Harrison Birtwistle’s relationship with the Nash Ensemble stretched back over four decades, and in his final years he composed a succession of works for the group. Two years after Birtwistle’s death, and a few months short of what would have been his 90th birthday, the ensemble had assembled a generous three-part celebration; the first concert was shared with students from the Royal Academy of Music, while the second and third, conducted by Geoffrey Paterson, featured the soprano Claire Booth and the BBC Singers.
Both concerts alternated chamber pieces with some of the songs with ensemble that Birtwistle composed intermittently throughout his career – Three Songs from the Holy Forest, to poems by Robin Blaser, the librettist of Birtwistle’s penultimate opera, The Last Supper; Songs by Myself, to the composer’s own texts; and the wonderfully spare Nine Settings of Lorine Niedecker, in which Booth’s supple, intense singing was supported by just a solo cello line.
