BBC SO’s all-English Barbican programme carried out with utmost professionalism by all individuals – Seen and Heard Worldwide

United Kingdom Knussen, Britten, Vaughan Williams: Silja Aalto (soprano), Morgan Pearse (baritone), Vilde Frang (violin), Lawrence Energy (viola), BBC Symphony Refrain and Orchestra / Sakari Oramo (conductor). Barbican Corridor, London, 24.5.2024. (AK)

Knussen – Cleveland Footage (London premiere, 2003-09)
Britten (orch. Colin Matthews) – Double Concerto in B Minor for Violin, Viola and Orchestra (1932)
Vaughan Williams – A Sea Symphony (1903-09, rev.1923)

This all-English programme carried out with utmost professionalism by all individuals gave us a reliable partial survey of twentieth-century trials and tribulations of compositional processes. Admittedly, Knussen’s work represents the start of the twenty-first century, but it surely was commissioned in 1999 and the precisely one century which right here separates Vaughan Williams and Knussen embraces the 20th century.

Knussen’s piece remained unfinished though his premature demise 9 years later in 2018 was not the trigger. It’s probably that Knussen has not accomplished as a result of he was unhappy with this composition. The query arises: do we now have the suitable to advertise the piece?

The piece has been marketed for this live performance (and specified within the programme notes) as a London premiere. That is the actual fact, however the programme notes make no point out of the historical past resulting in this efficiency.

Cleveland Footage have been commissioned by the Cleveland Orchestra in 1999; all seven actions have been meant to depict works from the gathering of the Cleveland Museum of Artwork.

Within the occasion, 4 actions have been accomplished, two progressed to completely orchestrated fragments and one motion was deserted as undeveloped sketches of about ten bars.

As revealed by Colin Matthews within the revealed rating (2022), ‘the majority of the work was composed in 2003 and scheduled for efficiency in 2004. Nevertheless it was not completed in time, and additional makes an attempt at programming it in 2005 and 2009 fell via. In the meantime Michael Tilson Thomas gave Olly the chance to learn via the unfinished work with the New World Symphony in Miami in 2008. Regardless of this profitable studying, he remained dissatisfied with the music, and couldn’t be persuaded to revisit it or to clarify what he felt was flawed with it.’

Faber Music revealed the rating in Might 2022, it was premiered on 24 June 2022 on the Aldeburgh Competition, that’s carried out twice by the BBC Symphony Orchestra on a big day dedicated to Knussen’s music. (The Cleveland Orchestra carried out it in December 2023.)

As seen within the rating (and quoted by Knussen), the composition is ‘Devoted to Tom and Jane Morris, written in grateful homage to colleagues whose initials head every motion’.

These are the dedicatees: 1. G.B; 2. A.G; 3. A.R.T; 4.C.M; 5. M-A.T; 6. nothing; 7. M.L.

Colin Matthews tells us that he’s the proud dedicatee of No.4 however who’re the others? I might a lot like No.1 to be for British composer Geoffrey Bush however I’ll by no means know.

At virtually 16 minutes lengthy, the actions depict the composer’s response to seven nice work (all within the assortment of the Cleveland Museum of Artwork): Portail avec Penseur (Façades and Lake with Rodin) / Calabazas (Velasquez) / Dans les vagues (Gaugin) [Fragment] / Two Clocks (Tiffany and Fabergé) / St Ambrose (Goya) / Don Quixote (André Masson) [unplayable, only ten bars of sketches; not performed] / The Burning of the Home of Lords and Commons (Turner) [Fragment]

The orchestral forces wanted are extra-large – the title within the printed rating is Cleveland Footage for giant orchestra – together with about thirty percussion devices divided between 5 gamers: additionally 4 flutes, 4 clarinets, three bassoons, brass devices, two harps, celeste, piano and full strings.

Coming to Knussen’s piece for the primary time was not simple. The soundscapes have been fascinating and always different but it surely was onerous to make sure what was being depicted at which level. Regardless of my intense listening, I bought misplaced: I famous 5 motion as an alternative of the six performed. Wanting on the rating post-concert, I famous with aid that the second motion follows the primary segue.

I ponder if future performances might show footage of the related work?

Britten was nonetheless solely 18, and a scholar on the Royal School of Music, when he composed his three-movement Double Concerto for violin and viola. His composition instructor John Eire appreciated the piece, however Britten didn’t and left the piece with out scoring orchestral elements. The query arises once more (as above in reference to Knussen’s Cleveland Footage): do we now have the suitable to advertise the piece?

We have no idea what Britten considered his Double Concerto later in life, if in any respect, however he didn’t do something about it. Nevertheless, Colin Matthews orchestrated it some twenty years after Britten’s demise, offering viola gamers with a concerto price taking part in. Not solely did I like this concerto – which I heard for the primary time at this live performance – however my visitor for the night, an occasional concertgoer with no musical background – actually loved it: she a lot most well-liked it to the 2 different compositions on the programme.

After the preliminary orchestral fanfare, the concerto begins with the viola, adopted by response from the solo violin. Such dialogues between the 2 solo devices, with virtuoso runs and complex rhythmic passages in addition to lovely cantilena sections, have to be as difficult as satisfying for performers. Violinist Vilde Frang and viola participant Lawrence Energy delivered beautifully. Energy gave the impression to be within the driving seat, partly due to the musical materials however most likely additionally as a result of he gave the impression to be totally accustomed to the orchestration: he might have performed the piece along with his unusually massive and top-quality viola. In line with the programme notes Energy has two glorious violas however we have no idea which he performed on this event. I have no idea what Britten consultants take into consideration Britten abandoning this piece however I can’t assist considering of Bartók’s First Violin Concerto – written within the years 1907–1908, however solely revealed in 1956, 11 years after the composer’s demise – composed through the interval of his passionate love for the violinist Stefi Geyer who didn’t have related emotions and didn’t even just like the piece devoted for her. Maybe Britten, a reliable viola participant, composed the violin-viola double concerto for emotional causes which he didn’t want to revisit later.

Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony (Symphony No.1) can be an early work though from the composer’s thirties, not from teenage scholar days, and he revisited and revised it. It is a full-scale choral symphony, lasting over an hour, for soprano, baritone, combined choir, and a big orchestra together with three flutes, three oboes, 4 clarinets, three bassoons, for horns, three trumpets, three horns, three trombones, tuba, three timpani, percussions, drum, two harps, organ, and full strings. The textual content of the four-movement choral symphony consists of poems by Walt Whitman. It’s meant to be concerning the sea, sailors, and life on the ocean however more often than not I couldn’t assist considering that I used to be listening to some grand non secular course of reaffirming religion. I did watch the surtitles with the total textual content, however I used to be nonetheless questioning about seas in one other world. It’s my fault solely, I’m positive, however I totally appreciated the wonderful BBC Symphony Refrain giving their most satisfying utmost greatest. They’re a big novice choir, this time effectively over 100 folks onstage, however there was nothing ‘novice’ about their efficiency …besides their apparent love for and dedication to music. Baritone Morgan Pearse managed the Wagnerian size with competence, confidence, and pleasing musicality. Within the lesser function, soprano Silja Aalto fitted completely. The orchestra carried out with prime skilled customary; not a straightforward job on this piece and, additionally, within the opening Knussen piece.

Conductor Sakari Oramo is a kind of few conductors who’s in full management of the scores and, subsequently, of his performances. I might identify many superstar conductors who ought to take observe.

The live performance was recorded for broadcast on eleventh June and for 30 days afterwards on BBC Sounds.

Agnes Kory