Dona nobis pacem (Mark Allan, photo)
It’s not often that the fate-fuelled Tchaikovsky Four occupies the first half of a concert let alone programmed with two of Vaughan Williams’s less-played works. Well, here we are. The Symphony has fared well as a starter: Leningrad Philharmonic/Rozhdestvensky (below), Russian National Orchestra/Paavo Berglund (Edinburgh Festival, I was there) and now this one conducted by Tony Pappano, LSO brass well-nigh flawless to open the work, laying down a playing-standard for colleagues to follow, duly done, Pappano finding a balance of symphonism, balletic elegance, and energetic emotional outpouring in the first movement, the Fate motif intensifying its presence. The middle movements might be regarded as escapes, a flowing Andante initiated by a shapely oboe solo, the music increasing in passion before turning on its dark side, riposted by the Scherzo’s pizzicatos (pre-Britten in playfulness, and plucking impressive from the LSO), the Trio’s character studies, and the Finale’s festive drive to an uninhibited coda cueing a reception more usual at a concert’s end.
Substantial Vaughan Williams in part two. The evocative Flos Campi (Flowers of the Field, 1925) – viola, wordless chorus, and orchestra – related to the Song of Solomon, sensual music, pastoral, mystical (anticipating the Fifth Symphony), the chorus adding an alluring timbre. Antoine Tamestit was superb (Lionel Tertis first off), richly expressive, if rather closely balanced for someone who was placed among the woodwinds on the night (reported one review). Pappano (Henry Wood did the premiere) led a revealing twenty-minute performance. Larger choir and orchestra for Dona nobis pacem (1936) composed at a time of tension anticipating impending war, setting words by Walt Whitman, graphically so, the composer reflecting his own WWI experiences as an ambulance driver, and embracing contemporary anxieties. Once again, Pappano (Albert Coates back in the day) sculpted a compelling reading, placing this cantata (jubilant come the end) on a hitherto unsuspected level of achievement. Initially I had reservations about Julia Sitkovetsky’s pitching if not her commitment, with Ashley Riches, LSC & LSO also rising to the occasion, sharing with the conductor a thirty-minute voyage of discovery, which it was for me.
Antoine Tamestit viola
Julia Sitkovetsky soprano
Ashley Riches bass-baritone
London Symphony Chorus
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002n8gs