OneTouch Theatre, Eden Court, 10 December 2009

Jonathan Morton

WINTER IS by its nature an interior season, and there can be no better way to celebrate it than with the Scottish Ensemble’s annual candlelit concert. The group’s commitment to presenting newly commissioned works in the context of more established repertoire allows the audience to really explore challenging contemporary pieces, framed with the continuity and aural familiarity of tradition.

The way in which works interconnect at a Scottish Ensemble concert is always a source of fascination and satisfaction, together with the excitement and expectation of being taken somewhere you never imagined.

This dynamic was very much in evidence in their latest performance, Winter Light. Composer John Woolrich curated the programme as part of the ensemble’s 40th Anniversary Season, including works by Richard Strauss, Arnold Schoenberg, Woolrich’s re-interpretation of seven Italian Songs by Hugo Wolf, and his new work Capriccio, premiered at the BBC Proms in the summer of 2009.

Richard Strauss’s operatic Prelude to Capriccio opened the concert on familiar ground, followed by Woolrich’s striking Capriccio and his magnificently poetic string arrangement of Wolf’s Italian Songs. Woolrich is an intriguing and eclectic composer, and his Capriccio showcased beautifully the talents of Scottish Ensemble Artistic Director and first violinist, Jonathan Morton.

Woolrich’s discussion of composition in conversation with Morton prior to the concert revealed his interest in single movement structure and a favoured style which he interestingly likened to film editing. The playful fragmentation and contrast of colour and rhythm in his Capriccio are a compelling musical study of tension and release.

As a miniature violin concerto, the dialogue between soloist and ensemble featured a remarkable array of sound. The wonderful textures created by the composer had a cinematic quality, ranging from the deliberation of staggered rhythm and pizzicato strings in some sections to mysteriously veiled bowing and scratched bare accompaniment in others.

The juxtaposition of sound throughout the piece heightened the listener’s experience of each fragment. Woolrich also understands the value of silence, which he used to good effect, giving pause for the imagination amid a concentrated and largely unpredictable piece of work. The expressionistic nature of the piece was extremely enjoyable, as was the sensitivity and grace of Morton’s solo performance.

Woolrich’s arrangement of Hugo Wolf’s Italian Songs presented a superb distillation of musical expression that (like the very best shorts in film) presented completely convincing poetic statements compressed into a few short minutes. The translation of voice and piano into string arrangement produced a rich and lyrical sonority of sound.

“My lover is singing outside the house in the moonlight”, “Well I Know” and “How much time I lost in loving you” were particularly exquisite. The emotional span of these pieces in relation to their scale is quite extraordinary. The contrast between Woolrich’s two compositions in the programme illustrates the way in which an artist can only be strikingly contemporary in full knowledge of past explorations of the discipline.

Schoenberg’s early work Verkl&aauml;rte Nacht (1899) is a curious mixture of symphonic aspiration and compact scoring for a chamber ensemble, originally a string sextet. Clearly influenced by late German Romanticism and the rich tonality of Brahms, Mahler and Wagner, it is undoubtedly one of the composer’s more accessible and melodious works.

Inspired by a poem by Richard Dehmel the single movement composition takes the listener through an emotional soundscape full of contrast, expansion and lyricism. The first few bars of resonant depth in the viola and cello begins our descent into the moonlit forest. Verkl&aauml;rte Nacht is very much a night of the soul, the exploration of a relationship through betrayal, transformed by forgiveness.

Schoenberg’s intent of “sketching nature and expressing human emotions” is absolutely realised in the textures of sound he creates. It is a highly evocative and visual work, both in terms of its interior and exterior settings. The desolate voice of the viola is explored thematically in relation to the ensemble throughout.

Schoenberg makes us see the moonlight in the high oscillating sweetness of the upper strings underpinned by a deepening glow of light, warmth and reconciliation in the final few bars. He takes us on an enthralling journey through darkness and light, realised to perfection by the Scottish Ensemble’s performance.

Winter Light provided the capacity audience with a magical evening of musical contrast and continuity. It was an absolute pleasure to experience both new and familiar works in the intimate setting of the OneTouch Theatre, performed by Scotland’s finest and most innovative chamber ensemble.

© Georgina Coburn, 2009

Links

• Scottish Ensemble