The
Nash Ensemble’s series of mainly English music,
evocatively titled ‘Blue Remembered Hills’
is now into its last few concerts, with many
delights having been provided along the way:
this evening’s offering was the ensemble’s
usual pleasing mixture of the familiar and
the unusual, although the first half was perhaps
a little too much weighted towards the former
– one can, however, imagine that at the planning
stage someone must have come up with the idea
that in order to persuade audiences to come
and hear Sāvitri, it would
not be quite enough to have three superb soloists,
and they would need to entice with
some very well loved pieces to whet the appetite.
Delius’
On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring and
Summer Night on the River were presented
in arrangements by David Matthews, specially
composed for the Nash and first heard in 1998.
The playing was uncharacteristically rough
around the edges here, and I’m not convinced
that the kind of thinning out necessary to
create this version did much for either the
music or the instrumentalists, since very
little of Delius’ sense of what Warlock called
the ‘contemplative rapture that is tinged
with sadness at the transience of spring’
really came through here. Elgar’s Serenade
in E minor for Strings found the ensemble
in much more confident form, with the string
tone in the slow movement especially finely
attuned. The first half concluded with a performance
of Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending
in which Marianne Thorsen gave a finely
judged reading, exquisitely poised in those
difficult passages which suggest the lark’s
dizzying ascent, and blending mellifluously
with the chamber orchestra in the broader
passages: she was given positive support by
Martyn Brabbins, who had seemed rather reticent
in the earlier pieces.
Holst’s
chamber opera Sāvitri is
only rarely performed, so it was a treat to
find it programmed here: reading around the
work, the general flavour of commentary seems
to be that it is a delightful period piece
which flies in the face of all the Wagnerian
idolatry present at the time of its composition,
but it seems to me to be much more than that
-with its fervent declamations, passionate
near – soliloquies, intense level of emotion
and sweeping lines it owes very little to
Holst’s contemporaries but looks instead to
Mahler and beyond him to Korngold. As with
much of the latter composer’s work, one either
loves Sāvitri or loathes
it, but if, like me, you have a soft spot
for works like Die Tote Stadt, you
would probably love it. Holst studied Indian
literature and philosophy to a high level,
and the piece is based on The Mahabharata:
it’s a straightforward tale in which a man
is taken away by death, who then grants him
his life in response to the fervent pleadings
of his wife. A sort of eastern Orfeo, if
you like, with the gender roles reversed.
The
piece is beautifully set for the ideal combination
of bass-baritone, tenor and soprano, and you
could hardly have asked for more than the
soloists here gave us. Roderick Williams is
the possessor of one of the most sonorous
baritone voices around today: those who are
familiar with René Pape would recognize
a strong similarity, and he was unforgettably
commanding in death’s sombre introduction
‘I am the law that no man breaketh / I am
he who leadeth men onward…’ as well as ideally
touching in ‘Thine is the holiness’ and ‘Sāvitri,
glorious woman!’ Jean Rigby gave a characteristically
committed performance as the heroine, her
warm, tremulous tones perfect for the devoted
wife who succeeds in beseeching Death for
the life of her beloved, and she rose to great
heights in her passionate plea – you can’t
help but think of them as Plutone and Orfeo
here, and although ‘Art thou the Just One?’
is hardly ‘Possente Spirto,’ when it is sung
like this it succeeds in persuading us, as
well as Death, that life is worth living.
The smallest part is that of the husband,
and it was sung with ringing tone and poetic
declamation by John Mark Ainsley: ‘Love to
the lover’ is probably the most well known
section of the work, and he made the most
of it.
London
voices, directed by Terry Edwards, made a
positive contribution in the brief choral
parts, although personally I could do without
those rather vague sounds in the background,
and Martyn Brabbins elicited beautifully phrased,
highly committed playing from the ensemble.
As ever, a thought – provoking evening which
sent me back to the music to enjoy it anew:
the last in the series, on Saturday March
20th, features Lisa Milne singing
Quilter and Ireland, as well as performances
of the Vaughan Williams D major Quintet of
1898 and Elgar’s Piano Quintet: obviously,
not to be missed if you enjoy English music
– or even if you think you don’t, since it
is part of the remit of the Nash Ensemble
to inform our tastes as well as to entertain.
Melanie
Eskenazi
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