Fantasia: From Japan to Paris

City Halls Glasgow 30/10/25

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Ben Glassberg (conductor); Lawrence Power (viola) ; Claire Booth (soprano); Matthew Higham (flute)

The first afternoon concert of BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s 90th anniversary season, on the 30th October in Glasgow’s City Halls, presented an eclectically curated programme of 20th and 21st century works  under the heading ‘Fantasia: From Japan to Paris’.  With Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth indisposed that week, British conductor Ben Glassberg stood in at short notice.  The latest in the continuing long line of guest leaders was Swiss violinist and First Concertmaster at the Bern Symphony Orchestra, David Guerchovitch.  No fewer than 3 soloists performed.  Soprano Claire Booth was the soloist in Ravel’s 1903 sultry setting of 3 exotic orientalist poems by Klingsor, ‘Shéhérazade’.  She was joined by flautist Matthew Higham (BBCSSO Section Principal) in Oliver Knussen’s final completed work of 2017 before his death the following year, ‘O hototogisul – fragment of a Japonisme’.  After the interval, violist Lawrence Power was the soloist in Mark‐Anthony Turnage’s 2001 viola concerto, ‘On Opened Ground’.  The concert opened with the orchestral version of  synaesthete Toru Takemitsu’s 1967 piece ‘Green:(November Steps II)’ and concluded with Ravel’s 1920 demonically driven glorification of the dance, ‘La valse’.  The concert was recorded for later broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in Concert, after which it will available as a podcast on BBC Sounds for a month.  Attendance was probably satisfactory for an afternoon concert, but in the large auditorium did look a bit sparse.

Acknowledging the influence of Debussy, especially in timbre and orchestral texture, the Takemitsu was more like the music of another composer who advanced Debussy’s legacy, Messiaen.  My regular readers will know that I consider this a very good thing.  Framed within the lush shimmering impressionistic texture of the beginning and end of the piece, there was some atonal modernism in the middle, with braying trombones and interesting effects with both tuned and untuned percussion.  There was also some Messiaen-like emulation of birdsong.  Overall, as I had been expecting some avant-garde ‘plinky plonk’ like some early Takemitsu, I was pleasantly surprised.  A lovely piece from a composer who could ‘hear’ the colours in his garden, and beautifully played.

Two names are destined to always appear in any discussion of great orchestrators: Rimsky-Korsakov and Ravel.  Ravel’s ‘Shéhérazade’, however, unlike Rimsky-Korsakov’s, is not really about the narratives of the ‘Arabian Nights’ per se and more keenly, and indeed obsessively, a fantasy about the attraction of the exotic and sensual experiences of an imagined and romanticised Orient.  That is not, by the way, a negative criticism.  “Bring it on”, I say.  And  Claire Booth, Ben Glassberg and the BBCSSO did just that.  The first setting ‘Asie’ is the longest of the three.  The poet imagines sailing eastwards and the sights, sounds, smells and experiences that await the traveller to Asia, listing specifically the things he would wish to see.  There was no sense that the orchestra was ‘accompanying’ the singer; rather the sense that the voice was fully integrated into a texture where timbral colour was paramount and the voice was an instrument with as varied a palette to exploit as any other instrument, if not more so.  Integrated, but not engulfed.  Even in the huge climax, Claire’s diction and tonal clarity shone through.  There were some lovely exotic, chromatic solos for oboe, cor anglais, violin and cello which served to adumbrate the yearning in the words.  The diminuendo ending was magical.  Through the next two poems, there is a shift of mood, from a waning passion to experience the exotic east, to an intensified unfulfilled erotic yearning.  In ‘La flûte enchantée’ a slavegirl hears her lover’s flute (a gorgeous arabesque from Guest Principal Eilidh Gillespie over muted tremolo strings) and longs for when they can be together.  In ‘L’indifferent’, the poet expresses his homoerotic feelings for an unknown youth singing on his doorstep, but the youth declines his invitation and, with a friendly backward glance, walks away.  In the moment of disappointment, the voice sings a cappella.  I must admit that, in my own youth and (probably) due to this work bearing no resemblance to its Rimsky-Korsakov namesake which I’ve always loved, I dismissed it as worthless.  Now, older (if not wiser), and due in no small part to the quality of the performance by Claire and the BBCSSO, I repent this view and am happy to acknowledge it as ‘proper’ Ravel.

The Knussen, a homage to Takemitsu’s memory, was for a smaller ensemble with soli flute and voice.  To begin with, Matthew Higham played his flute, in emulation of the song of the hototogisul (the lesser cuckoo, with a very different song from that of the European cuckoo), into the space between the open lid of a grand piano and the strings, I assume to exploit sympathetic resonances.  The sung text, in English, is Knussen’s selection from various sources of 7 Japanese haiku, which he translated/paraphrased (of course, thereby losing the syllabic integrity – hmmm).  The first two await the appearance of the bird, the next three enjoy its song (signifying the approach of summer, but also with links to the ancestors); the last two wait in vain – the summer is over.  But the bird returns in an ornate cadenza.  The dialogue between flute and voice in the middle haikus, the unusual sonorities and the novel percussion were all interesting.  Without doubt, the piece was skilfully performed and merited the attention I afforded it.  But?  Yes.  First, it was definitely ‘plinky-plonky’ music.  For anyone who believes, as I do, that much of the beauty of a haiku lies in the discipline imposed by the syllabic structure in aphoristically encapsulating a single idea, whether or not profound, then that is lost in the piece.  I am grateful for the opportunity to hear it once.  Even though in general a fan of all things Japanese, I won’t be chasing a second hearing.

The title of Turnage’s concerto, ‘On Opened Ground’, comes from one of Seamus Heaney’s collections of poems.  This pleases me for a whole lot of reasons, but for the purpose of this review, one stands out.  To my ear, Heaney’s poetry and Turnage’s music share the common characteristics of an often blunt forthrightness, contrasting lyricism that is sensitive to beauty, and a sense of unshakable optimism.  I was also struck by a similarity with the composer William Walton, not in soundworlds (they are quite different) but in writing a concerto that shows deep knowledge of the fundamental character of the viola and the huge range of what it can express, from rather gruff masculinity to the lyricism of the tenor and alto human voices and beyond.  Both composers pleasingly avoid any “pipe-and-slippers” avuncular stereotyping.  The work is in two movements, each in two contrasting sections.  In the first, ‘Cadenza and Scherzino’, the cadenza is a series of short declamatory outbursts from the soloist, against a more stoic orchestra, followed by a more lyrical rpisode.  The scherzino is fast, rhythmic and dancelike, fabulously virtuosic for the protagonist viola with fascinating textures in the orchestra, exciting and vigorous with the sense of an adventure story, subsiding to a calmer dialogue with the front desk of the first violins and a calm conclusion.  Lawrence’s playing was phenomenal throughout.  The second movement is titled ‘Interrupted Song and Chaconne’ and does pretty much “what it says on the tin”.  The ‘song’ is nocturne-like, an expressive meditation for the soloist over atmospheric and quite exotic orchestral mood-setting.  The solo becomes more impassioned, even as the orchestra’s growing impatience interrupts to lay down the repeated bass line of the chaconne, first heard pizzicato on the double basses.  The solo viola soliloquises meditatively and with wide-ranging expressivity over this repeated bass line, finishing at peace in the upper range of the instrument.  This is a super piece and Lawrence, who gave its first UK performance in 2004 and has continued to champion it ever since, showed us very convincingly that he rates it highly and why.

If there is a fine line between glorification and caricature, Ravel’s ‘La valse’ is perched right on top of it.  Growling from the depths of the bass winds and strings, the embryonic pulse of 3/4 metre spontantaneously wills itself into existence.  Fragments of melody and glimpses of waltzing couples materialise through the clearing mist.  The scene becomes more distinct: hundreds of couples waltzing in a huge ballroom, all the while the waltz rhythm becoming more insistent and more irresistible.  Snappy stylish variations add variety but cannot derail the unstoppable drive towards the final pages.  In 1920, ‘La valse’ was just the latest in a long line of pices, beginning with the finale of Beethoven 7, that portray dance as demonic possession.  How does it end?  It hurtles swirling headlong until it crashes to the floor with a final thud and vanishes.  Was it real or imagined, living or ghosts?  Who can tell?  What it was was brilliant.  Bonkers but brilliant.  Full marks to Ben Glassberg and the BBCSSO for getting it just right.