A Look Back at the 75th Edinburgh International Festival 2022
I’m not exactly sure when I first attended the Edinburgh Festival, but it must have been the late 1960s, when I was still at school. Our music teacher at George Watson’s College, Richard Telfer, was the manager of the Assembly Hall on the Mound, where all manner of exotic events took place under the watchful gaze and horrified mien of John Knox, and where I sold programmes and watched the shows. In addition, Dick was able to procure cheap tickets for concerts at the Usher Hall and operas at the King’s Theatre, and so my love affair with the Festival began. I saw and heard such giants as Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Daniel Barenboim, Teresa Berganza, Geraint Evans, Birgit Nilsson, Luciano Pavarotti, Timothy West, Carlo Maria Giulini, Maurizio Pollini, Claudio Abbado, Placido Domingo, Andrew Cruikshank, Bernard Haitink, Leonard Bernstein, Alfred Brendel, Galina Vishnevskaya and Mstislav Rostropovich. These are the greatest of all time, and we saw them in Edinburgh.
In 1980, I was chosen as one of six students to work in public masterclasses with Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, televised for BBC (and still available to watch on YouTube), and in 1982, I made my operatic debut in “Manon Lescaut”, in the King’s Theatre with Scottish Opera. In 1984, I sang again at the King’s, in Cavalli’s “Orione”. In the 1990s, I appeared in Burns’ “The Jolly Beggars”, and, in 2017, I took part in a concert at the Scottish Portrait Gallery to commemorate the installation of the “Black Burns” by Douglas Gordon.
The 75th Edinburgh International Festival this year couldn’t possibly compete with those heady years in the 70s, but there was much to enjoy, and one or two events of the highest quality, to savour.
I need to clarify my experience of this year’s Festival. As a semi-retired opera singer, I have a particular speciality interest in, and knowledge of, classical music. Therefore, apart from one show of contemporary dance, Samsara (which I thoroughly enjoyed), all my reviews this year were of classical music. Of dance, theatre, contemporary music, circus, comedy, visual arts or the Refugee Series, I have no experience, and I wouldn’t presume to write about them. In addition, although I have been a professional musician for over forty years, I have no training in musical theory or musicology, and would not presume to speak technically about instruments I don’t play. With this caveat, I can say, however, that I have vast knowledge of performance all over the world, and this allows me to make judgements where I might otherwise fear to tread. I will also use a little of the experience of two of my friends who, this year, went to an unbelievable number of performances, far in advance of what I saw.
My basic reaction to this year’s Festival must be positive, and I can only congratulate Fergus Linehan on the success of his final Festival as Director. Andrew Moore, as Head of Music, was hugely responsible for the musical components of the 75th Festival, and his selections, on the whole, came off well.
Hugh Kerr has already on this website commented on the lack of Scottish content in this year’s programme, both classical and folk, and I would hope to see that balance amended when Nicola Benedetti takes over next year. Provided she is able to devote enough time to the Festival, which is not a given, since her own career is in full spate, I would hope that one of the original aspects of the Festival – the promotion of Scottish talent and expertise internationally – would be given higher priority in the future. I have been loath to comment too much on this aspect while I still had a flourishing career, for fear of being seen to be pushing myself, but now that I am largely out of the loop, I would very much like to see this problem addressed. We must invite more Scottish soloists, both vocal and instrumental, to the Festival (and clearly, to our national orchestras and opera) and not default immediately to London, New York or Berlin. The final concert of the Usher Hall series, “The Dream of Gerontius” on Sunday, featured a ratio of 2:1 in favour of Scottish singers, and this is how it should be. I hope we won’t see again concerts like the Dunedin Consort on 16th August, with no Scots on stage or the RSNO Mahler 3 on 23rd August, when, although we have, at present, at least four world class Scottish mezzo sopranos, the Festival imported an American soprano, based in Vienna, for a mezzo part! There was nothing much wrong with the performances on these days, but the balance was wrong.
I missed the opening night of the Festival at Tynecastle, which appeared a good idea, if not perfectly executed. However, the Opening Concert in the Usher Hall was a complete triumph, both in terms of programming and also in performance. Respighi’s orchestral blockbuster “The Pines of Rome” is rarely heard in the concert hall, due to its huge number of players, including off-stage brass, but, as a Festival overture, as it were, it is a knock-out. Donald Runnicles and the BBCSSO played it to the hilt, while in the second half, they gave us a sensational “Carmina Burana” by Carl Orff. With the Festival Chorus in top form, expertly trained by Aidan Oliver who has continued Christopher Bell’s fine work to make the chorus an enormous asset to the Festival, and a terrific trio of soloists, we were treated to a performance of great distinction. The fine series of concerts in the Usher Hall throughout the Festival, including a sensational “Salome” which I missed, provided variety and class, showcasing some great orchestras and performers. Odd programming caused some concerts to be lack lustre, and the ridiculous saga of the Philadelphia Orchestra refusing to play without a fully masked chorus (an ultimatum sensibly rejected by the organisers) brought some ridicule to the Festival. However, there were more successes than duds, particular favourites of mine being “Saul”, Mahler 3 and Nicola Benedetti’s Bruch Violin Concerto.
The Queen’s Hall morning concerts continue to provide value and class, and BBC Radio 3 playing them live each day reminds the outside world of the excellence of the Festival. One or two of the concerts suffered from weird programming, and there were a couple of duds, but the majority were real triumphs. The one I missed, but which everyone raved about, was the recital by the amazing Canadian pianist Bruce Liu, playing an eclectic programme from Rameau to Liszt, which was by all accounts sensational. My favourites were Richard Egarr and Friends, Istanbul 1710, the Chineke! Ensemble and the Brandenburg Concertos, but standards were very high throughout.
The Edinburgh International Festival is a remarkable institution, set up after the Second World War as a flash of light in the darkness and gloom of post war society, bringing previously warring people together through art and beauty. We still need this spirit of reconciliation and love to prevail, and we must remember that, although there is much to dislike and bemoan in contemporary society, we have come a long way from a ruined and exhausted Europe in 1947, after six years of all out warfare and barbarism, the destruction of many cities and infrastructures and the wanton deaths of millions of innocent human beings. Even the ravages of Covid and Putin, terrible though these have been, cannot be measured against the reconstruction necessary after WWII. We should remember this.
Looking forward to the 76th EIF, we must hope for a new era from Nicola Benedetti, which will, hopefully, take the Festival on to yet higher places. More Scottish content would be welcome, and my vision would see us apologising less for high standards, finding a real diversity rather than a contrived one, and re-establishing the International Festival as the pre-eminent festival, rather than hiding behind the comedy and the stilt walkers of the Fringe.
Great art enriches everyone, and we should never apologise for greatness!
Cover photo: Andrew Perry
