AMATEUR MUSIC REVIEW: Chetham's Symphony Orchestra - The Stoller Hall, Manchester.

Presented as a precursor to The Stoller Hall’s year long series of events under exploring the theme of ‘Sounds of Nature’, students from Chetham’s School of Music performed a concert programme of three pieces of classical music - each one designed to showcase the talents of these young performers.

Of the three pieces, only one fitted in with the ‘Sounds of Nature’ theme - programme opener ‘African Sunrise/Manhattan Rave’ by Manchester-born composer David Heath. Heath’s work relied heavily on percussion and gave one of Chetham's students (referred to only as Sophie) the perfect opportunity to showcase their skills on various percussion instruments. That’s not to say that the wider orchestral ensemble weren’t given a lot to do (quite the opposite, in fact) - there was much for each one of the performers to get into with their respective instruments. Heath’s composition, as the title would suggest, blended rhythmic sounds from Africa’s natural environment and put them against the man-made, urban rhythms of Manhattan, USA. The result was a fascinating work full of rhythmic and key changes and a lot of big percussion set pieces.

‘African Sunrise/Manhattan Rave’ opens with the tones of the marimba before the string section builds up underneath and are joined by the horns - the sound of the horns, at times, being reminiscent of George Gershwin’s ‘Rhapsody In Blue’ (like Heath’s work, another example of the crossover between the jazz and classical worlds). The opening sets the mood for the piece, blending the sounds and rhythms of the natural and urban worlds, hinting at where the work is to go next. As the piece continues, there are examples of African polyrhythms on the marimba, trills on the strings and horns, and, after a build-up of swirling strings, drums, and horns as the ‘African Sunrise’ section reaches its climax, birdsong. The ‘Manhattan Rave’ sequence is where Sophie was allowed to let loose on percussion, on a large drum kit, a metal sheet, and, astonishingly, a stepladder. It was a virtuoso performance indeed, with the young percussionist furiously, frantically, hammering away on the drums, while the rest of the ensemble played around her work. However, the contribution of the rest of the ensemble was somewhat drowned out by the loud, frenetic percussion work. Such was the intensity of the percussion performance, it recalled a bizarre sequence from the 1944 film ‘The Phantom Lady’ set in a jazz club which featured similarly feverish drumming. The section climaxed with the stepladder being struck in a faster and faster tempo, building up in speed and sound and replicating the sound of a Manhattan subway train! The work ended with a more reflective movement, featuring the tones of the vibraphone interchanging with the sound of the strings echoing the sound of the urban soundscape quietening down at the end of the day. ‘African Sunrise/Manhattan Rave’ was a highly complex and astonishing work and was by no means an easy piece to play, although the players made it seem practically effortless.

While it was clear that the opening piece would be difficult to beat, the next performance gave it a decent run for its money. Prokofiev’s ‘Piano Concerto No. 2’ gave another student (Rebekah) the chance to display her talents on the piano. Prokofiev’s piece certainly provided a lot of opportunities for the young pianist to perform some incredibly complex runs on the piano, as the piece developed along its running time. After an opening which slowly builds up in sounds and tempo, the concerto brings forth flavours of Russian dance music, intense bursts of horns and strings, all the while being driven forward by the complicated runs and trills on the piano. It was clearly a very demanding piece for the pianist but was performed flawlessly.

The final piece, Rachmaninoff’s ‘Symphony No. 3’, finally gave the wider Symphony Orchestra the chance to showcase their talents, front and centre. Opening with dark, almost foreboding tones on the cellos, the violins and violas swooped over the rhythmic sounds, as horn and percussion joined them to create a soaring blend of sounds. The rolling waves of horns and percussion then heralded the return of the strings as they burst forth into the piece and played melody lines which clearly must have been a big influence on film composer John Williams (in particular, his iconic theme for the film ‘Jaws’). The opening movement reaches a dramatic climax as the section ends with a very large drum being struck. The second movement build up the drama of the piece as the percussion (drums, timpani, cymbals) crashed and pounded in the background before giving way to the calmer, more pastoral third movement, where the strings and horns led the way. The fourth movement saw a return to the dramatic sounds of the earlier movements as the orchestra were conducted towards a very big, very dramatic climax at the end of the piece. Conductor Jonathan Bloxham had been expertly guiding the young orchestra performers through all of the pieces with precision but it was genuinely fascinating seeing his conducting become more and more excited as the piece built up towards its end. While the Rachmaninoff work had its share of moments of drama within it, one can’t help but feel it was a little overlong and was perhaps the least impressive work of the three performed (although this is no criticism of the performance of the work - the actual performance was of a very high calibre indeed!). 

Overall, the evening’s musical entertainment proved to be an excellent showcase for the talents of the classical instrumentalists of tomorrow, although were one to nitpick the programme may have been more interesting if there had been a change to the order of the pieces: commencing with Rachmaninov’s work, then presented the Prokofiev concerto, before using Heath’s astonishing piece as the ‘big finish’ of the night. However, there may have been logistical reasons for the running order as performed (in light of the need to move the grand piano as well as the percussion instrumentation between works) so this may be a rather fussy point on the part of this reviewer. Irrespective of that minor quibble, the young performers in the Chetham’s Symphony Orchestra have much to be proud of in their performances and it will be exciting to hear more from them both at the School and then when they go on to other things in the future.

Reviewer - Andrew Marsden
on - 18.2.22