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| Dame Evelyn Glennie |
It was great to see the Brighton Dome all but sold out for the latest concert in the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra’s already successful season. The two-pronged attractions of the superstar percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie, and the ever-popular crowd-pleaser, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade proved a winning combination. And they even threw in a bagpipe soloist for good measure. It was particularly gratifying to see a good number of children in the audience too – one young lad near me, only maybe four or five, was jigging along and enjoying the rhythms of both pieces in the first half, clearly excited by the dazzling array of percussion instruments on stage.
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| Geoffrey Paterson with the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra |
James MacMillan’s Veni, Veni, Emmanuel was premiered by Evelyn Glennie at the Proms back in 1992. It is a substantial, single movement work, and as soon as you see the array of percussion instruments spread across the whole of the front of the stage, you know you are in for a virtuosic and visually exciting display. Right from the opening thundering crash on the tam-tam, Glennie never held back, after a brief spell on the vibraphone, marching purposefully across to the other side for drums, followed by an extensive woodblock and gong solo. With marimba to come, and tubular bells to end, the piece certainly provided Glennie with the opportunity to demonstrate her absolute command and authority on such a diverse range of instruments. The work itself draws on the plainsong advent tune (O Come, O Come Emmanuel), and moves from Advent at the opening through to Easter at the conclusion. Having said that, you might be hard placed to spot the underlying plainsong melody, as it is broken into fragments, only really appearing towards the very end of the work. With Glennie charging about from instrument to instrument, Paterson steered the orchestra through their contribution with clarity and command, with particularly tight rhythms in the hocketing dance section, also maintaining the orchestral lilt when Glennie’s marimba stabbed at rhythmic cross-purposes. The final section, when the orchestral musicians put their instruments down and take up delicately tinkling bells and chimes whilst Glennie headed up to the tubular bells at the back of the stage was highly effective, and rather magical, as the intensity built to the final bells. The final ringing was then held for what seemed like an age, before Glennie damped the bells slowly one by one, and Paterson finally lowered his outstretched arms, the audience remaining silent in reverence.
After all that high drama and busy action in the first half, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherezade provided a somewhat soothing sense of calm. Despite having its own dramatic story to tell, with tales of Sinbad’s voyages and love between a young prince and princess, all told by Scheherezade to distract her husband for a thousand and one nights, we too become beguiled by Rimsky-Korsakov’s sumptuous orchestration. Perhaps it’s those familiar melodies, oft repeated throughout its four movements, and its lyrical solos, not least the major violin solo part, that create a more settled soundworld than the more stridently assertive Maxwell Davies & MacMillan works we heard in the first half. Paterson shaped the sea surges in the strings in the opening movement, and the BPO players produced a rich tutti sound. The work gives prominent multiple solos to the prinicipals of most orchestral sections, and these were delivered with warmth and accuracy, with only the occasional imperfections. But of course the major solo part falls to the violinist, and again, Ruth Rogers excelled here. Her lyrical tone, as well as her virtuosic multiple string stopping were exemplary, and her control of the harmonics at the close of the final movement was highly impressive. Peace and calm were duly restored at the end of the tale, bringing to a close yet another varied and imaginative programme from the BPO.
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| Robert Jordan with Geoffrey Paterson & the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra © Nick Boston |
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| Evelyn Glennie with Geoffrey Paterson & the Brighton Philharmonic Orchestra © Nick Boston |
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