SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Chipping Campden Music Festival, May 2010: A report from Roger Jones (RJ)

Monteverdi, Palestrina, Bach, Handel, Vivaldi, Haydn; Stile Antico, CCF Academy Orchestra, Nicola Benedetti, Ruth Rogers, Thomas Hull.


This year's Festival has certainly lived up to expectations with capacity audiences for many of the events. I received some particularly good reports on the Takacs Quartet's Beethoven evening, which culminated in an electrifying performance of the Grosse Fuge; Noriko Ogawa and Martin Roscoe playing Stravinsky's piano version of The Rite of Spring; and a wonderful Chopin recital by Christina Ortiz.

My visits, alas were limited to two; the first a candlelit concert by Stile Antico, which was strong on atmosphere, but not entirely satisfying from the musical point of view. One of the problems, to my mind, was the idea of alternating different parts of Monteverdi's Missa In Illo Tempore with plainchant and works by Monteverdi. While this may have seemed a good idea on paper, the result was an untidy mishmash which lacked coherence.

As the evening wore on, Monteverdi started to resemble Palestrina and vice versa, despite the fact that each composer has his own distinctive voice.   The purity of sound produced by the ensemble was exemplary. I was entranced for the first twenty minutes, but the interest wore off due to the lack of variety of expression and dynamics and surprisingly poor diction.

Mix'n'match seems to be the musical trend at present. The Academy of Ancient Music alternated Vivadli's Four Seasons concertos with arias by Handel and Purcell, but I heard no complaints about this concert. The audience were clearly won over by the marvellous singing of Elin Manahan Thomas.

My second visit to the Festival was for a concert spanning the whole of the 18th century by the Chipping Campden Festival Academy Orchestra. This initiative, now in its third year, enables young musicians at the start of their careers to play alongside professionals of some standing, and this year comprised seventeen of each. All were pressed into service for lively performances of Handel's Concerto Grosso in B minor and Haydn's witty Symphony No. 99 under Thomas Hull's astute direction.

The indefatigable Ruth Rogers must share the credit with him for the superb sound the musicians produced after working together for only a few days. Not only is she adept at keeping musicians in line, she is also a virtuoso vioinist in her own right, as she demonstrated when she partnered Nicola Benedetti in Bach's Double Violin Concerto in D minor. This was a towering performance in which both soloists conveyed their love of music in the sublime slow movement and the exciting Finale.

Earlier,  Nicola Benedetti had introduced us to Vivaldi's Violin Concerto in D major "Il grosse Mogul", one of 253 concertos that bear his name. The outer movements offered plenty of opportunity for Miss Benedetti to demonstrate her technical brilliance, and the central slow movement, described as a Recitativo had an air of mystery about it. She is a dazzling musician with tremendous presence who brought the same passion and commitment to the piece as she lavishes on the great Romantic concertos.

Can Chipping Campden maintain this high standard in its tenth anniversary year? I hope so, and in order not to miss a thing I have decided to pitch a tent next to St James' Church when May comes round again.

Roger Jones