‘Is it a concert? Is it a gig?” pondered writer Robert Macfarlane, introducing the second half of this quirky classical-meets-folk performance. By the end, melodeon and harmonica player Will Pound had drawn his own conclusions: the encore – an upbeat, gently madcap arrangement of the Sailor’s Hornpipe – would be “a rave”, he joked, to polite giggles from the unequivocally well-behaved audience.
Not that the evening had lacked moments to inspire toe tapping and chin bobbing. Percussionist Delia Stevens saw to that, as she danced between instruments laid out around her like at a jumble sale – among them a set of mixing bowls, one toy piano, a guitar balanced next to a vibraphone as well as numerous drums, shakers and contraptions I’d be pushed to name, mostly played two or three at a time. As a duo, Stevens & Pound bill themselves as a “left-field folk” act. Their mashup of Pound’s folk background and Stevens’s classical training is all about high-energy, rhythmically driven virtuosity.
The Silent Planet, their “reimagining” of Holst’s beloved orchestral suite The Planets, featured poetic narrations from Macfarlane accompanied by atmospheric improvisations from Britten Sinfonia soloists as well as Stevens and Pound, before conductor Clark Rundell took the reins for each movement. There were some wonderful effects: terrifying, warmongering blasts of conch shell for Mars, bright flares of horn in Mercury, a whirlwind hoedown for Venus. But it also sprawled noisily, the movements sliding into each other in their rapid switches from drones to jigs and reels, while Ian Gardiner’s orchestration lacked the finesse of Holst’s original. Only the new movement, Earth, threaded with the tune of All Things Bright and Beautiful, briefly allowed more breathing space before yet another syncopated romp.
The first half showcased older meetings of folk and classical. Britten’s diffident English Folksong Suite and Grainger’s irresistibly knowing Lincolnshire Posy – which saw the Britten Sinfonia’s wind and brass joined by members of Sinfonia Smith Square – bookended a Stevens & Pound medley that transformed the same folk tunes into funky tilts at tango and bluegrass. Fragmentary? Yes. Ambitious? Typically so from one of the UK’s most tenacious classical ensembles. Fun? Absolutely.
• At Norfolk Events Centre, Norwich, on 29 January; and West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, on 30 January.
