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Red Note Ensemble photo credit Wattie Cheung |
Reviewed by Robert Hugill on Jul 11 2014
Star rating:
World premiere of Judith Bingham's oboe concerto in a dramatic and characterful programme
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Michal Rogalski |
The concert opened with Judith Bingham's Oboe Concerto: The Angel of Mons which was commissioned by JAM. The work is written for solo oboe and small string ensemble (Red Note performed with 11 players). Bingham heard the London-based Polish oboist Michal Rogalski performing with Red Note last year, which gave her the idea for writing for this combination of forces. The work is inspired by the legend of the Angel of Mons, in which an Angel appeared to British soldiers during the Retreat from Mons and helped save the allies from the German forces. The Battle of Mons and the Retreat from Mons were the first encounters between the Germans and the British Expeditionary Force in the First World War.
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The Angel of Mons R Crowhurst (c1920) image credit National Army Museum |
This was an intelligently approachable piece, with some highly imaginative touches. The work started darkly with just the cellos and bass, then joined by Rogalski's lovely mellow oboe in a striking texture. There were many such moments, for example the static high writing for strings, punctuated by solo double bass.comments which began the third movement (when the Angel appears). There were showy solo moments for Rogalski, and even cadenza like moments, but there was also a sense that the oboe part was finely integrated into the sense of narrative.
The performance from Rogalski and Red Note was exemplary, and I am sure that this work is a fine addition to the repertoire of solo oboe works.
Red Note followed this with John Adams' Shaker Loops, performing the original version for just seven strings. Adams wrote the piece in 1978 and it explores a variety of different string techniques, putting each in a loop and layering them with Adams familiar combination of repetition and energy. The work needs intense concentration to bring off with seven players without a conductor, and Red Note's performance was a complete tour de force. It had an intense, tightly wound-up quality, which drove it along, though in some of the middle sections Adams also explores a feeling of stasis as well. For all the brilliance of the piece and the superb performance, I could not get away from the fact that for me Adams seems to dwell too long in each of the different sections, and more than once I kept telling him to move on.
Another familiar work was Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings, given a performance which seemed full of character and had some lovely moments. Without the lush bloom of a large string section, the performance was closer to the intensity of the original string quartet version of the score.
Judith Bingham's The Hythe was commissioned by JAM in 2012 and first performed at the City of London Festival by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (see my review). In four movements, the piece was inspired by the Anglo-Saxon poems The Wanderer, The Ruin and The Seafarer with difficulties of sea travel forming a metaphor for the soul's journey to God. Melancholy, richly sung lines and haunting textures depict the loneliness of life at sea. The poet is spurred on to another journey by a dance-like movement, which was sinister and threatening. Finally a characterful violin solo from Jacqueline Shave over a ground bass-like figure led to the vibrant climax. This was a strong and characterful performance of a fascinating work, one I come to appreciate the more I hear it.
Finally, Rogalski returned to the platform as the soloist in RVW's Oboe Concerto, which was written for Leon Goossens in 1944. The work comes just after RVW's Fifth Symphony and shares that work's intense muscular pastoralism and autumnal melancholy. It is a work which requires a strong, secure technique and great stamina from the soloist, but RVW generally disguises this. The oboe part is generally lyrical and flowing, often with lots of notes and the work needs to seem effortless. This Rogalski did, impressing with his mellow tone and evenly flowing flurries of notes. He also encompassed the work's very long lines rather impressively. The concerto starts in a lyrically pastoral mode but by the third movement, has developed quiet intensity and poignancy, which Rogalski and Red Note brought out admirably.
Red Note is Scotland's contemporary music ensemble, founded in 2008 by the Scottish cellist Robert Irvine. Irvine and John Harris are joint Artistic Directors. Polish oboist Michal Rogalski moved to London in 2012, prior to this he played regularly with Minnesota Opera and the Minnesota Orchestra. He studied at the Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw, the University of North Carolina School of Arts and the University of Minnesota.
The concert was repeated on Saturday 12 July in Lydd as part of the JAM on the Marsh festival (which runs until July 20). JAM returns to the City of London Festival on 16 July with the Mousai Singers giving the English premiere of Giles Swayne's The Yonghy Bonghy Bo (a concert which is repeated as part of JAM on the Marsh on July 19 in Hythe.
Recordings of Judith Bingham's music on Amazon
Elsewhere on this blog:
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- Ancient voices: Walter Widdop, the forgotten heldentenor - feature article
- Stylish elan: Steven Devine plays Bach - CD review
- Passionate and rare: Rachmaninov's Aleko - opera review
- Powerful revival: Queen of Spades at Grange Park Opera - opera review
- Terrific: Maria Stuarda at Covent Garden - opera review
- Julius Caesar: Music for the theatre
- A Multitude of Voices: Sospiri's WWI project
- Out of the Shadows: Music for tenor saxophone - CD review
- Scarily Spooky: Opera Holland Park's The Turn of the Screw - Opera review
- Home
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