Time stands still in Vilde Frang’s Elgar as the British leg of Pappano’s LSO tenure begins

After two decades in the capital principally spent down the mineshaft of The Royal Opera pit, taking up the reins as Chief Conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra gives Sir Antonio Pappano “the chance to reinvent myself”, as he put it at the season press launch last spring. British music, much of it new to him, will feature strongly – a Vaughan Williams symphony cycle is already underway – so after Wednesday’s season opener the focus was squarely on two English composers embedded in the orchestra’s collective DNA: Elgar and Holst. 

Indeed, the LSO gave the first public performances of both Elgar’s Violin Concerto in B minor (1910) and Holst’s The Planets (1920), so this was home territory for the orchestra. Fritz Kreisler, who in 1907 declared Elgar to be the “greatest living composer”, was the dedicatee of the concerto, although the score’s inscription “Herein is enshrined the soul of .....” is another of Elgar’s enigmas. I’d happily insert the name Vilde Frang here, for the Norwegian violinist has an incredibly special connection with this music. 

At around 50 minutes, it’s a challenging concerto, requiring enormous stamina. After the lengthy muscular tutti, Frang’s first entry immediately struck a note of introspection, with the hint of a furrowed brow, a world of veiled, misty reminiscences. With a mellow, nutty tone, and a husky viola-like darkness on the G string of her 1734 “Rode” Guarnerius, she sang and sighed her way through the opening two movements, the LSO strings offering billowy support in the noble Andante. Frang’s attack in the skittish opening to the Allegro molto finale was determined, with venom in the stinging double-stops, and in the haunting cadenza, with its pizzicato tremolando thrummed accompaniment – one of Elgar’s most magical moments – time really did stand still. A performance to cherish. 

Gustav Holst, about to celebrate his 150th birthday, scored a hit with his astronomical suite The Planets, each movement ascribed an astrological character. Pappano was a bundle of energy in an out-of-this-world account that showcased the different sections of his new band as much as any Concerto for Orchestra. 

Written in the shadow of the First World War, Mars powered along at its pounding 5/4 rhythm, Pappano unleashing terrifying fortissimos. Leader Benjamin Gilmore supplied the balm in the cool serenity of Venus, echoed by Juliana Koch’s coiling oboe responses and its eerie, spectral coda of celesta, harp and glockenspiel. Pappano emphasised the characteristic extremes of each movement: woodwinds burbling through fleet-footed Mercury; ebullient Jupiter, flushed in the cheeks; Saturn with an implacable tread. With its meddling bassoons, Uranus “the Magician” initially played up aspects of Dukas’ Sorcerer’s Apprentice, but Pappano also pointed up its militaristic side, drawing the listener back to Mars. 

The off-stage voices of Tenebrae were a touch too distant in Neptune, boxed behind the stage where resonance is limited, but the suite still closed in miraculous, pin-drop silence to close an outstanding evening that already sets the highest of bars for Pappano’s LSO tenure.