An orchestral concert featuring two separate UK premieres with both composers present and two other recent works might be a promoter’s worst nightmare, yet this was the first event I earmarked out of the whole of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s exciting 50th season. Judging by the packed house at the Queen’s Hall in Edinburgh, I was not alone. The charismatic Pekka Kuusisto and the SCO have a thrilling relationship: the audiences adore his sparky energy and direct rapport.
This “Time and Tides” concert, themed around songs and nature, was the last of Kuusisto’s three visits this spring featuring new work from Anna Clyne and Helen Grime. First, though, we heard music from Estonian former prog rock performer Erkki-Sven Tüür. Written for a string orchestra, Lighthouse was inspired by the ancient lighthouse on Hiiumaa. The piece featured energetic Baroque configurations, phrases shifting against each other in and out of rhythm set against soft but monumental glow from the cellos and basses. Mysterious rumblings gave way to wild rhythmic unison, the upper strings like turbulent waves against marching cellos and basses beaming the light out over the sea, Kuusisto conducting with deft fingertip precision.
To prepare us for Clyne’s folky Time and Tides, Kuusisto was joined by fiddler Aidan O’Rourke for a dreamy Skye rowing song, Kuusisto drawing improvised drones from a tiny harmonium, the music progressing to a slow waltz. Ancient St Kilda songs had the two violins passing the tunes to each other before three SCO players joined them for a lively Finnish folk song, Kuusisto’s harmonium adding complex soft harmony. Time and Tides, written for Kuusisto, had the full orchestra and solo violin exploring folk tunes from England, Finland, Scotland and America with a focus on boating, the oceans and parting from loved ones. It was a work full of surprises from Kuusisto softly whistling as he played the introduction to My True Lover’s Farewell, to the compelling colours in the orchestration, the contrabassoon, bass clarinet and softly bowed percussion adding otherworldliness. The orchestra wove complex patterns with the tunes, the soft xylophone chiming like far off bells in the dour rowing song My Fair Young Love, the triple drum beats in The Golden Willow Tree shattering. The final movement Farewell had violins and violas plucking open strings and then shaking their instruments producing an extraordinary shimmering sound as Kuusisto’s whistling sent the players out binding the tunes magnificently together, then tailing off as they all softly sang a farewell in an strangely moving finish.
Soprano Ruby Hughes joined a slimmed down string orchestra for Helen Grime’s It will be Spring Soon, a setting of three poems connected by joy written for Hughes and Malin Broman. In Philip Larkin’s Coming, Hughes pulled ethereal notes and phrases while the strings wove an restless tapestry, Kuusisto’s solo producing disjointed flourishes. Sandra Cisneros’ Little Clown, My Heart had a restless momentum, Hughes’ soprano urgent as string sections tried to outdo each other. The final setting, Jane Hirshfield’s Once, I with its quiet dissonances cast an ethereal spell and peace. Hughes’ encore of a Vaughan Williams Shropshire Lad song, Kuusisto adding hushed accompaniment, was a delight.
“Don’t give away the ending to Rautavaara’s Cantus Arcticus,” pleaded Kuusisto, who took us on this extraordinary journey from two intertwined flutes and instrument bird calls as the soundtrack of real birds merged with the players, music meeting nature. The great crescendo as the swans migrated was indeed breathtaking, a memorable end to an extraordinary evening of complete immersion, complemented by DJ Dolphin Boy mixing cool sounds derived from the programme in the bar at the interval.
