United Kingdom Numerous: Isata Kanneh-Mason (pianist), BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra / Delyana Lazarova (conductor). Metropolis Halls, Glasgow, 27.11.2025. (GT)
Jessie Montgomery – Strum (vers. for string orchestra, 2006, rev. 2012)
Rachmaninov – Piano Concerto No.3 in D minor, Op.30
Barber – Medea’s Dance of Vengeance, Op.23a
Debussy – La mer
This night marked the Glasgow debut of the Bulgarian conductor Delyana Lazarova because the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s new Principal Visitor Conductor. Lazarova is the primary girl to be appointed to the BBC SSO on this place. Her chosen programme provided an attractive combination of twentieth-century musical items of distinctive kinds and influences. A rustic extra related to a prolonged stream of world-class singers, few Bulgarian conductors have gained acclaim on the worldwide live performance stage, aside from Emil Tchakarov, who loved nice success earlier than his premature dying.
Lazarova’s music schooling started in Europe’s oldest metropolis, Plovdiv, the place she studied violin on the Dobrin Petkov Music Faculty with Violeta Stoyanova. She has an affinity with the Japanese European custom, notably in Dvořák, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky, and Bartók. She studied violin on the Jacobs Faculty of Music in Indiana with Mauricio Fuks and conducting with Johannes Schlaefli on the Zurich Hochschule für Musik. Lazarova has repaid her debt to her homeland by recording a CD of Dobrinka Tabakova’s orchestral works.
The opening piece, Strum, by the US composer Jessie Montgomery is customized from her 2006 piece for a cello quartet, and right here was carried out in its full model for strings. The opening pizzicato began on the violins and unfold throughout the ensemble in a sequence of plucking evoking American folks concepts, through which have been heard layers of rhythmic or harmonic ostinatos making a layer of sound. The piece invokes American dance in a nostalgic narrative earlier than ending in a celebratory finale. This was an modern work very worthy of listening to.
The spotlight of the live performance was the efficiency by the marvellously gifted younger Isata Kanneh-Mason – in latest seasons she has been one in every of music’s rays of sunshine – and right here she introduced a freshness in expression as if taking part in Rachmaninov’s music for the primary time. One of many elements of the composer’s most interesting works is the flexibility to precise pure heat within the orchestral textures, and right here, following the Slavic theme, within the opening Allegro ma non troppo, the orchestra switched from minor to main, creating the impact as if the solar is rising from behind the clouds. This gave the taking part in momentum and higher ardour, and a way of playfulness on the keyboard. The secondary theme was accompanied by tantalising exchanges between the piano and orchestra, and Kanneh-Mason’s first cadenza was pleasant in its delicacy of articulation.
This vibrance and novelty of expression continued into the theme and variations within the Intermezzo, which have been graced by a romanticism enhanced by the soloist’s brilliance in taking a brisk tempo within the type of a scherzo. This led the orchestra into the Finale: Alla breve with a flourish of energetic pleasure, taking us to joyous fanfares and an exhilarating upbeat rapture of the piano and orchestra within the end result of this masterpiece. The capability viewers responded with a roar of approval, and plenty of rose to their ft in appreciation of this terrific efficiency.
Samuel Barber continues to be little heard within the live performance corridor, and this collection of a colourfully orchestrated excerpt from the ballet written for Martha Graham within the early post-war interval was re-orchestrated by Barber to trigger higher impact. The opening was muted with the strings coming into right into a meditative part embellished by unusual solo passages within the orchestra. The xylophone then breaks the temper by tracing Medea’s feelings as she discovers her husband’s betrayal and resulting in her subsequent vengeance. This erupts in dissonance and weird syncopations revealing hints of modernism earlier than tearing to the finale and shutting with a crash from the percussion.
The efficiency of Debussy’s La mer launched us to completely different moods with the strings invoking the ocean via steadily evolving imagery of the weather amid shifting harmonies, ostinatos and vibrant textures. The opening ‘De l’aube a midi sur la mer’ evoked the rays of daybreak via to the sun-ridden noon in shimmering harmonies. Within the second motion, ‘Jeux de vagues’, Lazarova dealt with the various modifications in temper with nice ability, bringing out all of the instrumental colors, revealing magical results, and taking us to the ‘Dialogue du vent et de la mer’, presenting all of the vastness of the ocean and its mysterious magnificence.
This night’s programme by Lazarova provided fairly various tastes and kinds. It was an attention-grabbing choice, and Lazarova’s conducting methodology ensured the fixed consideration of the musicians whereas busily utilizing her baton to impact an important switches in tempo and dynamics, and her eyes – and slight nods of her shoulders – for emphasis. Within the concerto, the collaboration was principally attained throughout rehearsal, as there was little interplay between her and the soloist. Definitely, of their ninetieth anniversary 12 months, the BBC SSO has an exceptionally proficient visitor conductor in Delyana Lazarova, and the approaching months current a vibrant combination of attention-grabbing music.
Gregor Tassie
