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4 hours ago
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Another Sinfonia of London Prom, another five-star concert. Admittedly this programme of Technicolor masterpieces played into the wizardly hands of John Wilson, a conductor whose respect and enthusiasm for the golden age of MGM is legendary. None of this was movie music, however, and Hollywood panache is only a part of what makes this hand-picked ensemble one of the finest orchestras on the planet.
First, there’s that full-fat sound, where every musician is a potential soloist, yet the blend is to die for. Then there’s the parade ground discipline and a willingness to follow Wilson – who seldom lingers – into the very fires of Mordor. The spirit, too, is palpable. Whole sections sway as one, occasionally with broad grins on their faces, such is their delight in the music making.
If the conductor has a superpower, it’s an instinct for homing in on tiny details, not just drawing them out but making them really mean something. Take the beautifully articulated rustle of strings underpinning the poignant clarinet melody in the overture to Verdi’s La Forza del Destino. You may have already known it was there, but seldom has it felt so vital or so troubling.
A blistering account of the Verdi was curtain raiser to Walton’s Cello Concerto, a golden Mediterranean canvas undercut with sinister ticks and jittery cross-rhythms that feel as if they’ve wandered in from a Hitchcock movie. Principal cellist Jonathan Aasgaard was the generous-toned soloist, articulate and technically immaculate, yet refreshingly undemonstrative.
The second half was given over to Respighi’s Roman Trilogy, music with a reputation for cinematic excess, yet works that were embraced by Toscanini who was certainly no vulgarian. Wilson played the Albert Hall acoustic like a fiddle, whether depicting the brazen pomp of the Circus Maximus, Neptune’s chariot emerging from the Trevi Fountain, or nocturnal whisperings on the Janiculum hill, recorded nightingale and all. As the Roman army swept inexorably down the Via Appia, brass bands ricocheting across the balcony, the audience rose as one. All that remained to make the evening complete was a rip-roaring William Tell chaser by way of an encore and cue credits.
