SEEN AND HEARD INTERNATIONAL

Schuman, Schnelzer, Beethoven: Scottish Chamber Orchestra, François Leleux (oboe), John Storgårds (conductor), Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, 20.11.2010 (SRT)

William Schuman: Symphony No. 5 (Symphony for Strings)

Albert Schnelzer: Oboe Concerto “The Enchanter” (UK Premiere)

Beethoven: Symphony No. 7

It is striking and more than a little heartening to consider how important a role contemporary music has played in the Scottish musical scene so far this season. The RSNO’s Ten out of 10 is bringing a wide range of contemporary music to light and last month saw Glasgow Concert Halls’ Minimal festival. The last month alone has seen at least three UK premieres in Scotland’s concert halls. It’s a fantastic commentary on the general health of the musical scene north of the border, and it continued triumphantly in the SCO’s performance tonight. Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony was played brilliantly by an orchestra that, in this repertoire, could give lessons to any ensemble in the world. Conductor John Storgårds’ tempi tended towards the extremes but this merely heightened the drama.

However, the real draw here was the premiere of Albert Schnelzer’s new oboe concerto. Co-commissioned by the SCO and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra, Schnelzer’s concerto was written for the virtuoso oboist who performed it tonight. François Leleux was apparently inspired by hearing a performance of Schnelzer’s bassoon concerto in 2006 to ask the composer to write a work for him. Schnelzer is one of the best known and most popular composers in Sweden today, though this is the first of his works I’ve come across in Scotland. His concerto held me gripped, however. The “Enchanter” of the title is Leleux himself, and it’s a fitting tribute to his spellbinding playing. He turned the oboe into a multi-dimensional character, singing, dancing and leaping through his music. However the Enchanter is also inspired by a character in Salman Rushdie’s The Enchantress of Florence and the atmosphere of magic is apparent right from the off in the quivering, shimmering orchestral textures from which the oboe part grows gently. Schnelzer uses the orchestra brilliantly, treating them like a hugely varied palette from which to draw a rainbow of colours. Filigree flutes, for example, formed the beautiful background to a long, spun-out theme from the soloist in the first movement, and the use of percussion was particularly striking, gong and vibraphone creating a hypnotic effect. While cast in three movements the work seems to work more through contrasting sections: after the central Andante comes the finale which cranks up the energy levels considerably and leads into a cadenza of incredible virtuosity, played with jaw-dropping dexterity by the Enchanter himself. After this came a return to the elegiac mood of the opening and the end of a most satisfying work by a composer whose name I shall look out for in the future.

William Schuman’s 1943 Symphony acted as a showpiece for the vigour and intensity of the SCO strings. The music, tightly argued in its outer movements, poses formidable technical challenges which the orchestra took in its stride, but the central slow movement was a remarkably moving contrast. From its wispy, gently suggestive opening, through its central passacaglia to its beautiful ending it struck me as an America lament worthy to settle alongside its more famous cousin, Barber’s Adagio, and it made me wonder why this music is not better known.

So this was an altogether exhilarating evening: the music and the enthusiastic audience response were further proof that, cutbacks or no cutbacks, the performing arts in Scotland are in very rude health.

Simon Thompson