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A Worthing New Year Concert: Johann Strauss I & II, Léhar, von Suppé, Mozart: Florian Uhlig, piano,Worthing Symphony Orchestra, conductor John Gibbons,  Assembly Hall, Worthing, UK. 4.1.2009 (RA)

Strauss II: Overture, Die Fledermaus
Mozart: Piano Concerto No 23 in A, K488
Strauss II: Marches, waltzes, polkas
Léhar: Merry Widow pot - pourri
Suppé: Overture, Light Cavalry
Strauss I: Radetsky March


The factor most reminiscent of winter waltz time in Vienna at the WSO’s traditional New Year concert was probably the Austrian cold of January which had apparently emigrated to Worthing. The unusually sustained sequence of dry days with temperatures around freezing took a toll on what has been the most enthusiastically supported concert of recent WSO seasons.

Additionally, careful housekeeping by conductor John Gibbons meant that even if the weather had been milder, a further Viennese factor at work would have been the size of the WSO for this concert. With only six first violins and three seconds, it almost certainly resembled the initial scale of the orchestra Strauss the elder formed in 1825, after studying the violin and joining a popular dance orchestra.

Gibbons’ programme notes bring his audience insights like this and his wit and humour in introducing the pieces did much to warm cockles in both stalls and balcony. His informative and often amusing chats with the audience from the rostrum have gained him election to a Fellowship of the Royal Society of Arts in respect of audience communication.

Of the Strauss household, it was Johann the younger who provided the bulk of the ballroom content this year, the exceptions being brother Josef’s “Feuerfest [Firework] Polka” and dad’s concluding Radetsky March. Franz Léhar’s The Merry Widow provided its own selection for the programme and Gibbons also included for the first time, Johann the younger’s “Fairytales From The Orient” waltz.

The first half of the concert contained some contrast from an earlier Viennese era –Mozart's popular A Major Piano Concerto No.23 , which gave me a slight misgiving. The orchestral playing in the first movement of the concerto did not seem to be taut enough and I have heard German solo pianist Florian Uhlig in more compelling form at these concerts. Maybe his dressing room had been chilly – Gibbons assured the fans that rehearsing at 10am had not been in the warmth built up by the Assembly Hall heating by concert time at 2.45pm.

Whatever the cause, Uhlig’s right-hand articulation seemed to be suffering. I craved it crisper and more distinct and I felt the outer movements were deprived of some of their verve and bite too. But his slow movement conveyed Mozart’s almost chillingly clinical conciseness in such emotional music, there was beauty in its coda, and he gave the finale all of its rattlingly heartwarming effect.

Clarinettists Jon Carnac and Ruth Buxton made their star moments count, bassoonist Gavin McNaughton too, and it was both remarkable and delightful to see Carnac at one point bursting out with laughter at the comic operatic fun Mozart was having with his wind writing.

Richard Amey

Richard Amey is a journalist based in Worthing, Sussex, UK. He writes on classical music, dance and sport for local newspapers and an online version of this review appears on the Worthing Herald web site. (http://www.worthingherald.co.uk/)

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