Matinee Series: 4 – Evolution

Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Elder Hall. 16 Oct 2024

The Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s fourth concert in its popular Matinee series delighted the near capacity audience. Featuring three works not often heard in local concert halls, there was something for everyone. Hummel’s Concerto for Bassoon in F provided an uncommon opportunity to hear the bassoon as a featured solo instrument, and who better to play it but the ASO’s very own Mark Gaydon!

Following what has now become the traditional musical Acknowledgement of Country, the concert began with a fairly standard reading of the Overture to Weber’s opera Euryanthe. First performed a little over two hundred years ago, Euryanthe is argued to be one of Weber’s most important operas, but like so many operas that have come before, or after it, it has slipped into relative obscurity and only the overture survives into concert programs. The overture is reputably an outstanding example of the early German Romantic style, but it struggles to really stir one’s spirits as overtures should do at the commencement of a concert. Kate Suther led the strings with aplomb and the stage was set for many more sweet and comforting sounds to come.

Conductor Nicholas Braithwaite conservatively marshalled the orchestra with not a hint of flamboyance. He has a diversity and depth of experience upon which to call – he doesn’t need to resort to ostentation – and he allowed the band to do exactly what was needed throughout the program. Wisdom shone through!

In the hands of a master like Mark Gaydon, the bassoon is an exceptionally emotional and expressive instrument, and Gaydon allowed the playfulness, particular in the third rondo vivace movement of the concerto, to come through in leaps and bounds. With most brass and woodwinds not being needed (only oboe and French horn remained), Gaydon’s bassoon filled the expanse of Elder Hall with warm and comforting sounds much like those of a baritone singer. Many in the audience took the occasional opportunity to listen attentively behind closed eyes, as did this reviewer, and the effect was transporting. Gaydon was enthusiastically applauded at the end and was brought back for two additional curtain calls.

Brahm’s Variations on a Theme of Joseph Haydn, Op.56, is an interesting work. It began its life as a piano duet but is now better known in its orchestral form, and musicologists doubt the thematic material was in fact written by Haydn. That aside, the theme – Chorale St Antoni – is lush and melodic and the eight short variations are developed in quite attention-grabbing ways. The Chorale is more evident in some variations, with only a fleeting glimpse in others, before its eventual restatement in the finale, which sees Braithwaite really launch himself into the majestic and celebratory conclusion.

The ASO’s matinee series concerts are each only about sixty minutes long, but they seem to stretch out time and pack in so much. They are pure soulful rejuvenation!

Kym Clayton

When: 16 Oct

Where: Elder Hall

Bookings: Closed

Sacred & Profane: 2 – Harmony

Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. St Peter’s Cathedral. 11 Oct 2024

Sacred and Profane? In a Cathedral? What’s going on!?

Fear not! ‘Profane’ is an interesting word: it can be an antonym for sacred, or it can refer to irreverence. For the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s second concert in its Sacred & Profane mini-series, the profane refers to J.S. Bach’s sunny Brandenburg Concerto No.3 in G, BWV 1048. There’s nothing irreverent about it at all – it’s simply not sacred music.

Scored for only three violins, three violas, three cellos, and harpsichord (as basso continuo), it is the shortest of the six Brandenburg Concertos and comes in at around ten minutes. What it lacks in duration, and in the size of the ensemble, it makes up in enthusiasm and energy. It is an explosion of pleasure, and ASO concert master Kate Suthers energetically leads the ensemble in a spirited performance. It struck this reviewer that the pace set in the first allegro movement was bordering on being too fast – as the melody is passed around the pulse seems to lose its acuity. Possibly the acoustic of the cathedral doesn’t smile kindly on small string ensembles playing at break-neck speed.

Haydn’s Symphony No.30 in C, Hob. 1/30 (Alleluia) uses a Gregorian Alleluia chant throughout, and sees the evening’s concert depart from the profane and place all feet squarely in the sacred. While conductor Anthony Hunt, who is Director of Music at St Peter’s Cathedral, spoke from the podium about the use of the word alleluia in various Christian religious traditions, additional musicians came on stage, including oboe, flute and horn which dominated the sound palette. In the second movement the flute is glorious, as is the horn in the third. Hunt nicely matched the pace and dynamics to the reverberance of the cathedral.

Mozart’s setting of the alleluia in his exquisite motet Exultate jubilate, K.165 is perhaps the best and most popular ever written, and the audience delighted in Jessica Dean’s performance. One never tires of hearing it. Dressed in a gorgeous gown resplendent in the colours of summer flowers, Dean took to the stage with a flourish and Hunt launched into the brisk opening with the enthusiasm of youth. The work is in four sections, and Dean was at her finest in the third (Tu virginum corona) where the pace is less frenetic, and she reaches ethereal vocal heights of gentleness and sweetness. Truly delightful and transporting. This is swept away with the mighty Alleluia! final section in which Dean, Hunt and the orchestra have so much unbridled fun. It sits well on Dean’s voice and the audience is sitting on the edge of joyous exhilaration throughout.

The concert ends with Duruflé’s Messe Cum jubilo, Op.11, a Mass ‘with rejoicing’ for baritone chorus, solo baritone, and orchestra. It is one of the few sacred works that is written for a male chorus and was written in 1966. Like many others in the audience (judging by the post-concert conversations as the audience left the venue), this reviewer had never heard this work until tonight, and it is a revelation. It is grounded in a plainchant, which permeates its five sections, and Hunt is in his element throughout. The vocal line frequently inhabits the upper end of the baritone range and neither the soloist Nathan Lay nor the St Peter’s Cathedral Choir ever sound strained. Indeed, the vocal tones are warm and rounded, and the at-times bombastic tutti orchestral accompaniment that is contrasted with moments of graceful, yet haunting woodwinds provides a choral experience that begs to be heard again.

This reviewer is doubtful that a recording of Duruflé’s Messe Cum jubilo could ever capture the majesty one experiences from a live performance in a venue such as St Peter’s Cathedral.

Kym Clayton

When: 11 Oct

Where: St Peter’s Cathedral

Bookings: Closed

Ensemble Q & William Barton

Musica Viva. Adelaide Town Hall. 3 Oct 2024 

There is no denying the individual technical wizardry and the artful musicianship of the members of Ensemble Q.  To a person they are wonderful musicians, at the top of their game, but together they are greater than the sum of their parts – they are a stirring partnership. 

Ensemble Q is a Company-in-Residence at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre and its members comprise Alison Mitchell (flute), Huw Jones (oboe), Paul Dean (co-artistic director and clarinet), David Mitchell (bassoon), Peter Luff (horn), Trish Dean (co-artistic director and cello), and Phoebe Russell (double bass). Many Musica Viva concerts include new commissions, and William Barton joined Ensemble Q to perform his new composition Journey to the Edge of the Horizon. It was the highlight of the concert, but more on that later. 

The program comprised Six Bagatelles for Wind Quintet by György Ligeti, Concerto for Cello and Wind Quintet by Paul Dean, Brahm’s Cello Sonata No.1 in E minor, Op. 38 (skilfully arranged by Heribert Breuer), and Barton’s new work. It is an interesting mix of compositional styles and, with the exception of the Brahms, they are all ‘contemporary’ works. 

As is the custom, there is a traditional welcome to country preceding the concert, but this one is somewhat special.  Not only is the welcome given by a representative of the local Aboriginal community in person (and he looked magnificent in traditional costume and paint daubs), but the messaging also includes the twist of welcoming all ancestors – both indigenous and non-indigenous!  Barton was on stage with the rest of the ensemble, and his infectious smile couldn’t be bigger.  It is a touching and welcome moment, and the audience greets it with enthusiastic yet respectful applause. 

The concert begins with Ligeti’s Six Bagatelles.  A bagatelle is a “short and unpretentious instrumental piece, usually for piano.” (Oxford Companion to Music.)  Beethoven wrote 26 piano bagatelles, of which the ever-popular Fur Elise is one.  Ligeti was a luminary avant-garde composer, and much of his music deliberately obscures the contrasts between instruments where such differences would otherwise be expected. Although this is not the case in his bagatelles, interestingly, at least to this reviewer, Paul Dean has taken a leaf out of Ligeti’s book and seemingly reduced the solo impact of the cello in his own concerto.  An interesting connection between the first two pieces on the program (or not!).  Back to the Ligeti. The bagatelles are playful and each of the five wind instruments has its own place in the sun while the others beautifully blend to provide a solid canvas on which the instrument in focus can shine brightly. A horn, bassoon, clarinet, or oboe can dominate a chamber piece, but not here. Ensemble Q plays them with immaculate control and sensitive dynamics, and they sound perfect in the context of the piece: hushed bassoon, mellifluous horn, plangent oboe, ethereal flute, and lightly playful clarinet. The allegro third movement is especially pleasing where the flute commands the auditorium. 

After the Ligeti, Trish Dean joins the ensemble for a performance of partner Paul Dean’s cello concerto.  Scored in three movements, it is a musical response to the Dean’s change of physical surroundings when they relocated to Queensland.  It is a celebrated work which has a digressive narrative.  Like the Ligeti, it allows each instrument to take focus but without foregrounding the cello such as one might expect in a more traditional cello concerto with a full orchestra. It is enigmatic: melodies are explored and developed but not in an overt way, the cello provides the ’glue’ without dominating, and the rhythms are mixed and varied.  The audience is especially appreciative of the chance to hear the work performed by the composer! 

The least satisfying work on the program (for this reviewer) was the Breuer arrangement of the Brahm’s sonata. Originally scored for cello and piano, hearing it performed with the piano part being replaced by wind quintet and double bass is somewhat discombobulating. That is not to say it is not enjoyable, but if one is familiar with the original, then it is difficult to put the piano out of one’s mind and replace it with an ensemble.  Indeed, the cello appears to be obscured at times. The arrangement does however skilfully expose the inner voicing of the piano part. 

And then to the headline act – a première performance of William Barton’s Journey to the Edge of the Horizon.  Seeing and hearing it is worth the price of the ticket!  Barton is surely a national treasure, and his new composition is quite transporting.  Just as Paul Dean’s cello concerto is his response to exploring a new physical environment, Barton’s work is, in his own words, “journey music”! It is scored for wind quintet, cello, double bass and of course yidaki (also known as didgeridoo).  In fact, Barton plays four yidaki, all with different but closely related tonalites. He sits centre stage with the ensemble in an arc close behind him. It is as if he is their horizon – something to approach and (musically) get closer to, but never actually arrive, because the horizon is always unattainable.  It is a journey that is never able to be completed, and hence a journey that traverses different landscapes.  And that is precisely what the music does.  In a single movement of around 15 minutes duration, Barton allows us to drink deeply at the well of insistent rhythm and hypnotic melody before pulling us away and taking us somewhere different. His vocalisations are as if his entire body becomes an instrument, and his vocal intonations are an entreaty to move on and find something new. Fifteen minutes feels like fifty. The music is sublime, and it is almost impossible to describe, but that doesn’t matter.  Rather, it is something to be experienced, and the large Adelaide Town Hall audience felt privileged they had done just that. 

Have I already mentioned that Barton is surely a national treasure? 

Kym Clayton 

When: 3 Oct

Where: Adelaide Town Hall

Bookings: Closed

Symphony Series 6 - Reflection

Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Adelaide Town Hall. 21 Sep 2024 

Some symphonies are as enjoyable when heard on a recording as they are when listened to in the concert hall. Elgar’s mighty Symphony No.2 in E flat, Op. 63, is not one of them, at least in the opinion of this reviewer. It begs to be seen as well as heard. By any measure it is ‘big’, and the best listening experience is to hear it live and see it’s awesome might unfold before your very eyes. It can be an all-consuming experience, and the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s performance of it this evening under the expert and nurturing direction of British conductor Mark Wigglesworth bordered on the sublime.  

Elgar’s Symphony No.2 was the main piece in Reflection, the sixth concert in the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s 2024 Symphony Series, and it was an astonishing success. The program also included Mozart’s ever-sunny Concerto for Clarinet in A, K. 622, with Dean Newcomb, the orchestra’s very own principal clarinettist, as soloist. K622 is almost a party piece for Newcomb – he’s performed it elsewhere, always to critical acclaim – and tonight’s performance was as good as any you will ever hear. Unlike the Elgar, the Mozart holds up well on recordings and is always enjoyable to listen to. It is quintessential Mozart, brimming with diverse lush melodies that are developed in surprising and interesting ways. Newcomb made it his own and dealt easily (seemingly!) with the technical difficulty inherent in the piece.  He used that difficulty to bring the piece to life as if one was hearing it for the first time. Ambrose Bierce, an American writer, journalist and poet of the Civil War period, opined in his satirical book The Devil’s Dictionary that “…there are two instruments worse than a clarinet – two clarinets”, but tonight nothing could be further than the truth! (Newcomb and other clarinettists continued that excellence into the Elgar.)  

In the right hands, the clarinet is sublime, and Newcomb produced the most gorgeous tones in the Mozart. The cadenza in the first movement allowed Newcomb to show his artistry in the lower register, and in the second movement his breath control in the softest sections was almost otherworldly. At the conclusion of the concerto, the large audience erupted immediately into deserved and sustained applause, with shouts of bravo and wolf whistles. One might suggest the audience is parochial, but Newcomb stands tall on the international stage and the audience knows it, as did Wigglesworth whose pleasure at the performance was clearly written across his broad smile. Newcomb took a risk and performed an encore of blistering difficulty that again showed his technical command and his innate feel and musicality for both ‘classical’ and modern repertoire. 

A number of familiar faces were absent from the orchestra tonight, and those who played in their stead continued the high standard. Noticeably, associate principal percussionist Sami Butler slipped across the stage and stood in for absent principal timpanist Andrew Penrose. The Elgar demands much from the timpani and Butler was at the top of his game. He clearly looked like he was enjoying the challenge, and during the bows at the end of the symphony, Wigglesworth called on Butler to stand first and accept both his and the audience’s accolade. 

A general member of the audience cannot know what the conductor’s instructions are to the orchestra, but it would be a safe bet that in the opening of the symphony Wigglesworth insisted on almost unbridled enthusiasm from the strings. This reviewer was astonished at the physicality of the principal strings: to a person they arched their backs from the outset and threw every emotion at the piece. The symphony is written on a grand scale, with recurrent melodic material including quotations, seemingly, from other Elgar masterworks, and a dynamic schema that is almost exhausting for the audience and musicians alike. There is wave after wave of elongated crescendi that are almost wearying (in a nice way!) to take in, which eventually subside into calmness before the passionate roller coaster begins again. Tension. Abatement. Repeat. Majestic relentlessness and insistence. Pure joy. After each movement, there were audible sighs from the audience – sighs of contentment and of emotional release. With the final bars dissolving away into the night, the audience was stunned, but silence soon gave way to enthusiastic and heartfelt applause. 

Reflection indeed. The program put on display the best of humanity, something we sorely need more of in these trouble times. 

Kym Clayton 

When: 21 Sep

Where: Adelaide Town Hall

Bookings: Closed