Prom 62: Skride/Stagg/Maltman/ BBCSO/Young, Royal Albert Hall, review: 'A post-Schoenbergian world of rich, polyphonic textures'
A new work by Bayan Northcott, Concerto for Orchestra, and his first orchestral piece
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Bayan Northcott is not only a distinguished critic but a fine composer, and a new piece from him is a rare and welcome event. His Concerto for Orchestra - amazingly, his first orchestral piece - is as meticulous and astutely discursive as his prose, yet reveals a volatile poetic sensibility. Wonderfully concise, inhabiting a post-Schoenbergian world of rich, polyphonic textures, it proved as Viennese in flavour as the contrasting Mozart Violin Concerto No. 5 and Zemlinsky Lyric Symphony which followed in this inventively programmed Prom 62.
The BBC Symphony Orchestra played with brio under Simone Young; a conductor of longstanding international renown making her Proms debut at last. In the (surely gypsy, not "Turkish") Mozart, soloist Baiba Skride wrung proto-Romantic expression from cadenza to ample cadenza. While this bordered on over-sweet, the Zemlinsky was revelatory.
Now restless in love, now dissolving in separation and the ultimate peace of death, soprano Siobhan Stagg and baritone Christopher Maltman gave thrilling voice to Tagore's transcendent poems, set by a composer who has languished too long in the shadows of Mahler and Berg. Young oscillated sublimely between metaphysical twin poles, pivoting male and female around Zemlinsky's central 'Sprich zu mir, Geliebte'; this a near narcotic rapture at the music's yearning heart.
bbc.co.uk/proms 0845 401 5040
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments