The acoustic space of the Royal Albert Hall is notoriously problematic, but when music is specifically written with it in mind, as the pieces by Judith Weir and Brett Dean in this BBC Prom were, it’s quite another matter. Weir’s Moon and Star, premiered at the Proms in 1995, is an imaginative setting of a typically elusive, but evocative, poem by Emily Dickinson. With its brass (including four trumpets) echoing round the rafters and celestial-sounding percussion twinkling away, the cosmic elements of the score are ideally realised in this space. The BBC Singers once again proved eloquent advocates.
Dean’s The World’s Wife, a setting of five poems from Carol Ann Duffy’s delightfully bizarre collection of that title, was a BBC co-commission, receiving here its world premiere. Like Moon and Star, it’s resourcefully scored, but although the text is declaimed by a solo voice, it’s no more intelligible than in Weir’s piece. The problem may have been exacerbated by Claire Booth’s fast vibrato. But the sheer invention of the piece, together with the soaring, expressive voice of Booth, for whom it was written, were sufficiently compelling to make one hope for future performances.
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Any connection between the two halves of this programme may have been difficult to discern, but in the light of an interpretation of Elgar’s Symphony No. 1 in A flat as rewarding as this under Ryan Wigglesworth, one can scarcely complain. The perceived imperialistic overtones of Elgar’s music have often proved hard to dispel. The popularity of the swaggering Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1, and the words irrevocably attached (Land of Hope and Glory), haven’t helped.
Wigglesworth’s understated, almost hesitant annunciation of the motto theme at the beginning set the tone. And as the movement developed, it was the introspective and emotionally anguished aspects that were to the fore. After many tender and wonderfully delicate moments – beautifully executed by the BBCSSO – the final tutti statement of the motto theme seemed mournful and far from triumphalist.
The scherzo-like Allegro and ravishing slow movement continued in wistful vein, a chorus of horns (and later trombones) in the former exquisitely voiced, while during the latter, a preternatural stillness prevailed in the hall. The refulgent conclusion to the work here bespoke a nobility of spirit, light years away from militaristic fervour. With seemingly every bar of this magnificent symphony re-examined in this insightful reading, it thoroughly deserved its hyper-attentive audience.
