Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Adelaide Festival Theatre. 16 May 2014
The evening began with a studied performance of Rachmaninov’s symphonic poem ‘The Isle of the Dead’ but everyone was eagerly awaiting the main event.
Like eager thoroughbreds ready to explode from the starting gates, the Adelaide Symphony Chorus, the Young Adelaide Voices, the Marryatville High School Choir and the mighty Adelaide Symphony Orchestra patiently waited for conductor Nicholas Carter to take his position on the podium. As soon as he stepped up, and with no preliminary fussing, Carter gave one grand and sweeping upbeat and the on-stage behemoth erupted into ‘O Fortuna’ and sent Carl Orff’s iconic Carmina Burana thundering down the straight in an exhilarating and near flawless performance.
The hair on the back of my neck bristled with excitement and anticipation.
So many musicians on stage is always an awesome sight to behold and the sound they produced was awesome as well. The great skill in choral singing is to have many voices sounding as one, and that is precisely what choral directors Carl Crossin, Aldis Sils and Christie Anderson achieved. The diction was as crystal clear in the softest of whispers as it was in the loudest of louds, and the phrasing was immaculate. Carter controlled the abruptly changing dynamics and tempi beautifully, and on almost every occasion neither the orchestra nor the choir nor solo vocalist missed a beat.
Carmina Burana is a collection of 11th/12th century songs that were discovered in a Benedictine monastery in 1803, and in 1936 Orff put twenty-four of them to astonishingly percussive music. The selected texts speak of fate and fortune, the joys and fecundity of spring, the pleasure and pain of drinking and of gluttony, and lustful love. Mildly coarse and always satirical, the songs are mostly tongue-in-cheek medieval slurs against the catholic church and the papacy.
Carter had the adult choirs flanking the children’s choir on three sides as if to protect the youth from the profanities of the songs. The soloists – soprano Milica Ilic, tenor Paul McMahon and baritone Samuel Dundas were excellent. With only the one song, McMahon was the standout. He tackled the extremely challenging ‘Olim Lacus Colueram’ with great style and demonstrated that he knows how to ‘ham it up’ and convincingly tell a story. Dundas also displayed a honed ability to ‘word paint’. Ilic was at her coloratura best with beautifully rounded tones in ‘Amor Volat Undique’ and impressively the children’s choir sang her accompaniment from memory.
The orchestra was extremely tight. Steven Peterka led an accomplished percussion section, and Julia Grenfell was outstanding on flute and piccolo. The brass and horns continued to shine.
The ASO’s new Associate Guest Conductor, Nicholas Carter, demonstrated that he is a force to be reckoned with and that he has the promise of being a worthy a successor to Arvo Volmer.
Kym Clayton
When: Closed
Where: Festival Theatre
Bookings: Closed
