DEVIL'S VIOLIN

DEVIL'S VIOLIN

M&G Concert at the Civic Theatre

20.01.17

The City of London Sinfonia, launching their “Devil's Violin” mini-tour in Chelmsford, played a brilliant programme of folk and classical, exploring the similarities and the differences, the influences and the arrangements.
Led by violinist Alexandra Wood, they began with a toe-tapping, virtuoso La Folia sequence from Vivaldi, before introducing Dan Walsh [banjo] and Henry Webster [folk fiddle]. They played reels before we heard what Grainger did with them in Molly on the Shore; they played Bonaparte's Retreat, from the Appalachian tradition, before Copland's Hoe Down and his quirky Ukulele Serenade. An insightful and entertaining juxtaposition.
The devil headlined in Piazzolla's Romance del Diablo and Locatelli's Trillo del Diavolo, both featuring stunning violin solos from Alexandra Wood, and in the upbeat encore, The Devil Went Down To Georgia, with the folkies joining the band in a fun-filled fusion.
Millions of us heard the CLS this Christmas in the soundtrack to We're Going On A Bear Hunt – Ms Wood a featured artist – now available on Sony Classical. Would it be too much to hope for a crossover CD of The Devil's Violin ?

CITY OF LONDON SINFONIA

CITY OF LONDON SINFONIA

M&G Concert at the Civic Theatre

03.11.13

The first of this season's Civic Concerts welcomed back the City of London Sinfonia, in a timely celebration of British music, with a special focus on Benjamin Britten, whose centenary we celebrate this month.

Their principal conductor, Michael Collins, premièred Britten's Clarinet Concerto [realised by Colin Matthews] some sixteen years ago, and it was a real privilege to hear him play the mysterious elegiac slow movement in a new arrangement for small string orchestra by Joseph Phibbs.

The evening began with Britten's arrangement of a Purcell Chacony, and ended with a dramatic interpretation of the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings from the Scots tenor Thomas Walker and horn player Stephen Stirling.

Collins played the piece with which he won the BBC Young Musician Competition back in '78, the Finzi Concerto: a lyrical reading of the clarinet part, contrasted with some forceful string playing.

The Sinfonia, led by David Juritz, were on sparkling form – I don't think I've ever heard the Holst St Paul's Suite played with such verve and evident enjoyment, from the muscular jig to the folk fiddle freedom of the Dargason finale.

CITY OF LONDON SINFONIA

CITY OF LONDON SINFONIA

M&G Civic Concert

20.11.11

For their second visit this year, the CLS chose four accessible works from the chamber ensemble repertoire. This time they brought with them two great names in British music – pianist Peter Donohue, who first appeared at the Civic some thirty years ago, and clarinettist Michael Collins, who also conducted the Sinfonia in Rossini and Tchaikovsy, as well as directing Weber from the clarinet.

This was the Quintet, arranged for string orchestra, and played here with great delicacy, especially in the pianissimo passages in the Fantasia. After an agile, playful Menuetto, he took the Finale at a canter, to the delight of players and audience alike.

Donohue was the soloist in Shostakovich's First Piano Concerto, performed with a manic sense of fun, but managing, in the second movement, a more sombre mood, silky melancholic strings building to something more monumentally tragic. The trumpet, giving a wry commentary from the opposite side of the stage, drowsily muted in that Lento, was Nicholas Betts. In the bravura closing Allegro, the soloist really looked as if he were enjoying the ride, like an enthusiast behind the wheel of a vintage Bugatti.

Rossini's Sonata for Strings was blithely tuneful, with a lovely lightness of touch, and a passionate operatic Andantino. Tchaikovsky's Souvenirs de Florence, a late work, had a rich sheen in the string tone, some beautiful dialogue between cello and violin, and an emotional finale, bathed in the same Mediterranean sunshine as the Rossini.

CITY OF LONDON SINFONIA

M&G Concert at the Civic Theatre

20.03.11

Directed by guest leader Thomas Gould [who was here with the Britten Sinfonia last October], the City of London Sinfonia brought an unusual sequence of works for the last of this season's M&G Civic Concerts.

Two symphonies to start. An ebullient Allegro Assai led us into a nuanced performance of Haydn's 'Lamentatione', a reflective Adagio followed by a perky Minuet.

A much rarer treat from two centuries later: Philip Glass's Third Symphony, a chamber work for strings alone, and not without classical influence. Its mesmeric, subtly developed sequences were intelligently interpreted by the CLS, Gould's positive tempi bringing out what he referred to in the pre-concert talk as a suggestion of salsa … Movement Three was especially enthralling, with the lower strings setting up a pattern over which violin solos wove a marvellous melodic line.

A similar juxtaposition after the break: Barber's much more familiar Adagio for Strings, played with haunting intensity, preceding Mozart's Third Violin Concerto, given a performance of style and substance by Matthew Trusler, who achieved an easy rapport with the orchestral players. The spirit of Mozart was mostly clearly felt, perhaps, in the lilting Adagio, eloquently phrased by both soloist and Sinfonia. A dying fall at the end of the Rondeau concluded another hugely successful M&G series. Though it did make me long – vain hope, I know - for a proper concert hall in the county town, without the intrusive air conditioning or the annoying clink of cups and glasses from the bar after the interval.