By the end, it was hard to believe this concert had started with a barely audible timpani roll and a few diffidently lyrical trumpets. But the UK premiere of Wynton Marsalis’s Herald, Holler and Hallelujah! – a brass and percussion fanfare that swung through genres, its tailoring so sharp you could cut yourself – was one of two brief exceptions on a programme of American mega-hits. (The other, Charles Ives’ The Unanswered Question, was beautifully unsettling: strings ghostly as they floated down from the Royal Albert Hall’s gallery, their stillness interrupted by discordant flurries elsewhere.)
It was also hard to believe that John Wilson’s Sinfonia of London only gave its first live performance in 2021. Three years later, this handpicked supergroup has a reputation that outshines most established orchestras and brings audiences out in droves. Under Wilson, Copland’s Billy the Kid suite was an orchestral showcase. Here, the hushed lilt of a breezy woodwind solo and slow breadth from the strings. There, the rhythmic volleys of the ballet’s gun battle, shimmering with brass. Never mind the calibre of Wilson’s address book: ensemble work this tight is not born but made, forged with care and rehearsal.
In Barber’s Adagio for Strings – forward-flowing rather than dirge – the strings precisely matched bow speed and vibrato, the tone melded as if each section were a single player. With a fabric this fine and lines this long, the starts and ends of phrases can threaten to tear the gossamer. Here, though, the whole texture breathed quietly, attention lavished on its delicate edges.
Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue was another matter: stylishly brash, with a million-dollar twinkle in its eye. At times the orchestra’s extravagantly polished antics risked upstaging Steven Osborne’s piano wizardry, but his solo passages were captivating.
In John Adams’ vast pseudo-symphony Harmonielehre, the supersized orchestra – four trombones! two tubas! a duplex percussion section! – revelled in symphonic colour saturation. Quiet passages were minutely detailed. Complex rhythms snapped together as if in studio conditions. The climaxes were irresistible: both seismic and centred, that phenomenal tone-quality never faltering. The final chord had barely spoken when a Prommer roared “YES!” and euphoria swept the hall.
