Mozart and Strauss
Queen’s Hall, 3/4/25
Scottish Chamber Orchestra, François Leleux conductor/oboe, Cerys Ambrose-Evans bassoon
This is the last matinee of the season, attracting a decent audience for a concert which combines two of this year’s themes: concertos played by members of the SCO, and composers’ early works. Today’s SCO soloist is principal bassoonist, Cerys Ambrose-Evans in Mozart’s Bassoon Concerto written when he was seventeen. Introducing the concert, fellow bassoonist, Alison Green, comments on the youthful talent on display from the fifteen-year- old Tsotne Zedginidze’s First Symphony receiving its Scottish premiere. It has a difficult bassoon part: usually, she says, she’s in awe of the numbers of notes played by the violinists – today she’ll be concentrating on the multiple dots on her own score. The Richard Strauss ‘Serenade’, written when he was 17, is one of her favourite works, although she’s never before played Strauss’s earlier First Symphony. She looks forward to hearing Cerys Ambrose-Evans, who’s recently starred in the SCO’s children’s work ‘The Great Grumpy Gaboon’, demonstrating the soulful side of the instrument as well as its perkiness.
The popular French oboist François Leleux conducts three works today and plays in and directs the Strauss ‘Serenade’. He’s been a champion of the Tbilisi-born composer, Tsotne Zedginidze, who was 15 when he wrote his Symphony No 1 in 2024, and Leleux conducted the work’s premiere in Salzburg by the Salzburg Camerata on 28th January this year. The SCO’s Gordon Bragg is the guest leader in a fairly large orchestra with modern horns and trumpets, though no timpani. The cellos, under guest leader, US cellist Madelyn Kowalski, are at the front of the stage, to the conductor’s right. The violas sit behind them and the deeper string tone, often augmented by the two bassists are one of the recurring features of the one-movement Symphony. Though there is nothing ground-breaking in his experimentation, Zedginidze’s clearly enjoys exploring different orchestral sounds and styles of writing. In the mix, I notice minimalism in the repeated short rhythmic motifs, jazzier rhythms with string pizzicato, a swooping melody for the higher strings, sudden loud dissonant chords, a sprightly interlude for oboe, bassoon and flute, an anthem for horns and trumpets. A bass solo accompanied by slow strings leads to the quiet unresolved ending. David Kettle, who’d listened to the piece before the concert, points out features of its structure in his programme notes. The twenty-minute work is applauded by the audience while François Leleux holds up the score. An adventurous commission by the Mozartwoche Salzburg, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra which leaves us wondering what this composer will write when he’s as old as Mozart was when he wrote the Bassoon Concerto!
By 1774 that 18 year old was already well-established as a performer and composer, and though we don’t know the details of the concerto’s commission, there’s no doubt that it was written specifically for the bassoon, possibly as an attempt to revive it as a concerto instrument – it had been very popular with Vivaldi. Today’s bassoonist, Cerys Ambrose -Evans, comes on stage to applause from the audience and her colleagues – some of them watching from the stalls as the work requires only four other wind instruments. The two oboes, guest leader Maria Alba Carmona and Katherine Bryer, and two natural horns, played by guest leader Steve Stirling and Jamie Shield play a major role both in the warm orchestral sound of the concerto, and in the frequent harmonisations with the bassoon soloist. The brisk cheerful first movement, marked allegro, is played through by the orchestra before the bassoonist begins, and then picks up the main theme which she embellishes in increasingly elaborated repeats. When I listened to the work online a few days ago, I was surprised by how familiar it felt, and eventually tracked it down to Michael Chapman’s 1972 recording on the ‘other side’ of my LP of Jack Brymer in the Clarinet Concerto, both with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields conducted by Neville Marriner. It is a delightful work and demonstrates Mozart’s ability to showcase the qualities of the old instrument in the same way as he does the new-fangled clarinet towards the end of his life. The first movement cadenza, possibly the soloist’s own, takes us from a hesitant soulfulness (to use Alison Reid’s term) through to breathtaking virtuosity.
François Leleux is a supportive conductor, especially in the second movement andante ma adagio. He seems happy to let the soloist set the pace and the lovely melody is given room to breathe. Prefiguring the aria ‘Porgi amor’ from ‘The Marriage of Figaro’, it reveals the bassoon’s lyrical side, and the way the melody interweaves with the oboes is also reminiscent of the Countess’s aria. In contrast the final movement sees the instrument in its perkiest mood, joining in after the orchestra has played the main minuet theme and developing ever cheekier and more elaborate decorations as the movement progresses. Cerys Ambrose-Evans impresses throughout – her breath control, her championing of the languor of the slow movement, and her virtuosity are all on display in a wonderful rendition of this fine work. She thoroughly deserves the cheers she receives at the end
She’s back after the interval with twelve other wind players for the young Richard Strauss’s ‘Serenade’, clearly a homage to Mozart’s ‘Serenade in B flat for Thirteen wind instruments’, (the Grand Partita). Two bassoons and one contrabassoon (Heather Brown, who also played in the Zedginidze), four modern horns, two clarinets, two flutes and two oboes. The players sit in a semi-circle with François Leleux directing in the third seat from the left. The 10-minute work allows us to luxuriate in the beautiful interplay of harmonies in a hymn-like theme at the beginning and the end of the work, although the stormier occasionally dissonant sounds indicate the young composer’s desire to take more risks with the harmonies. The horn quartet just before the first theme returns is a glorious highlight of the work which gives the audience a rare opportunity to appreciate the SCO’s supremely talented Wind Ensemble working with oboist François Leleux.
The concert’s longest work is at the end of the programme, sometimes a challenge for the audience! Strauss’s Symphony No 1 isn’t often played but is given its best possibly chance to shine with the largest orchestra today, including three trombones and timpani. As the first movement’s andante maestoso leads into the allegro vivace, it’s clear that young Strauss manages large orchestral forces well, while he’s also proficient in the smaller details of melodic interludes for the woodwinds. The first movement is pretty lengthy, but both the andante and the scherzo are tunefully inventive and maintain a taut structure. Leleux’s expansive conducting entices us into the final movement’s allegro maestoso grand march. Strauss’s witty finale begins with a canon in the strings which moves through the woodwinds, till it reaches the trombones when the composer changes direction and increases the speed in a charge to the finish. The lad shows promise.
This most enjoyable concert is the last SCO concert in Edinburgh this month, although, in a special event, the SCO Chorus and the SCO String Ensemble under Gregory Batsleer present ‘Seven Last Words’ with music by James MacMillan, William Byrd and the Scottish premiere of ‘Be Still’ by Daniel Kidane in Greyfriars Kirk at 7.30 on Saturday 12th April. Unreserved tickets at £20 (with the usual concessions) are still available through the Queen’s Hall Box Office.
