SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Other Links

Editorial Board

Google Site Search

Shostakovich, Ireland and Berlioz:   Mark Bebbington (piano) Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra/Ian McRae 29.3. 2009, Worthing Assembly Hall, West Sussex, UK (RB)

Shostakovich: Festive Overture
Ireland: Piano  Concerto
Berlioz:  Symphonie Fantastique


Three years ago my son's work took him to the Brighton and Hove area. This became the cue for family visits to the area and I recall in particular a Royal Philhormonica Orchestra concert at the Brighton Pavilion. That would have been 2007. There I was shocked to see how infirm Paavo Berglund had become. Mind you,  the last time I had seen him at concerts was at Bristol's Colston Hall in the early 1970s. Now he tottered vulnerably and had to be helped up into what seemed to be a perilously high conductor's chair. That concert started with a rare appearance by Sibelius's Lemminkainen and the Maidens of Saari – a work Berglund has never recorded. It's the longest of the Lemminkainen Legends but the most passionate and vivid. Berglund began it very slowly and built the tension and verve steadily. All very effective. Then came the irredeemably lacklustre Schumann Cello Concerto. It has a few moments but could not be rescued even by the obvious fervour of cellist Paul Watkins. After the break came a Beethoven Symphony - I cannot recall which - possibly No. 7 - but it left no lasting impression.

That was two or more years ago. Last Sunday we were in the area again. My son had bought us balcony tickets for a matinee concert by the Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra. This was at Worthing’s Assembly Hall close to the civic centre part of a 1950s style enclave. There were vacant shops and the peeling white paint of the Art Deco flats opposite the main entrance to the Hall was not exactly encouraging. By contrast the Hall was in good heart though the audience numbers were small; I estimate that it was about a third full. There were considerable expanses of empty seats. The programme was a good one so was this the reward for enterprise or a function of a breezy, bright sunny afternoon with other attractions to offer. Parking was free and very convenient so that wasn’t the reason and neither overall was the quality of the playing. The programme notes were models of thoroughness, lucid, readable, not too technical, inexpensive – all qualities that spoke of another and admirable age.

The concert programme followed the typical overture-concerto-symphony pattern. The Shostakovich overture made for a boisterous and punishing choice and the numerous brass took a while to find their feet and come to room temperature. It’s an rowdy piece with a start that sounds as if it is about to launch into a national anthem. Amid all the brass and woodwind derring-do there’s a pleasing section towards the end which momentarily picks up on the sentimentality of the Second Piano Concerto.

Sussex is John Ireland country. Ireland’s windmill home is not that far away, neither is Chanctonbury Ring nor Amberley and its Wild Brooks, nor Cissbury Ring, nor Storrington for long the home of Ireland's friend Arnold Bax. The now dilapidated pub The White Horse of Bax’s last years is still there. It seemed fitting then that we were able to hear a rare performance of the Ireland Piano Concerto  which was for me the main attraction. Mark Bebbington was the young and dashing soloist; his presence having been retained with the support of the Ireland Trust. This was the first time I had heard the concerto live in concert – ignore a few Prom broadcasts where I listened over the radio and recordings by Parkin (Lyrita; Chandos), Joyce (EMI), Horsley (EMI), Stott (Conifer, now Dutton), Tozer (Unicorn) and Lane (Hyperion). For me the work has always suffered from a sense of being diffuse and wan. The colours seemed faded. Ireland could be more subtle and his Legend for piano and orchestra with its allusions to the South Downs’ pagan antiquity. These negatives were completely dispelled by Bebbington’s performance which I found grippingly attractive. He revelled in the cross-handed and sometimes jazzy - ever so slightly - virtuosity of the outer movements. From time to time he turned towards the audience as if to reinforce the communion – a touch familiar from de Pachmann though avoiding his spoken asides. He made even more of the work’s confiding, melancholy romance – establishing Ireland’s spell and never once breaking the mood. This was fine and touching playing. Of all the performances I have heard this one made the Ireland seem so much more than a faded relic. The programme indicated that Bebbington would be recording four British piano concertos with the CBSO. I hope that the Ireland will be one of them – it could, on this showing, easily sweep the field. Meantime I clearly need to catch up with this pianist’s cycle of Ireland’s piano solo music on the Somm label.

The guest conductor was Ian McCrae, himself a composer with various operas and two symphonies to his name. His Bernstein-like demonstrative dynamism on the podium was unmistakable. He has worked successfully to weave together music, young people, cycling and fitness. Clearly something of a Stokowskian communicator, after the intermission he addressed the audience with a miniature introduction to the Berlioz symphony and commended orchestra member Andrew Marshall’s very full programme notes. McCrae’s speaking style is warm, confident and informal. The Symphonie Fantastique – which again I was hearing live in concert for the very first time – came across as a work of extraordinary romantic brilliance; all the more so given its early nineteenth century date. I have heard more flamingly virtuosic performances but this one attentively brought out the work’s phantasmal delicacy and ravishing detail without short-changing the opiate nightmare elements.

I should add that Worthing is blessed with two orchestras. The other one is a fully professional band, the Worthing Symphony whose Principal Conductor is John Gibbons. By coincidence some eight years ago the Worthing Symphony gave the Ireland concerto with Philip Fowke.

Rob Barnett


^{Back to Top                                                    Cumulative Index Page}