CBSO
YOUTH ORCHESTRA ACADEMY
Symphony
Hall ****
What might have appeared a somewhat wan winding-up of the
CBSO Youth Orchestra’s year (a last-minute change of venue, an audience
straggling across the stalls of the auditorium) turned out to be a fizzer of a
concert, the hand-picked Academy delivering a Scottish-themed programme under
its regular conductor Michael Seal.
Seal, freshly-returned from conducting the CBSO’s Bollywood
concert at the Royal Albert Hall Proms, presided as coolly and magisterially as
ever over his youthful charges (some so youthful that the obligatory chaperone
was there, sitting unobtrusively at the side of the stage), baton so clear,
left hand eloquent, all gestures carefully marshalling his forces.
Peter Maxwell Davies’ An Orkney Wedding with Sunrise was
given with a huge amount of rhythmic gusto, not least from the strings, brass
whooping, and with quieter interludes gently delivered by cor anglais solo, and,
later, solo strings. The conclusion, bagpiper Robert Jordan solemnly striding
through the hall in full regalia, was totally uplifting – and the pipes amazingly
in tune with the orchestra!
A total contrast came with Bruch’s Scottish Fantasy (and a
revelation, in that its grave opening is so indebted to that of the Mendelssohn
symphony which was to follow), Charlie Lovell-Jones’ solo violin so
sweetly-toned in its silky lines, gutturally powerful elsewhere, his bowing
such a natural extension of himself.
His collaboration with the orchestra was heartwarming, their
alertness and responsiveness under Seal’s attentive baton equally so. A
mention, too, for the many telling contributions from harpist Isabel Ainsworth,
in this enthralling performance.
Finally came Mendelssohn’s Third Symphony, the “Scottish”,
vivid in its colours, bringing busy eloquence from the strings, expressive
solos from a tight woodwind section, and effective contributions from brass and
timpani, these two sections perhaps needing toning down a notch.
This was a dramatic reading under Michael Seal, dynamics
well shaded, and it was structurally good that he allowed every movement to
follow naturally upon its predecessor. Most memorable was the strings’
wonderful singing of the Adagio’s glorious melody, horns equally responsive.
Not so memorable was the dowdy posture of some of the back-desk upper strings.
Lift your instruments, be proud of yourselves!
Christopher Morley