Britten Sinfonia

The Britten Sinfonia plays Simon Holt and Schubert

8th March, 1.00 pm, West Road Concert Hall

[rating:5/5]

Why have so few people heard of Simon Holt? Even for a contemporary composer of classical music, he is obscure. And that is saying something.

Yet he consistently composes striking, original work that fits uncomfortably into crude categories that you might care to impose upon it. The novelty of his approach sometimes flirts with gimmick, yet never quite puts out. In his new work for the Britten Sinfonia, everything turns away, Holt is inspired by Auden’s Musée des Beaux Arts, and the humans’ remarkable ability to ignore the catastrophes that surround them.

Throughout the piece, players proceeded about their businesses unaffected by their surroundings. The remarkable, heterophonic pizzicato texture that opens the piece was ignored by the serenely melodic playing of double bassist Roger Linley. His narrow melodic range and plodding tempo subtly evoked Breugel’s ploughman throughout, whilst the virtuosic melding of high strings depicted Icarus’s fall.

This textual conceit was deftly handled yet at times the periodicity of the music seemed a little contrived. The episodic changes in tessitura and technique initially seemed a touch clumsy. Yet as the piece’s central contrivance was revealed, their purpose became clear.

About two thirds of the way through piece, a man in black stood up in the audience and slowly made his way onto stage. He sat down at the piano and, as the strings fell silent, began to violently parody their frenetic tremolandos and trills. Huw Watkins’s control of this difficult music was impeccable: his assured technique bought crisp clarity to the most convoluted of textures. Yet as this cadenza drew to a close, the strings recommenced their periodic mayhem completely oblivious to the frenzy that had taken place. The pianist departed and the music drew to a contained, unison close.

Holt had achieved a remarkable conjuring trick. Throughout, the audience vigilantly drew on the programme notes as we slavishly equated the high strings to Icarus and the double bass to his heedless countrymen. Yet the pianist’s entry calls our bluff – he is Icarus. This shift asserts the ensemble’s mutual disregard as not symbolic merely of Icarus’s fall, but of society in general. The periodicity of the music forced this indifference onto a structural level that complemented the textural metaphor. Whilst, I grant, this symbolic hearing of music can seem contrived, Holt invites us, through his words, to look one way and, through his music, to look the other.

In Schubert’s Piano Quintet in A ‘The Trout’, the Britten Sinfonia faced another challenge. For this is Schubert at his straightforward, direct best. Crowded with memorable tunes and stunning figuration, the piece presents a technical tour de force that must sound as relaxed as an evening on the Cam.

From their ebullient opening to the ecstatic closing arpeggios, the Britten Sinfonia excelled in Schubert’s merriment. It was, technically, faultless to my ears. The ensemble’s playing was subtle and considered. Charming alterations of articulation enhanced the Theme and Variations, whilst only that movement’s disarmingly abrupt trills shook Jacqueline Shave’s muscularly confident leading.

Yet the ensemble’s most remarkable achievement lay in its superb balancing of parts. No player ever asserted themselves beyond what was strictly necessary – solos never burst out, they shone out. These luminescent melodies were supported both by the dynamic sensitivity of their accompaniment but also by its beautifully light articulation. The pianist was so sensitive that he even felt compelled to lower the lid of the piano a touch at the end of the first movement.

This superbly charming performance was capped by a encore; the leader’s arrangement of Bach’s Air in D. This romantic yet understated rendering of the classic favourite bought the concert to a warm, fuzzy close. The Britten Ensemble had matched the beauty of the weather, and for the first time this term, I found myself with absolutely nothing to complain about.