ADMISSION: ONE
SHILLING by Nigel Hess
With Patricia
Routledge and Piers Lane
Directed by
Chris Luscombe
The Playhouse –
Canberra Theatre Centre
May 21-22.
Reviewed by
Peter Wilkins
In 1938 at the
outbreak of the Second World War, renowned British classical pianist, Myra
Hess, approached the director of the National Gallery of Great Britain, Sir
Kenneth Clark, with an idea that would soothe the troubled minds and hearts of
the people during wartime.
What resulted
was a series of lunchtime concerts at the denuded gallery, and within the
partially bombed building . Expecting only a small number of friends to attend
the first concert, Hess and Clark were
amazed to discover over a thousand people waiting to get in. Eventually
about 800 were crammed into the large gallery to hear Myra Hess deliver the
first piano recital . In the ensuing years of the war, she would organize a
series of lunchtime concerts, inviting many of Britain’s leading musicians to
support her magnificent cause.
It seems
remarkable that it was not until 2006 that internationally acclaimed,
Australian born concert pianist, Piers Lane arranged a commemorative concert to
recall the music and the spirit of those wartime recitals. In the audience, Dame
Patricia Routledge listened intently, and Lane’s friend remarked how similar
she looked to Dame Myra Hess. It was then that the genesis of Admission One
Shilling was born, and first performed at the National Gallery in honour of the
initiative of Hess and Clark.
After long hours
of devising by Routledge and Lane with grand nephew, composer Nigel Hess and
director, Chris Luscombe, Admission: One
Shilling was beautifully crafted into a profoundly moving and celebratory
tribute to Dame Myra’s wartime effort. Sadly, only three performances were given
in Canberra, and, although sold out, it is unfortunate that this gentle and
engaging work could not have been seen by so many more. The superlatives roll
off the tongue. Delightful, engaging, transformative. The purely constructed,
one hour performance, in the tradition of those concerts all those years ago
recalls the unique character of the recitals, with Lane triumphantly performing
magic on the keyboard as he expressively played the works that would have been
performed by Hess during those dark days. Adroitly adept and masterly in his
renditions of work as diverse as Bach and Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert,
Chopin and Scarlatti, Lane counterpoints Routledge’s readings of the words and
recollections of Hess, gleaned from diaries, interviews and reports
The performance
is simply staged. Lane, in tails, sits at a Grand, while Routledge, in a period
frock similar to the one worn by Dame Myra in the projected image on the screen
behind the Grand, remained seated on a
period chair alongside a table with a jug of water. Accompanied by Lane’s
musical interludes, Routledge reads from her script, gently resting up her
knee. She glances often towards the audience as she entire effortlessly brings
Myra Hess to life through her own words and accounts of her time. Her
magnificent articulation becomes a symphony of experiences and impressions, not
attempting to become Hess, but capturing with every nuance the remarkable
character, soul and professionalism of the visionary pianist.
We are
transported through script and music and accompanying projections of the people
at the concerts, the sandwich ladies and Hess herself to wartime, London and
the National Gallery. It escapes me for a time that I am at the 1 p.m. matinee,
which would have coincided with the time of the lunchtime concerts. It lends
the matinee a nostalgic air.
All too soon,
the performance comes to a close to rapturous and deservedly appreciative
applause. Lane and Routledge are the consummate professionals of their
respective arts. Luscombe has endowed the production with charm, truth and
simplicity. The words create the world of a remarkable woman;l the music the
language of all tongues and the sheer artistry of a pianist at the very
pinnacle of his profession. Admission One Shilling is more than a performance about Dame Myra Hess. It is about
a nation’s fortitude and resilience at a time of dire conflict. It is about the
spirit of the soul to rise above the circumstance and find solace in the sounds
of music. And it is about the nature of the artist who feels the power of
predestination and the need, through humour, to not take life too seriously. Admission: One Shilling is a lesson in
life.
