Alban Gerhardt plays Britten Cello Symphony
City Halls, Glasgow 12/3/26
BBCSSO, Ryan Wigglesworth (conductor), Alban Gerhardt (cello)
https://www.bbc.co.uk/events/eqwcd4
The latest concert in the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s afternoon series at Glasgow’s City Halls was on 12th March and carried the headline ‘Alban Gerhardt Plays Britten's Cello Symphony’, promising the German virtuoso in the 1963 work originally written for the great Russian virtuoso Mstislav Rostropovich. It was preceded in the first half of the programme by Scottish composer Thea Musgrave’s 1999 short evocative piece for string orchestra ‘Aurora’, commissioned for the students of the Colburn School of Performing Arts in Los Angeles. After the interval, Elgar’s 1913 ‘Symphonic Study’ (a symphonic poem in all but name) ‘Falstaff’ was followed by Britten’s ever-popular ‘Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra’, a.k.a. the ‘Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Henry Purcell’, commissioned in 1945 by the London ‘Ministry of Education’ for an educational film about the instruments of the orchestra with the LSO and Sir Malcolm Sargent. The orchestra’s Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth conducted the programme. Chicago-born award-winning violinist, currently a concertmaster of the Royal Danish Orchestra (reputedly the oldest orchestra in the world) Emma Steele was our latest Guest Leader. The concert was recorded for later broadcast on ‘Radio 3 in Concert’. Unusually for afternoon concerts, Kate Molleson was present to do the introduction to the programme for the recording, preceded by her customary preamble to the live audience. Attendance in the stalls was modest but not embarrassing. However, there was also attendance in the balcony. In her preamble, Kate welcomed young people from two schools, one of which, Lornshill Academy, was where I was based as a teacher between 2011 and 2015. Gratifying to see the BBCSSO and Clackmannanshire doing their bit to cultivate the audiences of the future.
Musgrave’s ‘Aurora’ plays on two senses of ‘dawn’, a description of the emergence of daylight as described in Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, and the emergence of youthful musical talent, as in a music school. An atmospheric plaintive solo from Andrew Berridge’s viola over soft chords was answered by Emma Steele’s Vuillaume violin with harmonics. D-major radiance, hovering in the texture, became more established as the dynamic ebbed and flowed, the overall trend a gradual increase. I was occasionally reminded of the texture of William Walton’s music, though not particularly his Shakespeare-related work. After a very expressive and radiant climax, the dynamic subsided, at the last moment resolving magically from D to G, a soft pizzicato from the cellos. A charming piece.
My last live hearing of Alban Gerhardt was the memorable Scottish premiere of Julian Anderson’s Cello Concerto ‘Litanies’ with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in November 2022. It’s been a good long while since hearing the Britten Cello Symphony and I was very much in the mood for it. The absence of concertante interplay is what makes it a symphony rather than a concerto (rather than the four-movement structure, which doesn’t prevent Shostakovich’s First Violin Concerto being one, after all). That said, there are some superficial structural parallels between those two works. The first movement of the Britten opens with baleful growling from the double-bases and other bass instruments. When the cello enters, we notice that both orchestra and soloist are dealing with private woes, but, unlike the Shostakovich, neither derives solace from the other. There are hints of the grief found in the ‘Sinfonia da Requiem’ and the post-apocalyptic numbness of the ‘War Requiem’. The solo part is extremely virtuosic and expressive. The role of the timpani is very prominent and contributes to the bleakness, as well as the anger. The movement ends without resolution or consolation. The nervous mercurial scherzo dashes about in a joyless game of chasing for ghosts, lyrical interludes from the muted solo cello receiving no response from the jittery winds, while disapproving comments from muted brass halt the scampering from time to time, and muted strings hint that the scene may be unreal, confirmed by the concluding agile but ethereal harmonics on the cello. The same numb surrealism extends to the Adagio, a funereal trudging march, its rhythm set by the timpani. The cello becomes quite agitated, while the orchestra is largely stoic, yet at last they appear united in grief. Not, perhaps, strictly concertante writing, but the movement tails off into a cadenza, the timpani the soloist’s unlikely partner for a time, until it lets the soloist soliloquise. Declamatory phrases separated by rapid multi-finger bursts of repeated note pizzicato seem to confront the issues that have been hitherto avoided. A lyrical arco melody with some left-hand pizzicato shows that there has been some healing, confirmed as the soloist sets up a rhythm that carries us attacca into the Passacaglia finale. A bluesy trumpet solo lets us know that a weight has been lifted and the music takes on a quasi-improvisatory sense of freedom. Eventually the tempo slows from some taking stock. When the finale’s opening music returns it is with renewed confidence and vigour, building to a hard-won but exuberant triumph. A great performance of a somewhat enigmatic work, with fantastic playing from soloist and orchestra alike, and an evident shared understanding between soloist and conductor of its structure and inner logic. Full marks from me.
Elgar’s ‘Falstaff’, at half an hour, falls midway in duration between Strauss’ ‘Till Eulenspiegel’ and ‘Don Quixote’ and like both of those, is conceived as a somewhat caricatured portrait of an unlikely anti-hero. It has never enjoyed the popularity of either of those or, indeed, of other “tone poems in disguise” by Elgar, like the fabulous ‘Alassio’ The orchestration is really fine, indisputably Elgar, and easily up to the standards of the First Symphony. Similarly, the themes are well-crafted, with leitmotifs for Sir John himself and Prince Hal. Like the Strauss tone poems mentioned, it is episodic in structure but, unlike the Strauss in my view, the episodes don’t really knit into a coherent narrative. Instead, a series of tone images evoke different scenes and moods and, after a while, the differences blur into similarities. The overall mood becomes introspective. The piece ends in a whimper. It affects me in much the same way as Strauss’ ‘Ein Heldenleben’ and, though a quarter-hour shorter than my least favourite of Strauss’ tone poems, it feels just as long. The orchestral playing was excellent throughout and there were some very fine solos, in particular from Guest Leader Emma Steele, principal cellist Rudi de Groote, and principal bassoonist Graeme Brown. No effort was spared to lavish advocacy on the piece, but as a vehicle for connecting artists with an audience, I would issue a fail on its MOT.
No such issues with Benjamin Britten’s ‘Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra’, which is always a delight, and is devoted to displaying the individual character of the instruments, the fabulous ensemble timbres of the sections, and the magnificent splendour of the whole orchestra. The Purcell theme is ripe for the fashioning of variations, but few composers could have brought the same combination of ingenuity, inventiveness and patent affection for the original to the task as Britten, while simultaneously fulfilling an instructional brief, something the work achieves admirably. The concluding scampering fugue is always a thrill and, when the Purcell theme is reprised over the fugal lines, delivers a “guaranteed goosebumps moment”. And so it was, the brilliant swaggering coda confirming the pride the members of the orchestra can feel in their band, the enthusiastic applause showing it is shared by their audience.