MUSIC REVIEW: Manchester Camerata Five:Zero, with Jess Gillam - The Stoller Hall, Manchester.

The Manchester Camerata have quite rightly earned themselves the reputation of presenting music both new and old, familiar and unknown, in a more contemporary way or giving the pieces a new and interesting lease of life. They are certainly not afraid to put themselves 'out there', as the saying goes. And as they celebrate 50 years of music making, this evening's concert featured music for the saxophone, which was played by guest soloist, Jess Gillam.

With seven pieces of music on their programme, I was abashed to learn that I had only ever heard of three of the composers, and actually only knew one of the pieces in the list, so it was a concert of discovery for me.

Jess Gillam on the other hand, is no stranger, as I have seen her perform a couple of times before, and know of her skill and agility on the whole range of saxophones. Tonight she favoured the alto and soprano saxes.

However, the concert started with what I would consider not only to be a rather strange piece of music, but also an odd choice to start the concert with. The stage was not fully lit as it would normally be, and the music was so quiet (ppp) at the start, only a single instrument, that people were still walking, standing, coughing, and not realising the concert had actually started until a few bars into the music. The music, "Venus / ZOHREH" by Shiva Feshareki, was a series of slow chords, hardly perceptible at first, which took an extended and very gradual crescendo, over several minutes, repeating the same phrase seemingly ad nauseam, until it became faster and very loud. The piece finished with the lights coming up on the stage. 

The Manchester Camerata this evening consisted of just 17 instrumentalists, all from the string section, and so it was actually a chamber string ensemble we were watching. It was therefore, even more striking, to choose a solo instrument from the wind section. For the next piece, Glazunov's Concerto for alto saxophone and string orchestra (op109), the talented Jess Gillam strode out onto the stage dressed more for a fancy dress party or circus than a classical music concert, sporting a glossy matching trouser suit of black and red striped glitter! However, if you were to ignore the visual distraction this caused, the piece was amazing and of course Gillam's playing exemplary. Glazunov's music here is more like a series of small vignettes in differing styles than a standard concerto. One could quite easily distinguish lounge jazz, a lively fugue, a folk song, a lament, and a traditional Russian dance amongst the melodies.

The third and final piece in the first half of this concert was the only piece of music that I had any prior knowledge of; Shostakovich's Chamber Symphony (op110a). The piece was written in response to the terrible and needless loss of life in the second world war, with paticular reference to the bombing of Dresden. It was fitting then that the Camerata dedicated this performance to those in Ukraine at the moment, and the plight they are undergoing. The piece itself is hugely emotive and even if you didn't know the backstory of its composition, you would be left in no doubt about the themes and message the piece conveys. It starts dark, brooding and sinister, whilst the melody has a very Jewish flavour. These soulful slow passages give way to sounds replicating bombs being dropped and we hear the panic and distress this causes as fast and furious chaos ensues. The final section of the work is an ironic waltz, once again quite sinister building to a confident forte as we hear jarring triplets, loud and commanding against a plaintive single string of a violin. A very powerful and emotive motif. The denouement is more peaceful and melodic, again rustic and Jewish in flavour.

The second half of the concert started with pp tremolo strings and now an 18th member of the Camerata joining the ranks just for this one piece playing the crotales. These are a series of tuned metal discs which are played with a violin bow. The later section of the piece when the higher notes of the crotales were used was the more effective. The music was 'Be Still' by Daniel Kidane. This was followed by another piece for orchestra and solo saxophone, and this time is was 'On The Nature Of Daylight' by Max Richter. We heard a beautiful seires of lush chords slow and elegaic starting the piece, almost hymn-like, before Gillam comes in on the soprano sax this time, with a minimalist but tuneful melody. Not true minimalism here since the music is more varied and tuneful than say that of Steve Reich or Philip Glass, and the piece was very enjoyable.

This was followed by an interesting and rather effective composition which made the strings sound like they had a reverb on them. An unconventional piece with clever use of the conventional instruments, demanding a lot from the players. Technically difficult , there was a long central pizzicato section in the classical style - inasmuch as it was totally tonal, harmonic and lyrial, which contrasted beautifully with the more discordant and avant-garde outer saections of the work. After a fast-paced dance-like denouement, the piece gave way to a screeching single violin that seemed to be crying. The music decresecendoed into ppp finishing with a final plucked phrase from a solo cello.

For the concert's finale, we moved to the music of David Heath and his rather strange but upbeat piece called, 'The Celtic'. For this, Gillam joined us once again for these three short movements. The first was an interesting juxtaposition between the stident celtic-sounding chords in the violins and the faster soprano sax riffs of jigs, reels and even a hoe-down! The second movement was slow and reflective where the saxophone's notes seemed to take on a meaning of their own, as the movement came to a very quiet and melancholy end. A jolly sax rhythm started the third movement, sounding very much like a hornpipe, but this became faster into a true jig , before a slower section, and then a fast and flourishful finish.

Reviewer - Matthew Dougall
on - 11/3/22