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The Herald Scotland
a day ago
- Entertainment
- The Herald Scotland
Review: The London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Usher Hall
The 1995 work is a modern showpiece for symphony orchestra, as performances by the BBC SSO and National Youth Orchestra of Scotland have demonstrated, and it was a fine introduction to all the sections of the London Philharmonic here, especially the ensemble sound of the basses and the clarity of the wind soloists. The rest of the programme was box office gold, Holst's Planet Suite taking up the second half and the large orchestra occupying every square inch of platform in front of the audience-filled choir stalls. Somewhere offstage the National Youth Choir of Scotland made another memorable contribution to the Festival with the final Neptune movement's ethereal wordless chorus, which now seems redolent of a much healthier 20th century fascination with our Solar System. Elsewhere in the work, classical allusions emerge as readily as scientific ones, from the martial opening of Mars through the popular hymnic theme of joy-bringer Jupiter to the magical exchanges of Uranus. All the details of the marvellous orchestration, including a stellar percussion section, two harps and celesta, and rare sounds like that of the bass oboe, were apparent in Gardner's efficient reading, even if it lacked a little in the way of burnished edge. READ MORE: The first half performance of Rachmaninov's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini by Italian pianist Beatrice Rana was also much less flashy than it is often played, and none the worse for that. It is a keyboard show-pony's favourite, but Rana was having none of that in a measured, lyrical reading that allowed the orchestra's first oboe and other soloists their place in the spotlight and featured as beautiful an expression of the Andante Cantabile slow variation as one might hope to hear. The wonder of the work is how the 25 variations flow into one another and from soloist to orchestra and back, so having them enumerated and named in supertitles as well as on the thin free printed programme seemed a pointless distraction. And projecting the composer's programme note for Forest in the same way during the first viola's opening solo at the concert's start was just plain rude. To purchase tickets for the festivals, please click here
Scotsman
05-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
Tectonics: BBC SSO 1, Glasgow review: 'food for thought'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... Tectonics: BBC SSO, City Halls, Glasgow ★★★★ This year's Tectonics Festival, running over Saturday and Sunday, took as its key theme 'the profound act of listening'. You could argue that goes without saying for any music festival, but when it comes to Tectonics, and the explorative cutting-edge repertoire favoured by curator Ilan Volkov, the challenge can be as provocative as it is revealing. Ilan Volkov PIC: Alan Peebles Saturday's evening performances by the BBC SSO certainly gave us food for thought, not least in Norwegian composer Øyvind Torvund's Symphony. Ignore the connotations of the title, as in music you passively sit and digest from a performance on stage. In this 40-minute work the 'stage' was everywhere: woodwind in the main foyer, strings in the adjoining bar, brass inside the auditorium, soloists (saxophone, synth/guitar and percussion) located in sundry other spots, all interacting via television screens to Volkov's baton. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad We, as receptors, mapped our own way through the piece, free to promenade and thus individually determine the relative hierarchy of the textures. Hanging around the strings was to pleasurably ingest their permeating radiance, a cohesive Vaughan Williams-like density. Amble towards the wind and their cackling, dissonant belligerence grew increasingly antagonistic. Within the relative vastness of the auditorium, the brass generated waves of climactic clichés mostly in the combined spirit of Bruckner and Mahler. The magic lay in being able to create our own relationship with the score.
Scotsman
26-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
BBC SSO, Anja Bihlmaier & Javier Perianes review: 'some performance'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... BBC SSO, Anja Bihlmaier & Javier Perianes, City Halls, Glasgow ★★★★ Four formidable women strode through the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra's sometimes overwhelmingly powerful concert – well, five, if you also include conductor Anja Bihlmaier (and you really should), who was a fastidious but compelling presence throughout the evening's three eclectic offerings. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad First came a parade of Salome, Ophelia and Cleopatra, courtesy of three short pieces – collected together as Trois femmes de légende – by French composer Mel Bonis. There was more than a hint of Debussy and Rimsky-Korsakov to Bonis's exotic evocations which flowed freely through moods and textures, but the BBC SSO gave a nimble, perceptive account, with Bihlmaier thoroughly alert to the composer's restless swerves of direction and richly conceived musical imagery. Javier Perianes The evening's true star, however, was Elektra, as portrayed in Richard Strauss's most shockingly modernistic opera, which was itself transformed into an 'symphonic suite' (really a massive symphonic poem) by conductor Manfred Honeck and composer Tomáš Ille. Cramming Strauss's orchestral excess into a relentless 35 minutes was a hair-raising prospect, but Bihlmaier tackled the direction with a cool head. Her gleaming clarity and cleanness, however, allowed the music to radiate its incendiary power with searing heat. Seldom can quite so many musicians have been squeezed onto the City Halls stage, and seldom can the venue have shaken with quite as much sheer sound from an orchestra – there were even a few rare moments when Bihlmaier allowed her elegantly sculpted soundscapes to crack open, revealing the seething brutality beneath. It was quite some performance, as deftly paced as it was dramatically dispatched, and it showed the BBCSSO more than up for the challenge.
Scotsman
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Scotsman
BBC SSO, Anja Bihlmaier & Javier Perianes review: 'some performance'
Sign up to our Arts and Culture newsletter, get the latest news and reviews from our specialist arts writers Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... BBC SSO, Anja Bihlmaier & Javier Perianes, City Halls, Glasgow ★★★★ Four formidable women strode through the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra's sometimes overwhelmingly powerful concert – well, five, if you also include conductor Anja Bihlmaier (and you really should), who was a fastidious but compelling presence throughout the evening's three eclectic offerings. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad First came a parade of Salome, Ophelia and Cleopatra, courtesy of three short pieces – collected together as Trois femmes de légende – by French composer Mel Bonis. There was more than a hint of Debussy and Rimsky-Korsakov to Bonis's exotic evocations which flowed freely through moods and textures, but the BBC SSO gave a nimble, perceptive account, with Bihlmaier thoroughly alert to the composer's restless swerves of direction and richly conceived musical imagery. Javier Perianes The evening's true star, however, was Elektra, as portrayed in Richard Strauss's most shockingly modernistic opera, which was itself transformed into an 'symphonic suite' (really a massive symphonic poem) by conductor Manfred Honeck and composer Tomáš Ille. Cramming Strauss's orchestral excess into a relentless 35 minutes was a hair-raising prospect, but Bihlmaier tackled the direction with a cool head. Her gleaming clarity and cleanness, however, allowed the music to radiate its incendiary power with searing heat. Seldom can quite so many musicians have been squeezed onto the City Halls stage, and seldom can the venue have shaken with quite as much sheer sound from an orchestra – there were even a few rare moments when Bihlmaier allowed her elegantly sculpted soundscapes to crack open, revealing the seething brutality beneath. It was quite some performance, as deftly paced as it was dramatically dispatched, and it showed the BBCSSO more than up for the challenge.
