In classical music's equivalent of the Rumble In The Jungle (let's call it The Maul in the Hall) heavyweight geniuses Mozart and Beethoven went amiably toe to toe in the Llewellyn Hall on Tuesday.
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The judges, the members of the teeming audience of small schoolchildren, preschool to year 6, were asked to judge which man's music reigned supreme. At the end, discerningly, with their shrill and enthusiastic cheering they gave Beethoven a resounding points victory.
Tuesday's and Wednesday's four Mozart vs Beethoven occasions are part of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra's Noteworthy music education program. The CSO expects 5000 children to attend the four performances in which Mozart and Beethoven are played respectively by the costumed and bewigged George Ellis and Guy Noble. Both men are orchestral maestros of renown but on Tuesday were having child-like fun dressing up as the towering heroes of their profession.
The CSO played, for us all to judge, excerpts of some of both composers greatest hits.
"I wrote 41 symphonies and you only wrote nine!" Mozart crowed at Beethoven.
"But yours were a little bit bigger," Mozart admitted in a generous afterthought.
And perhaps it was the fact of the terrific gig ending with some of Beethoven's enormous-in-every-way Ninth Symphony (lots of little faces around me were registering childish awe) that tipped the vote Beethoven's way. Throughout the show Beethoven's excerpts seemed so much more more grown up than Mozart's relatively frivolous confections..
"Have a listen to zis!" a vain Beethoven/Noble invited in his outrageous fake German accent. And listen the children did to his surging Egmont Overture.
And then, exclaiming "Zis is genius! Zis is a ripper!" the vain German bade the children sing the "Da-da-da-da" that so hair-raisingly announces his Fifth Symphony.
Back stage, awe-struck I cornered this giant of western civilisation and stammered a few questions to him.
Noble and I had a laugh over what an "avuncular" Beethoven he had portrayed (even breaking into a skip and a dance at one point). The true Beethoven had been famously brooding and tempestuous.
Noble is afraid that "classical music can seem so alien to a modern child". He dares to dream that after events like these "Kids may think 'That was cool. That was a fun thing to do.' "
"So it's like giving them the virus so there's a possibility later on of them loving classical music."
One of those most likely to have been infected by the "virus" on Tuesday was Callie (surname withheld), six years old, of the Miles Franklin school. From a forest of volunteers Beethoven invited called Callie to come up and sample conducting.
"Zis is a baton, that's a fancy word for a stick," the composer of nine big symphonies chortled, handing Callie the tool of the conductor's trade. He showed her how to boss an orchestra into making great bursts of melodious noise.
Will Callie ever forget this experience of magical empowerment? Henceforth will any other possible career (other than being a maestro) have any allure for her?
