Saturday, August 9, 2025
Royal Albert Hall, London
Dalia Stasevska has recorded The Observatoy, with the BBCSO, and a previous generation of NYO members brought The Planets to the Proms, in 2016, under Edward Gardner. Caroline Shaw’s piece, from 2019, for the Hollywood Bowl and LA Phil, is reasonably effective, if rather repetitious and reminding of other opuses, the arrivals seemingly haphazard.
There was a palpable keen and productive rapport between players and conductor (established over the last few weeks, detailed preparation and concerts) that carried into Gustav Holst’s Suite with freshness, Stasevska driving ‘Mars’ with warlike implacability and battalion force; ‘Venus’ was ethereal and alluring, played with cool beauty; ‘Mercury’ winged along, effervescently, tricky rhythms cleanly negotiated; ‘Jupiter’ bounced forward, if a bit pushed, scampering into a rather self-conscious hymn-tune (perhaps it’s done too much business elsewhere); ‘Saturn’ was suitably shadowy, the Grim Reaper stalking the land, emotional railing impressive, an accepting glow as an envoi; there was no stopping ‘Uranus’, a dance to the edge; and ‘Neptune’ was far away, chilly, icicled, receding further (ladies of Farnham Youth Choir). There was an NYO vocal encore.
Although it was fifty years on this date since he died, there was nothing by Shostakovich. The concert opened with some of John Williams’s score(s) for Star Wars, the familiar credits-rolling music played with panache and Albert Hall-filling sonorousness, Stasevska setting a brisk pace. Subsequent selections brought a range of expressions, moods and colours, attended to with skill and enthusiasm, whether fast and furious, gently intimate and wafting, or adventuring with spirit (I wonder if Mr Williams knows Arthur Bliss’s soundtrack for Korda’s mid-1930s’ production of Things to Come).
By the way, the Proms now attracts a “crowd” rather than an audience, according to the radio presenter.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002gryr