The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra pulls off an interesting musical mix in Poole

United KingdomUnited Kingdom Shostakovich, Mozart, Stravinsky: Elisabeth Brauss (piano), Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra / Mihhail Gerts (conductor). Lighthouse, Poole, 29.1.2025. (CK)

Conductor Mihhail Gerts rehearses with pianist Elisabeth Brauss and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra © BSO 

Shostakovich (arr. Barshai) – Chamber Symphony
Mozart – Piano Concerto No.9, K.271
Stravinsky – Petrushka (1947)

I am always impressed when a substitute conductor takes on a mixed concert programme unchanged. With the indisposition of Tianyi Lu it was the Estonian Mihhail Gerts who stepped into the breach: dapper and smiling, with 20 years’ conducting experience he must be a lot older than he looks.

Rudolf Barshai is well remembered as Principal Conductor of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra for much of the 1980s: a fine conductor of Shostakovich’s symphonies, he recorded the Eighth (Shostakovich’s greatest, for my money) with them during his tenure. It was good, then, to hear the orchestra open this concert by playing Barshai’s arrangement of Shostakovich’s Eighth String Quartet – the most popular of his quartets, I almost said: certainly the most often played. Although it was written some years after Stalin’s death (during a visit to Dresden, which perhaps looked much as Gaza does now), it is a harrowing piece: the obsessive use of his musical signature DSCH might even suggest that he is still haunted by the fear of losing it, of having it rubbed out, consigning him to Russia’s uncounted millions of the disappeared, the forgotten.

Arranging this often-stark music for a string orchestra ten times the size of a string quartet brings many gains and some losses: there is great power in the playing, and the extra sonority of four double basses darkens and extends the expressive range downwards. On the other hand, the percussive strokes of the Largo so brutally cut like knives in the quartet; in this arrangement they are powerful but plummier, less focused. The work was given a fine performance, taut and moving; it was a treat to be given the chance hear it, if such a word can be used of music that bears witness to the horrors of which mankind is capable.

Perhaps we needed to turn to Mozart. His Piano Concerto in E-flat major, K271, is in some ways a small-scale piece: it is scored for a small string body augmented only by pairs of oboes and horns, and there is some evidence that Mozart originally intended it to be played on the harpsichord. Surprisingly, though, it is longer than any of the great piano concertos we are used to hearing (and it is the only one with a Köchel number below 400 that is regularly performed).

It was apparently written for a travelling female virtuoso; it was good to hear it played by the young German pianist Elisabeth Brauss, light-fingered and well attuned to the playful aspects of the piano writing (the first being her butting in when the orchestral introduction has only just got under way – something Mozart never permitted again; another being a fondness for trills). Her Andantino was thoughtful and touching, the concluding Rondo brilliant and high-spirited. The word ‘treat’ was entirely applicable here, as the warmth of the audience reception attested.

It is impossible to listen to Petrushka without marvelling at Stravinsky’s dramatic flair and his extraordinary ear for orchestral colour. It sounds absurd, but I found myself imagining the crowded platform – with piano, harp and celeste off to the side like a giant musical box – as an enormous palette, with each section, and individual players within it, a different colour for Stravinsky to dip his brush into and try out various combinations. (Or a big box of assorted chocolates,,, but no, that is taking synaesthesia too far). Although there is a story, with changes of scene clearly signalled, the piece as a whole seems oddly static: as if the narrative only matters to Stravinsky for the variety of musics it offers him.

The score bristles with brief solos, often tart and spiky. I loved the piercing shrieks of Owain Bailey’s piccolo over blasting trombones; after a tiny smudge at the start the famous mini showpiece for trumpet with side drum was nonchalantly dispatched (I wonder if Shostakovich was thinking of this passage in that fearsome Trio in the third movement of the Eighth Symphony?). Too many striking contributions to mention, but it was right that the pianist (Tomáš Klement), first flute (Anna Pyne) and first trumpet (Paul Bosworth) were given solo bows.

Gerts piloted the orchestra through Stravinsky’s brilliant patchwork with unobtrusive skill; indeed, his clear, unfussy conducting throughout the concert made it all too easy for me to underplay his achievement. A safe pair of hands, rather than a showman? Nothing wrong with that. A success all round.

Chris Kettle

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