and well with both her offspring and the musical public. The great romantic 20th century poet drew a sell -out crowd to an elegant location last evening in Dublin. The Smock Alley Theatre, downtown and riverside, well restored and equipped in comfortable three quarter round seating, hosted one of the chamber music concerts of the present ‘Music in Great Irish Houses’ Festival. The Heath Quartet performed Beethoven’s Opus 132 and one of the grand dames of Irish theatre, Olwen Fouere recited Eliot’s Four Quartets, a beloved work – according to many the poet’s very best- often, if questionably, contextualized with Beethoven’s late masterpiece.
Expectations ran high as festival marketing stressed not only Heath Quartet and Ms. Fouere but director Tom Creed as well: what had they come up with under his direction? How creative would the evening’s entertainment be? How would musical and poetic masterpieces intertwine, fare in his hands? The long and short of it is that little happened at all: no symbiosis between poetry and music, no interaction, nothing creative, no theatrical direction of the musicians. The poetry was read aloud from a book and followed by a performance of the Beethoven. The four musicians walked in as the actress left, accompanied by some uncomfortable, lukewarm applause. Something went terribly wrong with the expectation management of this event.