Leonard Slatkin can be one of
the most erratic of conductors so his withdrawal from this Prom for
personal reasons (in fact, because of an affair he had had with the
evening’s soloist Evelyn Glennie), and his replacement being Yan Pascal
Tortelier, made the prospect of the complete ballet music for Ravel’s
Daphnis and Chloe more palatable. Alas, this was not to be the
case. What we got instead in the second half was one of the most lugubrious
performances of the work I have heard in either concert or on record.
Coming in at just over 50 minutes
it was neither a fast nor a slow performance; it just failed to ignite
and the BBC Symphony Orchestra played it rather blandly as if to underscore
the point that they would rather have been somewhere else. There were
some beautiful textures to be heard, notably in the final reprise of
the lovers’ theme, and the "General Dance’ provided the sort of
orgiastic whirlpool of sumptuous decadence one hears in recordings by
Munch and Monteux. But aside from this, the second movement’s ‘Warriors’
Dance’ had been underwhelming and the religiosity of the first movement
was glimpsed rather than heartfelt. Occasionally brass were too trenchant,
and but for some beautifully phrased woodwind playing the performance
would have been even more anodyne than it was.
Tortelier replaced the scheduled
Barber (Medea’s Meditation and Dance of Vengeance) with a true
rarity, Dukas’ Overture ‘Polyeucte’. An early work by the composer,
it perhaps lacks the inventiveness of some of his later compositions
but on its own terms it is a piece that is both sumptuous and dramatic
and was beautifully, if somewhat stridently, played by the BBC SO.
Chen Yi’s 1998 Percussion Concerto,
receiving its European premiere at the Proms, is a work of high contrast
and bold statements, a work that is a reflection not only of the composer’s
musical experience but of her cultural background too. But it is, too,
an anti-concerto using a smaller array of percussion than is usual in
percussion concertos and, in the first movement at least, relies heavily
on contributory percussion from the orchestra. The contrast between
the western and the eastern is most noticeable in the middle movement
‘Prelude to Water Tune’ which requires the soloist to recite a poem
by Su Shi (it would, incidentally, have been helpful had the programme
included a transliteration of the poem rather than just an English translation)
whilst concentrating the tonal palate mainly on the marimba and vibraphone.
Ms Glennie was an ideal soloist for she also has a better than average
voice (even if at times during this performance she sounded squally
rather than genuinely comfortable in the upper range) but as ever her
playing was electrifying, full of colour and flamboyance, especially
in the fearless way she tackled the virtuoso writing of the final movement,
‘Speedy Wind’. It was certainly a much better work than the woman sat
behind me thought – ‘If I never hear it again it will be too soon",
she muttered.
Marc Bridle
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