United Kingdom Edinburgh International Festival 2024 [14]: Usher Hall, Edinburgh. 18 & 19.8.2024. (GT)
18.8.2024 – Alison Balsom (trumpet), Pierre-Laurent Aimard (piano), Royal Scottish National Orchestra / Elim Chan (conductor).
Wynton Marsalis – Trumpet Concerto
Schoenberg – Piano Concerto, Op.42
Lutosławski – Concerto for Orchestra
This was the only concert in this year’s Edinburgh International Festival to feature the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, and it offered the orchestra’s former Guest Conductor, Elim Chan, with an opportunity to reconnect with the musicians with whom she collaborated for three richly inventive seasons between 2018 and 2021. The young Chinese conductor has already imposed her authority as an outstanding interpreter of a wide repertoire both here and internationally; she is now one of the most sought-after conductors. This eclectic programme is typical in showing off her incredible range of musicianship; whether Beethoven or Stravinsky, Chan can devise the highest level of performance and make her musicians believe in her interpretation.
The Wynton Marsalis Trumpet Concerto received its premiere earlier this year, and this marked its Scottish premiere. Thankfully, the brilliant Alison Balsom was the perfect soloist in a piece which embraces all the styles possible. Comprised of six movements, the opening march was a colourful sequence of different influences and sounds, with jazz, the blues, and Latin American rhythms all pushing the envelope in the limits and beyond for this instrument. The second movement, a ballade, was more tranquil, yet contrasting melodies were heard in the orchestra introducing an exciting element to the music-making. In the following movements, we heard influences from African drumbeats, French waltzes and finally, at the end, loud sounds from the jungle. This was a fantastic piece and despite its length of over half an hour, it zoomed past very quickly so exciting was the virtuosity of both soloist and orchestra.
So great was the difference between the two opening pieces that we had an interval before the Schoenberg Piano Concerto, as if to cleanse the palate before the more awesome technical twelve-note atonality of the Viennese modernist. The Schoenberg concerto offered a darker atonality with its opening chords and sweeping dissonances – and we heard many joyful moments in Pierre-Laurent Aimard’s virtuosity playing of the keyboard – as if he was in a different world, the Frenchman was often sitting without any apparent movement as the music streaming forth from his fingers evinced more invention and dazzling playing that was accompanied with outstanding skill by Chan and her musicians.
Of all his masterly works, the Concerto for Orchestra is Lutosławski’s most often performed and is among the great orchestral works together with those by Bartók, Prokofiev and Stravinsky. The Polish composer uses his folk songs exquisitely by enshrouding them in an almost technicolour orchestral texture of sometimes bewildering notes and half-shaded harmonies. Lutosławski allows every section of the orchestra to be heard in bringing fresh harmonic nuances swaying from a brooding, atmospheric world to a bold and exciting experience, and hints of the Baroque and a tantalising reprise of Polish folk songs, all making this performance a memorable occasion.
19.8.2024 – Roman Simovic (violin), São Paulo Symphony Orchestra / Thierry Fischer (conductor).
Guarnieri – Excerpts from Suite Vila Rica
Ginastera – Violin Concerto, Op.30
Franz Waxman – Carmen Fantasie
R. Strauss – Eine Alpensinfonie, Op.64
One of the most remarkable aspects of the 2024 Edinburgh International Festival is the programming that have introduced composers who are little known – or indeed barely familiar. The Bamberg Symphoniker brought symphonies by Hans Rott and Josef Suk, Alexander Grechaninov’s ‘Seven Days of Passion’ was performed by the Edinburgh Festival Chorus, and there has been heard Nadia Boulanger’s Psalm 130 from the Hallé Orchestra, while the Basle Chamber Orchestra brought Fanny Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto and Emilie Mayer’s Fifth Symphony. And now, on their 70th anniversary five-concert tour of Europe, the São Paulo Symphony Orchestra introduced an eclectic programme of three South American composers, plus one of the great orchestral masterpieces.
Mozart Camargo Guarnieri from São Paulo and is probably Brazil’s greatest composer. Alberto Ginastera of course was from the Spanish-speaking Argentina capital of Buenos Aires, while the better-known Pablo de Sarasate was Spanish from the Navarro province.
Guarnieri’s piece was introduced by Thierry Fischer who announced that the orchestra would play five movements from the ten movements (instead of only two) of Guarnieri’s orchestral suite based on a 1957 film called Rebelião em Vila Rica. The first movement (Maestoso) was upbeat in mood – the tone was set immediately by the timpani and the trumpets, backed by the vibrantly colourful woodwind, whereas the Scherzando evoked dance-like passages from the woodwind, brass and percussion in a sequence of bustling vivacity. A switch in the atmosphere came in the Valse with a rather charming idea shared in a dazzling number of solos by Arcadio Minczuk on the oboe, the violin of Emmanuele Baldini, and Claudia Nascimento on flute and the clarinet of Ovanir Buosi. The dance theme followed with the Saudoso in a lyrical, even sentimental, sequence of Brazilian dances, and finally, the fifth movement (Baiao) was a Latin dance from northern Brazil and stylish and exotic in its colours. Each movement was little more than a couple of minutes long and introduced the idiom of Brazilian music while allowing us a hint of the orchestra’s great virtuosity.
If the Guarnieri suite was a cheerfully bright opener allowing us to judge the virtuosity of the orchestra, what followed was a darker piece in the rarely heard Violin Concerto by Argentina’s Alberto Ginastera which occupies a different world of atonality and neo-expressionism. Largely recognised for his brilliantly colourful pieces based on Argentinian folk dances – Ginastera composed operas, ballets, symphonies and orchestral pieces, sonatas, solo piano pieces, choral and organ works, film music and songs, plus six concertos, including one for harp.
Written in 1963, the Violin Concerto is an immensely challenging piece for both soloist and audience. The opening movement (Cadenzi e Studi) started with an extensive violin solo in a very austere and reflective atmosphere of the period of the Cold War. There enter dialogues with the orchestra in several brilliant virtuosic battles with the orchestra in the double-stops and quarter tones, and the second movement (Adagio per 22 solisti) is an exploration of colours, and most notably a marvellous ghostly passage between the harp of Liuba Klevtsova and Cecilia Moita on the celeste. The third movement (Scherzo pianissimo – sempre volante, misterioso e appena sensible), is eerily bizarre. The final movement (Perpetuum mobile – Agitato e alluciante) is all demonic playfulness and ends in a virtuosic finale. It was a sharp contrast between the rather sentimental opening piece and the next invoking the memory of Bizet’s Carmen performed earlier in the EIF. The southern warmth continued in the exotic colours and rhythms of Franz Waxman’s Carmen Fantasie, and again, the richness of virtuosity in the woodwind group was enhanced by the verdant harmony of the string groups. Violinist Roman Simovic’s incredible gifts were revealed even more by his marvellous playing and the accompaniment by Fischer at the rostrum was excellent.
Richard Strauss’s Alpine Symphony offered a further indication of the standards of this excellent orchestra. In the hour-long masterpiece, one was drawn to the magnificent artistry of the orchestra, exhibited with this twentieth-century central European symphonic work. From the first violins through to the admirable double bass section, the strings are splendid with a deep rich sonic bloom. The woodwind are all virtuosos from the golden harmony of the flutes to the dark hues of the bassoons and then the horns were most prominently heard in their full glory with the golden rich tones. This was most apparent with the entry into the forest in a beautiful singing horn melody, also later the glissandos on the harp of Liuba Klevtsova and strings evoked the flow of water in a mountain stream. This was especially evident in the elegiac intonation from Minczuk’s oboe followed by a visionary melody on the horn by Luiz Garcia. Then in the sequence in the meadow, the cellos led by Kim Bak Dinitzen were magnificent by invoking a walking theme. The trombones were majestic in the ascent to the summit and matched by the oboe’s idyllic harmony and the visionary motif on the horn. The transfiguration was spellbinding and ever so slowly the remarkable music-making came to a tranquil and peaceful repose.
This was a magnificent concert that was masterfully directed by Thierry Fischer and at last following waves of appreciation from his audience, the orchestra gave an encore of Guarnieri’s Danca Brasileira. This great Brazilian orchestra were last here in 2016, and hopefully, we will see this great ensemble again in the not-too-distant future.
Gregor Tassie