VoxCarnyx

City Halls, Glasgow

This wasn’t Bulgarian-born Delyana Lazarova’s maiden encounter with the BBC SSO, but Thursday’s concert did represent her first official appearance as the orchestra’s new principal guest conductor. It’s a marginally more relaxed role than chief conductor, but it does enable the incumbent to exert meaningfully something of his or her personality on the orchestral response. What this performance told us was that Lazarova is a disciplined, energetic musician capable of combining such marked precision with interesting musical thought.

At least, that was the majority impression on Thursday, instantly conveyed in Strum, a virile, catchy showpiece for strings (its origins being the composer’s initial 2006 string quintet version) by New Yorker Jessie Montgomery. It’s not new repertoire for the SSO – having performed it outdoors under Marin Alsop and under canvas during Covid times at the 2021 Edinburgh International Festival – but this indoors version bore an infectious immediacy that got the new relationship off to a snappy start.

There was quirkiness in abundance, generated initially by jousting solos, a rock-fuelled riot of strummed rhythms and catchy ostinati gradually building to a full-scale menagerie bearing the heady influence of American folk and dance styles with the heated undercurrent of minimalism. 

Fast forward and the second half pitted a rare Samuel Barber work against the familiar sumptuous seascape that is Debussy’s three symphonic sketches, La Mer. 

Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, adapted from the dance score Barber wrote in the 1940s based on Euripedes’ Medea for the groundbreaking American contemporary dancer and choreographer Martha Graham, unleashes a side to the composer at odds with his more typically Romanticised persona. Dissonant and harsh, at times viciously thrusting, but equally touched by magic and mystery, Lazarova embraced the score’s heaving feverish sentiments to the full, eliciting a performance that journeyed inexorably towards its fulminating conclusion.

Her Debussy was the perfect foil. The richness of its colourings, tidal sweeps loaded with emotive ebb and flow, breathtaking moments of calm, delicacies of touch like the textures of a Turneresque sea-spray, all played their part in defining a consummate performance.

What, then, of Rachmaninov’s Third Piano Concerto, which came earlier in the opening half and featured the British soloist Isata Kanneh-Mason? There was no denying the technical prowess informing her performance, its remarkably articulate finger work and fiery, insistent energy. 

But it was frustratingly self-centred. Those moments where the pianist can lay low and allow the orchestral subtleties to shine through were entirely ignored, even by Lazarova who seemed content to accept the situation, descending into something of a tonal mishmash in heightened parts of the finale. Give and take was not on the menu. 

Even where the piano is firmly in the spotlight, expectations were often dashed, such as Kanneh-Mason’s tone production, its tendency despite honest intentions to flatline across the melodic phrase. The music’s lyrical dimension was weakened as a result. Kanneh-Mason has proven her worth on many occasions, but on this one her understanding of the concerto’s inner depth felt like work in progress. 

Ken Walton

(Photo credit: Martin Shields)

This programme is repeated in Aberdeen tonight (28 Nov) and will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in Concert on Tuesday 20 January, beyond which it  will be available to stream for 30 days on BBC Sounds