United Kingdom BBC Proms 2025 [6] – R. Wigglesworth, Mozart and Bruckner: Mariam Batsashvili (piano), BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra / Ryan Wigglesworth (conductor). Royal Albert Hall, London, 27.7.2025. (KW)
Ryan Wigglesworth – For Laura, after Bach (BBC commission: world premiere)
Mozart – Piano Concerto No.20 in D minor, K466
Bruckner – Symphony No.7 in E major
Laura Samuel, former leader of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, died at the age of 48 in November last year. This concert opened with a short piece for string orchestra dedicated to her memory, written by conductor, Ryan Wigglesworth. It began with vigorous contrapuntal textures using material from the Gigue from Bach’s Partita in E major, a recording of which had been played at Laura’s funeral. A grave central section, introduced by double basses, featured moving solos by section leaders, and the final section became more and more impassioned, ending with the violins quietly rising towards the stratosphere. Taking the applause, Wigglesworth pointed upwards, for Laura. It seemed a fitting tribute to the orchestra’s departed colleague.
One of Mozart’s most popular piano concertos then received a very winning performance. Mariam Batsashvili was faultless in her presentation of Mozart’s glorious melodies, perfectly controlled, always avoiding any hint of sentimental distortion but nevertheless loading each phrase with appropriate emotion. The interplay between her and the orchestral woodwind was an absolute delight, when the melody passed from one to the other there was perfect accord in how the music should be played. She was also able to encompass some forthright strength in her playing, especially in the cadenza’s that Beethoven had provided, giving some weight that was not always apparent in the orchestral accompaniment.
From the beginning, the orchestra had been very light in its touch, especially light was the contribution from the cellos and basses so that the anxious and disturbing elements we have come to expect from Mozart’s D minor Piano Concerto were often underplayed, and instead there was degree of delicacy and an atmosphere of rather mellow melancholy suffusing their performance, with occasional flashes of lightning, such as the razor-sharp articulation of the violins in their staccato descending arpeggio motive in the first theme. But even the stormy G minor outburst in the Romance seemed very mild behind Batsashvili’s coruscating scales. In the rather grim first half of the Rondo the orchestra did provide increased drama, the horns in their moment strongly intrusive, then more rugged Beethoven in the cadenza, and suddenly we are in chirpy D major! You had to smile.
Mariam Batsashvili gave an encore of stunning virtuosity – a blistering performance of Liszt’s La Campanella. It is not always easy to see the insights that might be available from programmers’ frequent coupling of Mozart and Bruckner, and Liszt’s torrent of notes seemed an unlikely prelude to Bruckner’s Seventh – but fortunately there was an interval during which we could readjust.
This was an extremely beautiful, moving and wonderfully played performance of the evening’s symphony. I write that by way of introduction to the following remarks to show that I was not impervious to the many virtues of the performance, so my criticisms can be taken in that context. Indeed, there were some particularly fine moments. I think especially of the second theme, Moderato, of the slow movement, where the accompanying figure on violas and cellos was perfectly judged, quietly played, so as not to register as the first note of the theme itself, which the violins bring in after a quaver’s rest. The violins played the theme with great warmth of heart. Similarly, the Trio of the third movement was beautifully inflected, it sounded so warm and natural. And the dirge on tubas after the Adagio climax was magnificent, the desolate pianissimo conversation between first violins and woodwind that followed touched the essence of this bereaved meditation. The finale was very deftly handled, the brass wonderfully crunchy in the third theme. These things were all good, and much else besides, but…
… so irritating is the fashion for an inaudible opening tremolo. My hearing is no longer that of a young man, but I have been to performances where the pianissimo tremolo is just that, pianissimo and perfectly audible. Two thirds of the way back in the Arena I could see it happening, but I could not hear it. Effectively the symphony began with the soaring arpeggio-based theme on the cellos which is irresistible to conductors and they ensure that Bruckner’s Allegro moderato marking is ignored in favour of something more like Andante molto moderato. As the movement proceeds, things slow down so that by the time we get to the first part of the development which concerns itself with an inversion of the second theme, we enter deep adagio territory. Then comes the climax of the development where the opening arpeggio theme is inverted, fortissimo, heavy brass to the fore, and suddenly, at last, we are at something like Allegro moderato! But not for long: when the recapitulation arrives, the brakes go on. It was, as I say, beautiful, moving and wonderfully played – but how much more wonderful it would be one day to hear what the composer asked for.
The first movement coda began at a lugubrious tempo, but speeded up, a glorious blazing sound, disfigured by a failure to keep the final crotchet confined to one short, sharp beat. I always feel this is a misunderstanding of what will provide true finality, and hanging on to the last note has the opposite effect to that intended. When the Adagio began there was little sense that this was a movement in a different tempo: effectively it was now a second slow movement. The programme note made no mention of what edition of the score we were hearing, but there was no cymbal and triangle at the Adagio climax, nor were there any ‘rits’ at the end of the first theme phrases in the Finale, so it is very likely to have been the Haas edition that was being performed.
The Scherzo was joyful and animated, with a tendency to emphasize the high note of the trumpet theme and give short measure to the last. Checking the score, I see that the last note, unlike the first three, is devoid of accent marks, so the trumpet was in fact doing it right and I was on the brink here of unfair criticism! I was impressed by the way Wigglesworth built up the resplendent coda that brings the work to a close, but once again the last note was held on to, and indeed preceded by an unmarked ritenuto, so we were robbed of the crisp finality that the score would seem to ask for.
For listeners at home, who might wonder if there was something amiss with the placement of instruments in their stereophonic sound-picture, note that there were two bass tubas on the stage, but only one bass tuba player, so that after the first movement the tuba player was required to cross the stage from his place on the right beside the trombones to take up a new place beside the four Wagner tubas on the left, only to return for the Scherzo and Finale. Some orchestras place the Wagner tubas and trombones in a row with the bass tuba in the middle so that they can play with whichever ensemble the score would have them support.
Altogether this was really a rather mellow performance of the Seventh, undisrupted by cymbal clashes or exaggerated dynamics – except perhaps for the timpanist’s first contribution where he underpins the highly expressive first wave of the first movement coda, a long and powerful crescendo that became so loud at its peak that the rest of the orchestra was briefly overwhelmed. The BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra showed themselves once again to be a really great ensemble and they played excellently throughout, with some particularly fine contributions from the woodwind and wonderful warm string tone.
Ken Ward