BBCSSO, 24/10/2019
Maxwell Davies : An Orkney Wedding, with Sunrise
Tchaikovsky : Piano Concerto No. 1 (Yulianna Avdeeva, piano)
Sibelius : Symphony No. 2
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Thomas Dausgaard
An Orkney Wedding... is probably the late Sir Peter Maxwell Davies's most popular work, and it's easy to see why. It's picturesque, humorous, touching, accessible, and an excellent concert-opener. It was given an appropriately uproarious rendition by the orchestra, and crowned by Chris Gibb's solo bagpipe processing into the hall and up onto the platform to celebrate the sunrise after the preceding shenanigans.
Some of the whisky fumes were still lingering at the start of the Tchaikovsky, because I heard a few odd notes from the horns and winds in the first movement, but the air cleared soon enough for a good, unsentimental reading of the concerto from Avdeeva and Dausgaard. Avdeeva overpedals a little for my taste, liking the resonating sound to linger slightly, but otherwise she gave a good, forthright interpretation, energetic and reflective by turns, enough to ring the changes and prevent things from ever slipping into humdrum routine. I didn't get the thrill of a revelation as I had from Alexander Gavrylyuk a year ago, but it was still an enjoyable performance.
Sibelius's 2nd Symphony, heard in proximity with a major piece of Tchaikovsky, still shows distinct traces of influence (the influence is very prominent in the 1st Symphony), particularly in passages at the start of the second movement. However, it's the rich, dense writing for brass choir that really tells you you're listening to Sibelius. The whole symphony was vibrantly played, but the brass was a force of nature, with that faintly alien quality that comes out in the best of Sibelius, the sense that you're witnessing something beyond human experience, something that simply is, beyond rhyme or reason. It's something to look for in most Sibelius orchestral music, like Beethoven's ineffable silences, and it was perfectly delivered tonight. Like the Maxwell Davies, this is another piece that concludes with a sunrise, though a more metaphorical one, but no less uplifting for that.
[Next : 26th October]
Tchaikovsky : Piano Concerto No. 1 (Yulianna Avdeeva, piano)
Sibelius : Symphony No. 2
BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra
Thomas Dausgaard
An Orkney Wedding... is probably the late Sir Peter Maxwell Davies's most popular work, and it's easy to see why. It's picturesque, humorous, touching, accessible, and an excellent concert-opener. It was given an appropriately uproarious rendition by the orchestra, and crowned by Chris Gibb's solo bagpipe processing into the hall and up onto the platform to celebrate the sunrise after the preceding shenanigans.
Some of the whisky fumes were still lingering at the start of the Tchaikovsky, because I heard a few odd notes from the horns and winds in the first movement, but the air cleared soon enough for a good, unsentimental reading of the concerto from Avdeeva and Dausgaard. Avdeeva overpedals a little for my taste, liking the resonating sound to linger slightly, but otherwise she gave a good, forthright interpretation, energetic and reflective by turns, enough to ring the changes and prevent things from ever slipping into humdrum routine. I didn't get the thrill of a revelation as I had from Alexander Gavrylyuk a year ago, but it was still an enjoyable performance.
Sibelius's 2nd Symphony, heard in proximity with a major piece of Tchaikovsky, still shows distinct traces of influence (the influence is very prominent in the 1st Symphony), particularly in passages at the start of the second movement. However, it's the rich, dense writing for brass choir that really tells you you're listening to Sibelius. The whole symphony was vibrantly played, but the brass was a force of nature, with that faintly alien quality that comes out in the best of Sibelius, the sense that you're witnessing something beyond human experience, something that simply is, beyond rhyme or reason. It's something to look for in most Sibelius orchestral music, like Beethoven's ineffable silences, and it was perfectly delivered tonight. Like the Maxwell Davies, this is another piece that concludes with a sunrise, though a more metaphorical one, but no less uplifting for that.
[Next : 26th October]