A superstar is born

About two years ago I attended a concert at Liverpool's Philharmonic Hall. The main attraction was a shy young man playing the cello, who had just won the BBC Young Musician of the Year award, Sheku Kanneh-Mason. He delivered a polished performance, technically secure, at times allowing the audience a glimpse of things to come. He was helped at the conductor's pult by the firm leadership of Vasily Petrenko who is not one for musical extravangance but clear and sound delivery.

What a difference a year, or two, makes. The Royal Wedding, assorted media performances later and, yesterday, the same person filled the Philharmonic Hall in Liverpool to the rafters with people who were dying to hear him (and take a picture on their iphone) at a solo performance, accompanied on the piano by his sister Isata Kanneh-Mason.

Sheku Kanneh-Mason at The T.J. Martell Foundation in October 2018

As I wrote in 2016, there was never any doubt that Kanneh-Mason had the potential for cello stardom. His almost flawless technique prepared him for a steep musical career. The question was how he would navigate the stumbling blocs on the way, not least those moments of fame which were bound to come him as a rare example of a gifted black musician in a country that was (and still is) crying out for more diversity amongst its performers and audiences. As everyone knows who has been in a concert hall in the UK, auditoria here are filled with people from the same demographic: white, middle class and well into pension age, presumably a legacy of the brutal cull of secondary school music teaching in the 1980s. So it is no surprise that a country hungry for a fresh face embraced Kanneh-Mason (and his family) with open arms.

Yet with fame, especially of the Royal Wedding type, come problems and it was an open question whether Kanneh-Mason would be able to walk the fine line between cashing in on the popular classical music promise and the hard slog of the concert hall performances and studios.

As more recordings of him were released, the worries increased. Most of the pieces were pleasant yet musically inconsequential nods to popular taste. The real test would be whether he would develop his repertoire and further take on the modern classics, as he did with so enormous success with Shostakovich's cello concerto. The British say that the proof of the pudding is in the eating and last night, the pudding was being served and it was delicious indeed.

The evening started with an dynamic delivery of Boccherini's Cello Sonata No 6. Brother and sister displayed a special rapport which helped with the rapid tempi changes and Haydnesque flourishes.

The next piece was Puolenc's Cello Sonata. I must have heard it now perhaps a hundred times, most notably played by Daniel Mueller Schott and Robert Kulek. Whilst studio recordings hugely privilege the cello, as studio technicians can dim the piano sound and heighten the prominence of the cello, both cello and piano were perfectly synchronised last night and Isata Sheku-Mason took the foot of the pedal in the right moments to allow her brother to shine.

Poulenc's second movement is the Cavatine, a beautiful instrumental aria. This was where technical prowess was to be transformed into personality and, whilst I would have loved a less hurried, more longing interpretation from Kanneh-Mason, he clearly put his own stamp on the piece which means he has now joined the musical conversation about the piece's interpretation in his own right, and that at age 19. 

The fourth movement of Poulenc's Sonata was probably the trickiest for both to navigate and both may agree that there were moments that needed extra work still. But even in those moments of strain, if anything, Sheku Kanneh-Mason appears only to be the victim of his own success. His technique is so polished, his dexterity so extraordinary that he sometimes rushes some of the passages instead of slowing them down. Sometimes less is more, and since the first bars of the fourth movement are fiendishly difficult for the piano too, a slower pace may have worked wonders.

Debussy's Cello Sonata and Brahms' Cello Sonata No 2 followed after the interval. Both brother and sister offered a muscular interpretation of Brahms, and Sheku an energic and forceful pizzicato in Debussy's Sonata's second movement. There were perhaps moments of technical brilliance that lacked the emotional urgency in Debussy but to say that is to take nothing away from a superlative performance of a promising cellist superstar in the making.

Brahms' Sonata was perhaps the most difficult piece for the hall. Liverpool's Philharmonic has the acoustic characteristics of a barn hall and solo instruments are helped greatly by sparsely instrumented passages. In turn, where composers pull out all the stops, the sound easily gets mixed in with its own echo from the bare walls. So, whilst Poulenc and Debussy were perfect for the hall, Brahms' Sonata got slightly drowned in its own reverberations. Brahms' was clearly a piece ideal for the more intimate, originally scheduled location of the concert. (It didn't help that there is always somebody who finds it difficult to switch off their mobile phone.)

I tend to close my eyes during performances since the various antics of performers (conductors and soloists alike) interest me little. Last night however I couldn't do this. Kanneh-Mason's technical skills were never in doubt but what he now offers audiences is starting to become a musical personality, a way of playing that is his very own. His famous pout notwithstanding (he has publically commented on it) his way of playing now clearly shows that he is one with his cello. More so, he dabbles in displays of full control over the instrument yet also developed a way to indicate critical distance to it. This creative tension between the player and instrument, a simultaneous unity and separation, is riveting to observe.

In Sheku Kanneh-Mason we are blessed with that rare thing, the career of a musical superstar unfolding in front of our eyes.

Fixing Liverpool's crime problem

The New Yorker recently ran a feature on Bill Bratton, the former and current Police Commissioner of New York and Los Angeles. Bratton achieved some fame (and notoriety) as an advocate of the 'broken windows' policy which is often credited with bringing crime levels down in New York during Rudi Giuliani's govenorship.

Ever since the big apple experienced a precipitous fall in crimes, a debate has been raging whether the 'broken windows' policy has been a factor, or even the major contributor to this success.

Kirkdale, Liverpool - crime capital in England; image: www.guardian.co.uk

In essence, advocates of the 'broken windows' policy base their support on the slippery slope argument. Small misdemeanours will lead to larger ones, leading from 'victimless' to more serious transgressions. Ignoring offences that are, initially, seen as inconsequential, such as fly tipping or drug dealing, send out a signal to everyone that criminal behaviour may be tolerated too. The 'broken windows' policy is a tool to nip things in the bud, before they can get out of hand. It strengthens the community's resolve to see all types of misdemeanour as harmful to at least one victim: the local community itself.

Whilst I have no evidence either way to decide this debate, I can say on thing with certainty. Living in Liverpool, one of the most deprived areas in Britain with the highest crime rate, I think it is quite irrelevant whether preventing so called 'minor' crimes may lead to a reduction in larger ones too. So far I have still to meet a single resident of, say my current home Kirkdale, who says that tolerating a single 'smaller' or 'victimless' crime leads to high quality of life. No matter of what 'scale' or 'consequence' a crime is, it seems to me that reducing any type of offence will make for a better quality of life.

As Kirkdale (Liverpool) is an area with, on average, more than 600 crimes per month which makes it one of the highest in England (in July the official crime statistics by the government documented a record of 828 crimes in Anfield and Kirkdale), you can take my word for it that tolerance of allegedly 'harmless' drug dealing (and drug deals gone wrong with people being stabbed in front of shop stores) do not add to feelings of high quality of life in the area. To my mind, there is every reason that the local police should try out the 'broken windows' policy in Liverpool.

What's wrong with Liverpool?

As I mentioned before I moved to Liverpool in April and now live in Kirkdale (North Liverpool). Whilst this may not be the poshest place to be, people are usually (or should that be: unusually) friendly here. Yes, prostitution and drugs are a problem here and so is the occasional murder or stabbing. The biggest problem however for everyone living here seems to be that the Liverpool Council appears to be asleep on the job.

Just one example: Liverpool is very untypical for British cities in that is has broad avenues and enormous huge circle roads with wide sidewalks. Plenty of space for creating a network of segregated bike paths through the city, similar to the bike super highways in London (of all places)! You would think!

Liverpool could have plenty of this! If the council knew what a bike is!

In fact, Liverpool has not a single mile of bike path anywhere! Bikers are practically non existent and where they dare to step out on the road they are usually met with honking horns.

It doesn't stop there though. As other councils have made huge strides towards instituting recycling collections (often against a lot of understandable opposition) the Labour Council in Liverpool has not even started establishing food collections. And recycling collections themselves are still only fortnightly.

So, when is Liverpool going to arrive in the 21st century? How long can it take for a large council like Liverpool's to catch up with the rest of the country?

What happened to Liverpool?

About three weeks ago, I moved to Liverpool. Leaving Cardiff was difficult since I have lived there for more than a decade. I only say this because my affection for Cardiff may cloud my judgement a tad. My first impression of Liverpool goes back to the year 2008, when it was European City of Culture. I visited the city and really enjoyed my stay. I don't remember much about where I stayed but the city centre seemed vibrant and clean.

My second impression couldn't be more different. When I moved here in April this year, I was genuinely shocked. The areas to the north of the city centre are mainly rows of boarded up houses or large free spaces without any urban feel to it whatsoever. I ended up taking a place in Kirkdale, just around the corner from Everton (Goodison stadium) and nothing I have seen in the UK or anywhere else in Europe in fact, prepared me for this. There is practically no community centre left in Kirkdale. The area is marked by large open spaces or newly built houses (the usual boxy, faintly bucolic style that passes as homeliness in Britain), with broad dual lane avenues running through the middle of it.

The former Police and Post Station in Kirkdale

There are hints of former glory which produce a pang of nostalgia. Some of the corners still have grand brick buildings with intricate ornate brick work, but the buildings themselves are either run down, burned out or simply left to rot. They are also typically standing alone with no adjacent buildings, adding to the feeling that this is not an urban place at all. It is devastation on a grand scale. But how did this happen? And why? What happened here? I am at a loss to explain it. I have never seen anything like this level of deprivation and devastation in an urban space in the UK. It almost seems as if this is a city in eternal decline.