SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

The BBC Symphony Orchestra’s 80^th Birthday Concert - Wagner, Stephen McNeff, Kaija Saariaho, Stravinsky: Tom Service (Presenter) Oliver Cox, Owen Gunnell (Percussion) Kari Kriikku (Clarinet), BBC Symphony Orchestra/David Robertson, Barbican Hall, London, 22.10.10 (J-PJ)

 

Wagner: The Flying Dutchman overture

Stephen McNeff: ConcertO Duo for duo percussion and orchestra

Kaija Saariaho: D’Om le Vrai Sens

Stravinsky: Le Sacre du Printemps

 

The programme for this musical birthday party was adroitly chosen. In a nod to the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s past it began with the work that had opened their very first concert in 1930, Wagner’s Flying Dutchman Overture. At the end of what was, admittedly, quite a long evening we heard Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps. This was appropriate not only because it gave the entire membership of the orchestra a chance to join in the festivities and to shine in a virtuoso orchestral showpiece but also because this is typical of the sort of music in which the orchestra has excelled during its history. But it was fitting – and perhaps inevitable – that the remainder of the programme should have been devoted to the first performances of two new pieces, specially commissioned for the occasion. Over the last eighty years, and especially during and since the time of Sir Robert Glock, the BBCSO has been in the vanguard as a vehicle for new music from around the world. Whatever one may think of some of the pieces that have been given a first hearing by this orchestra it has performed an invaluable and probably unparalleled service to contemporary music and for this, if for no other reason, music lovers should salute it.

In addition to all this music we saw two instalments of archive clips of the BBC SO’s twelve chief conductors, past and present, and there was a rendition of ‘Happy Birthday To You’ led by presenter Tom Service.

The Flying Dutchman overture made for a serviceable curtain raiser. Gutsy and rough-edged, it was lifted by some great brass playing, but let down by off-colour woodwind. Stephen McNeff’s ConcertO Duo was written for former Royal College of Music students Oliver Cox and Owen Gunnell (jointly self-branded as ‘O Duo’, hence the work’s odd-looking title). A self-consciously ‘cool’ piece, it never fully explored the range and subtleties of percussion playing. Cox and Gunnell came on stage, clapping and stamping, then slapping the floor, as if to emphasise percussion’s primordial origins. Fine, perhaps, for a primary school audience. The rest of the concerto included some dexterous playing, but the music was strangely unfocused and lacked direction.

Kaija Saariaho’s clarinet concerto similarly ran out of steam fairly early on. Inspired by six medieval French tapestries that feature The Lady with the Unicorn and depict the five senses plus an undefined sixth, the work droned on in finely graded harmonies that made each of the six movements indistinguishable from one other. But the biggest annoyance was the so-called staging by Peter Sellars. This consisted of projections of bright colours onto a screen and obliging Krikku to wander around the concert hall blasting out ‘unicorn’ calls before finally leading a group of BBC SO players off-stage. One wonders how much he got paid for that.

With Le Sacre du Printemps the BBC SO finally did what it does best: brilliant, innovative playing under an assured and imaginative conductor. David Robertson created a more choreographically-inspired sound than usual, peeling back some of the conventions of this oft-played work to reveal some surprising instrumental touches (splendid brass and percussion interjections, for example). This performance was a fitting finale to the orchestra’s birthday celebration.

John-Pierre Joyce