Scottish Chamber Orchestra: Schuldt Conducts Schumann

City Halls, Glasgow - 11/11/22

The uncharacteristically mild evening of the 11th November brought the Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s warm ensemble sound to the equally warm acoustic of Glasgow’s City Halls, with a programme which reprised their Queen’s Hall performance of the night before, sandwiching a Scottish ‘premiere’ (‘deuxième’) of Julian Anderson’s Cello Concerto ‘Litanies’ between two symphonic works of warmest Schumann.  Happily, the disappointingly sparse attendance did not diminish the warmth of the Glasgow welcome accorded to our wonderful ‘third’, Edinburgh-based orchestra with German guest conductor and cello soloist, Clemens Schuldt and Alban Gerhardt, respectively. 

Schumann’s Overture, Scherzo and Finale is, in all but name, a symphony without a slow movement.  Indeed, before its eventual publication, it briefly held the titles ‘Symphony No.2’ and ‘Sinfonietta’.  The Overture opens Gothically in E minor, but swiftly gives way to a great Allegro E-major tune, rhythmically, playfully and impishly developed, and it was beautifully played con brio. The Scherzo’s equally playful, tripping dotted 6/8 string melody in the relative C# minor, thematically related to the overture, received playing with a Mendelssohnian lightness of touch, while the 2/4 Trio section in D-flat major, with glorious harmonies and winds prominent, was quite delicious, surpassed only by the cheeky coda based on the Trio.  Also some exquisite pianissimi.  The SCO, as I have said before and no doubt will say again, is a great band and brings an unparalleled chamber music feel to the performance of all repertoires.  The Allegro molto vivace Finale begins with a call to attention, but quickly delivers a set of great tunes with melodic inventiveness, loads of smiles and exploitation of a rich vein of counterpoint.  A fanfare ushers in a hymn-like episode before the coda seals the triumph.  It is classic Schumann and a great concert opener, delivered with perfect balance and not a little wit. 

“‘Tis an ill wind that blaws nae guid”.  A couple of minutes into the performance of the Cello Concerto, one of the strings on Alban Gerhardt’s cello snapped, necessitating his departure from the stage to effect a repair and prompting the conductor Clemens Schuldt to invite the composer Julian Anderson up to the stage from the stalls to speak about the piece which had been specifically written for Alban Gerhardt, the performance resuming da capo on his return.  Anderson’s music is undeniably modern but it does not eschew tonality or lyricism.  The concerto has the bones of a fast-slow-fast 3-movement structure played without a break but can also be seen as many episodes of different character, with both orchestra and soloist assuming roles of prominence or accompaniment, dialogue and soliloquy, sympathy and antipathy.  Very frequently, orchestral colours, especially but not only bass instruments, are used to amplify the solo line, giving it a “larger-than-life” quality.  The extended slow middle section has an elegiac quality, stemming from two events that happened during the composition of the work: the death of the composer’s colleague and friend Oliver Knussen and the destruction by fire of Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris.  The writing is wealthy in mood-setting sonic effects, including muted trombone glissandi, tubular bell softly tolling, rapid foot-shuffling by the string section, spectral high double-stopped glissandi on the solo instrument and birdsong imitation in the winds.  The ‘finale’ starts as a rhythmic rapid pursuit and calls to my mind similar writing in Stravinsky’s Symphony in 3 Movements, with block chording that seems to quote ‘Le Sacre’.  An orchestral rant brings this to a sudden halt and the piece concludes morendo with one of those spectral rising double-stopped glissandi on the solo instrument.  It is a compelling, totally involving and sonically theatrical work and it received a virtuosic and committed exposition from its dedicatee.  Memorable too was the sight of composer, soloist and conductor in one embrace, turning to acknowledge the rapturous applause. 

If Schumann’s 3-movement erstwhile Sinfonietta prompts the ‘symphony without a slow movement’ epithet, then the chronologically last of his 4 official symphonies to be composed, published as his Symphony No.3 and nicknamed Rhenish, seems to repay any imagined deficit with an extra movement (though not a slow one).  The Rhenish is, in essence, an upbeat holiday album from travels in the Rhineland, especially a trip to Cologne’s magnificent cathedral, in 1850, when the Schumann’s had just moved to Düsseldorf.  The first movement is Schumann in confident Florestan mode, in a hemiolic 3/4 that seems to stride ebulliently over the bar lines and favours the horns to sing out the melody.  Schumann, not (please note) Schuldt, dispenses with an exposition repeat to launch a contrapuntally and harmonically adventurous development, while horns and trumpets get to bring back the great tune before the joyous coda.  Brass playing, incidentally, on modern instruments all evening, was superb.  The delightful Scherzo, moderately paced evocation of the rolling waters of the Rhine, with a country dance Trio tune, finishing with a cheeky soft pizzicato, was beautifully played.  The third movement marked ‘not fast’, is not slow either, but is calmly lyrical with brass and timpani silent, featuring a hymn-like melody, and was played with great elegance by strings and winds, with a particularly well-articulated clarinet line.  The slow fourth movement, supposedly depicting a ceremony in Cologne cathedral, witnessed by Robert and Clara, where an archbishop was made a cardinal, is indeed solemn and dramatically majestic, but I always find it as dark and brooding as it is undoubtedly spellbinding.  Eusebius is silenced and Florestan returns for the ebullient finale with two joyous themes, one song-like, the other dance-like, exploring different keys but driving onward to a declamatory statement before the contrapuntally rich coda brings the symphony to its triumphant conclusion, the SCO’s horns shining afresh. 

Yet again, SCO delivered a performance enriched by the sympathetic direction of a fine guest conductor, the cooperative music-making of a gifted guest soloist and their own special brand of chamber-informed mutually responsive playing.  A memorable evening indeed.