BBCSSO: Elgar Symphony No. 2
City Halls, Glasgow - 18/05/23
Ryan Wigglesworth, conductor | Laura van der Huijden, cello
“Bold, Passionate, Moving Elgar” – the tagline for the closing concert of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s 2022-23 season referred to the composer’s Second Symphony, a masterpiece from 1911, concluding a programme which also featured Richard Strauss’ ‘Till Eulenspiegel’ and a world premiere of a BBC commission, Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s new Cello Concerto with Laura van der Huijden as soloist. Chief Conductor Ryan Wigglesworth directed, bringing his first season in the role to a rousing close. As ever, the programme was introduced for radio and recording by Kate Molleson. The concert was reasonably well-attended.
‘Till Eulenspiegels lustige Streiche’ (‘Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks’), to give Strauss’ 15-minute 1895 piece its full title, is a deliciously whimsical character piece depicting the life of a legendary medieval rogue who meets a sticky come-uppance by hanging, yet lives on in folklore. It is my favourite of Strauss’ tone poems and a justly ever-popular concert-opener. Till’s leitmotif is introduced on horn (colourfully played by guest principal Chris Gough), making recurrent appearances in different moods with different scoring throughout the piece, which is scored for a large orchestra with triple winds additionally augmented by piccolo, cor anglais, bass clarinet and contrabassoon. The playing was crisp and agile, the BBCSSO on top form reminding us why Ryan Wigglesworth has been such a catch for the BBC and Scotland.
English cellist Laura van der Huijden has been involved from the outset in the genesis of Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s new concerto (2022) and was credited in the programme note as the originator of the idea of constructing the piece around aspects of current environmental science research. The resultant 20-minute piece, in 3 movements played without a break and written with Laura in mind as soloist, respectively evokes volcanoes as agents of both destruction and creation, algal phytoplankton blooms as agents of carbon capture, and the extraordinary almost permanently airborne existence of the European swift. Frances-Hoad’s music is engagingly evocative, often melodic and fully capable of being appreciated as ‘pure’ music without a programmatic element. She is clearly also a very skilful orchestrator; Laura’s rich warm tone never being swamped by the extraordinary sonic effects realised by a large orchestra. For example, a sense of eerie unseen menace was evoked by harps, lower strings glissandi, tubular bells and vibraphone – spooky. The demanding solo cello part seemed to depict an intelligent observer experiencing these natural wonders first-hand and responding with a sense of awe. This wonderful new piece was awarded an enthusiastic reception from the Glasgow audience, as composer, soloist, conductor and orchestra joined on stage to acknowledge the extended ovation.
Elgar’s two completed symphonies are very different, yet inescapably by the same composer. Where the First is predominantly introspective and exudes an air of noble stoicism, concluding with a triumphant sense of hard-won self-realisation, the Second is predominantly confident, exudes an air of striding ebullience, but concludes with an afterglow of deep contentment. If pressed, I probably prefer the first, but I’d never knowingly miss an opportunity to catch either live. And I am most definitely glad not to have missed Wigglesworth’s interpretation of the Second with the BBCSSO, as it was top-notch. The first movement’s confident opening bowled along joyously, slowing slightly for the second theme, introduced on the cellos, who were radiant as ever. A passage in the development where a harmonically complex figure is played over a pulsating triplet ostinato on timpani and bass drum was beautifully pointed: it returns more menacingly in the scherzo. The movement ends with yet another example from my list of top 10 codas, strings and winds swirling upwards to an orchestral chord – magical! The slow movement, nocturnal and funereal at first, morphs into a noble, majestic and rather elegiac melody, building to a powerful emotional climax and subsiding to a solemn resolution, performed with the perfect mix of nobility and passion. The scampering, playful scherzo received an agile outing, the dramatic quotations from the first movement being clearly pointed. The cellos shone again with bassoons in the legato melody that opens the finale with a hint of the dance, while the second theme is another confident striding one. The writing develops in complexity to a climax, subsiding gradually in a passage for which Elgar provided an organ part – I’ve heard this in the Usher Hall, but the City Halls lack an instrument – this is no privation; the orchestral parts are dramatic enough. The closing pages of the symphony remind me of those of Brahms’ third, quoting the opening themes of the symphony in an expression of calm contentment after the storms of life.
A great concert and a fitting closure to the season, not forgetting a reminder that, with Wigglesworth at the helm, the BBCSSO is set fair for an equally thrilling 2023-24 season. The long wait for September begins.