Next year Autumn in Malvern marks its silver jubilee in commemoration of the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. This year Peter Smith’s programming in his enterprising festival celebrated the centenary of Britten’s birth, concluding with a visit from the Orchestra of the Royal College of Music where Britten himself had been a student.
There was a subtle link between the four offerings, beginning with Arvo Part’s Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten, continuing through Mozart’s sublime Sinfonia Concertante for Violin and Orchestra, with Elgar’s Oboe Soliloquy preceding the finale, the splendid Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge by Britten himself (Bridge (the Mozart link was that both his piece and Britten’s were premiered in Salzburg).
Mark Messenger, a local lad now Head of Strings at the RCM conducted with enthusiasm and encouragement, drawing from these still-young charges playing of immense engagement and flair (perhaps too much so, every piece ending with the kind of theatrical bow-flourish one might expect from a virtuoso string soloist).
Tuning-up was a bit prolonged and insistent, volume from a comparatively large orchestra on a comparatively small stage in this boxy acoustic occasionally threatened the health and safety of some listeners’ hearing (Part’s gradually accumulating concluding unison after his lamenting cascades one particular example), but the promise and attitude displayed by these students was heartening.
Alessandro Ruisi (another local lad, Birmingham-born and -educated) was the radiant violin soloist in the Mozart, partnered by the rich, mellow viola of Christine Anderson.
This was rather an inflated presentation, pauses disconcertingly inserted, ensemble not always perfect, and with some slips creeping in towards the end, but the overall effect thrilled the audience.
After Andre Machado’s long-breathed, sweet account of Elgar’s melancholy little Soliloquy (almost a bonus Falstaff Dream Interlude) Messenger concluded with a treasurable reading of the Britten, its various influences melded into a unity of conception, and with a bravura “Aria Italiana” where all the strings strummed gleefully under the unison coloratura of the first violins. Messenger stepped to the side of the stage here, sharing with us in the audience the sheer enjoyment smiling from his youngsters.
