Scroll down to watch as a cat makes its way on stage during Beethoven's 'Pastoral' Symphony at the 52nd Istanbul Festival...
When nature encroaches on classical music, the results are sometimes disastrous, sometimes wondrous, but never dull.
I remember a particularly atmospheric performance at the Bravo! Vail Music Festival, in which an audibly stormy and windswept backdrop leant great atmosphere to a performance of Haydn’s Symphony No. 59 given by the musicians of Chamber Music Berlin-Vienna in the outdoor Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater… though the orchestra looked less than pleased as sheets of rainy mist made their way towards them through gaps to the side of the stage roof.
I’ve also had the misfortune of being dive-bombed by bats when performing at a wedding with my own string quartet. Not our finest hour, though being the professionals that we are, we soldiered on as best we could.
'A stray cat wandered on stage'
But on Friday I witnessed perhaps the best example of art and nature in synchronicity when a stray cat wandered on stage during a performance of Beethoven’s ‘Pastoral’ Symphony given by Festival Strings Lucerne at the 52nd Istanbul Music Festival.
The people of Istanbul love cats, and set up food and play stations for the city’s wild felines. Apparently, this cat is a regular in the Lutfi Kirdar International Convention and Exhibition Centre, where the concert was held, and the assembling audience members were charmed – even giving a hearty applause – when she coolly walked across the stage before the performance began.
But as the concert’s second half started (following a fluid and elegant performance of Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto by Maria João Pires), our feline friend appeared on stage again before walking through the audience and attempting to leap onto the lap of a most unimpressed man in the row ahead of me.
'She reacted as if to live birds'
When she next appeared on stage, the circumstances couldn’t have been better for her star appearance. As cuckoo calls in the orchestral part sounded, she reacted as if to live birds, much to the delight of the crowd.
A cat makes its way on stage during Beethoven's 'Pastoral' Symphony at the 52nd Istanbul Festival
The performance itself was a joy – the conductorless Lucerne players bringing a genuine chamber music feeling to the work, with all the fluidity that implies, under the direction of their concertmaster Daniel Dodds. But I suspect it’s the fantastic coming together of art and nature that the audience will take away. Beethoven, I have no doubt, would be delighted!
Festival Strings Lucerne with added cat at the Istanbul Music Festival © Lutfi Kirdar
Organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (IKSV), the 52nd Istanbul Music Festival runs from 21 May to 12 June 2024, featuring 25 performances in 17 venues from artists including the Budapest Festival Orchestra, Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra, Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra, Hungarian National Choir and Borusan Quartet, as well as soloists including Khatia Buniatishvili, Francesco Piemontesi, István Várdai, Edgar Moreau and Roby Lakatos.
