VoxCarnyx

City Halls, Glasgow

It’s over fifty years since Ravi Shankar’s concerto for sitar made such a powerful statement on how potent the fusion of Eastern and Western instrumentalists could be. It was one of the late Shankar’s close collaborators, Indian tabla supremo Zakir Hussain, who in 2023 took things further with a Triple Concerto for tabla, sitar and bansuri just as fascinating in its cross-cultural proposition.

Hussain’s concerto was the opening work in Thursday’s East-meets-West programme by the BBC SSO, playing under its former associate conductor Alpesh Chauhan, who previously championed the work with the Symphony Orchestra of India. Hussain, himself, was due to feature in Thursday’s concertante trio, but died last December, his place taken by his equally-talented brother, Fazal Qureshi. 

Its foremost strength proved to be the superb Indian front line, the tactile intricacies of Qureshi’s tabla playing matched by the charismatic, at times rock-leaning, Niladri Kumar on sitar, and the beguiling bansuri (bamboo flute) playing of Rakesh Chaurasia, whose lung capacity facilitated moments of superhuman breath control. Their presence, sitting crosslegged on decorated daises, was visually and musically theatrical, playing out a metaphorical scenario of conflict and resolution. These interactions were mesmerising, exhilarating and imbued with action-packed spontaneity.

Against this, the orchestral writing did seem relatively bland, modally-confined, in short knowing its place in the hierarchy of things. Yet its background cinematic role benefitted from the warmth and expansiveness of the SSO’s richness and the soft relevance that emanated from that understanding. Chauhan was a consummate ringmaster, deftly in control, inspiring slick communication between the starry trio and backline support.

The remainder of the programme demanded far greater orchestral nuance and virtuosity. In Rachmaninov’s symphonic poem The Isle of the Dead, inspired by the dark and mysterious eponymous painting by Swedish artist Arnold Böcklin, the former quality was powerfully evoked, its haunting, lugubrious opening charged with ominous premonition, its arc-like structure thrillingly heated in the crashing climaxes. If the momentum occasionally faltered, it was only marginal, Chauhan handling the shaping and colouring well.

As he did with the invigorating sound world of Stravinsky’s revised 1919 suite, The Firebird. This was an electrifying conclusion to an intriguing evening. There was expectant thrill in the atmospheric turbulence of the Introduction, menace in the Firebird’s fitful dance, exotic scents peppering the Princesses’ Dance, exhaustive depravity in the Infernal Dance, and beyond the queasy whiffs of the Berceuse the resolute triumphalism of the Finale. 

Ken Walton

This concert was broadcast live on BBC Radio 3, subsequently available on BBC Sounds for 30 days

(Pictured: Zakir Hussain)