VoxCarnyx

City Halls, Glasgow

Ninety years is quite an achievement for any orchestra, so you’d expect there to be quite a song and dance about it as a matter of celebration. In the event – which was a “birthday concert” at its City Halls home, broadcast live on Radio 3 – the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under chief conductor Ryan Wigglesworth played it relatively cool. 

Nothing provocatively challenging; nothing blatantly celebratory (not even an impromptu chorus of “Happy Birthday”); nothing emblematically Scottish; more a regular BBC SSO concert boosted by the presence of eminent pianist Sir Stephen Hough in Grieg’s popular concerto (thank you Messrs Morecambe, Wise and “Mr Preview”), and a rare performance of Sir Michael Tippett’s wartime masterpiece A Child of Our Time, featuring the topnotch voices of the National Youth Choir of Scotland (NYCoS).

True, Radio 3 had despatched its fast-talking No 1 Scots presenter Tom Service to emcee the event, offering as some helpful context the fact that Tippett had actually conducted his oratorio with this very orchestra in the 1960s, though of course “not necessarily these players!”. And there was, let it be said, a new work commissioned as an opener to the occasion, Bacchanale by Ayanna Witter-Johnson.

To evoke the spirit required, London-born Witter-Johnson turned to her Jamaican ancestry for inspiration, notably the exuberance of the Caribbean carnival. Bacchanale burst explosively into life, an orgy of rhythmic intoxication, ecstatic trumpeting, belligerent ostinati, sensuous string tropes and ample side helpings of percussion. The problem is it quickly ran out of ideas, everything piled into the initial outburst beyond which it had little new to say – a bit like a party popper. Or, as one astute observer within earshot put it, “a piece of a thousand endings”.

It did eventually end, signalling the way for Hough and a take on Grieg’s Concerto that reflected this pianist’s very personalised intellectualism. That’s a good thing, in the sense that he established a tantalising atmosphere of anticipation. Melodies that most of us could whistle in our sleep were often reshaped with just a hint of unexpected hiatus or recalibrated emphases. 

There was enormous power in Hough’s delivery, fiercely rhetorical in the opening movement, ravishingly shaped and intoned in the Adagio, approaching giddy (if occasionally splashy) heights in the Finale. Hough’s idiosyncrasies and forceful personality presented an interpretational challenge for Wigglesworth and the SSO, who did well to read the majority of intentions. Explaining that his choice of encore was governed by the need to avoid a broken piano string, Hough transferred his thoughts elegantly to Chopin’s E flat Nocturne.

If anything epitomised the underlying solemnity of Thursday evening it was A Child of Our Time. Inspired by the 1938 assassination in Paris of a German Embassy worker by a stateless young Jewish refugee and the resultant escalation of pre-war Jewish persecution, Tippett’s harrowing secular oratorio recasts it as a profoundly universal parable framed within a sequence of African American spirituals.  How could the words, “we cannot have them in our Empire – they shall not work nor draw a dole”, not resonate chillingly today? Or Tippett’s emotive treatment of the interwoven spirituals fail to convey the rich seam of humanity entrenched in the music?

Wigglesworth gelled his forces well, helped enormously by NYCoS’ flawless, articulate solidarity. Immaculate intonation, glowing expressiveness and thrilling homogeneity belied their youth, adding a spiritual glow to a busily efficient orchestral canvas and solo vocal quartet whose animated storytelling proved a central fascination, not least the ravishing mezzo voice of Beth Taylor, John Findon’s euphoric tenor and Ashley Riches’ proficient bass. Where Pumeza Matshikiza’s soprano was a potent enough force, her diction let her down, occasionally her intonation. 

And that was it, a substantial programme that in so many ways could just have been a typical night at the SSO. Maybe that’s exactly what we were celebrating. 

Ken Walton

(Photo by Martin Shields)

This concert was broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and is now available for 30 days via BBC Sounds. It was also filmed for future broadcast on Inside Classical, available after broadcast on BBC iPlayer