MUSIC REVIEW: Pictures From An Exhibition - The Halle Orchestra - Bridgewater Hall, Manchester.

It seems like a couple of years since I was last walking through the doors to Manchester's Bridgewater Hall.. oh, wait a minute, it IS a couple of years! Live music concerts are back, and finally I had the opportunity to go and watch one of the world's premier orchestras in action again. The virus is still out there, as we are all only too aware, and so a few things have changed to try and minimise the spread, and we are still all advised to wear masks, but these are minor inconveniences which we are all happy to accept in order to get back into theatres and concert venues again.

This afternoon's concert (a very rainy and blustery Wednesday afternoon), had just three pieces on the programme, two of which I knew and loved, whilst the meat of the sandwich was a very contemporary and somewhat avant-garde composition of which I knew nothing.

The concert started with Bernstein's overture to 'Candide'. New-to-me conductor Cristian Macelaru was in fine form; keeping the piece swift, light and flowing, with great observations of the dynamics of the piece.

This was followed by the violin concerto by Wynton Marsalis. The violin solo being performed by Nicola Benedetti, for whom the concerto was written. The work is in four movements although there is only one real discernible break in the entire 30 minute-long piece. And in fact, should perhaps more accurately be classified as a work for orchestra with solo violin, rather than a concerto, but maybe I'm being a little picky here. To be honest, I think any music critic would be hard-pushed to pigeon-hole this work, as it really doesn't fit any style or genre, and flirts mercilessly with the classical compositional form, the clashing discords and atonality of the likes of Berg or Schoenberg, and interpolates popular music rhythms and melody fragments throughout, such as jazz, blues, country, hoe-down, Irish reel, military march, and goodness knows what else; sometimes reminiscent of Aaron Copeland, other times it is a New Orleans funeral band, before being whisked to Scotland for a wee jig...

To say that the piece was a hotchpotch wouldn't be far wrong, and just as one was starting to like or follow a particular section in the work it transmogrified itself into something quite ugly and bizarre. That's not to say that the work wasn't clever, it was. Perhaps too clever. Rather percussion heavy at times, and Marsalis instructing the orchestra, and even the soloist, to maniupluate their instruments in unconventional ways: the percussion section even used a sweeping brush at one point! A central section of a very long 'cadenza' on the violin, also necessitated one of the percussionists to accompany a part of it on cowbell and drum kit, positioned centre stage in front of the conductor, and had to traverse the stage from the rear and return there during Benedetti's solo. The end of the concerto finished on a rather quiet but upbeat melody which was repeated ad nauseam, quiter each time as Benedetti played and walked off stage, with the final note of the concerto being played pianissimo on the off-stage violin. 

Benedetti, of course, was superb. How could she not be, it was written for her, and the music is in her bones. Her skill and joy of playing the piece was omnipresent and her standing ovation at the end  totally deserved. 

After the interval, and I was back on musical terra firma. Mussorgsky's 'Pictures At An Exhibition' was indeed written after seeing pictures of buildings, costume designs, clocks, all by his friend Viktor Hartmann. The 15 short pieces are played without a break, and represent Mussorgsky himself walking around the exhibition, viewing the pictures, and putting to music his feelings of the artworks, and, perhaps more tellingly, his feelings for their artist, his now deceased friend, Hartmann. The pieces were written in 1874 for solo piano, but it was some 30 years' after the death of Mussorgdky in 1881 that Maurice Ravel plucked up enough courage to orchestrate them, and indeed, it is in this orchestrated form, that the vast majority of us know the work. The dominant melody 'promenade' which becomes the principal theme in the final movement, 'The Great Gate Of Kiev' (including the ringing of a large church bell), is the most memorable theme; grandiose, pompous, self-effacing, a little lopsided. But other tunes contained within are much darker and more reflective. Played together however, they are a delightful set of pieces and made for a lovely finish to the Halle's concert this afternoon.

Conducted by Cristian Macelaru, he brought a keenness and freshness to both this and the Bernstein overture, which this reviewer certainly appreciated. He is animated, passionate, controlling and punctillious.

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 8.12.21