BBC SSO, Ryan Wigglesworth & Jaemin Han, Glasgow review: ‘a sense of utter compatibility’
The BBC SSO now seem to have developed an excellent rapport with their principal conductor, writes Ken Walton
Are we witnessing a “coming of age” in the relationship between the players of the BBC SSO and their principal conductor Ryan Wigglesworth? Two years into their partnership and, for the first time I can recollect over that period, there was completeness, composure, a sense of utter compatibility in Thursday’s performances that strongly supported that notion.
The most noticeable aspect was Wigglesworth’s own deportment: visibly relaxed, judicious and economic with his interventions, essentially trusting of his musicians and just letting the music happen. The result? An orchestra sensing the freedom to express itself freely and confidently within the conductor’s interpretational framework.
The clincher was Beethoven’s Eroica, a glorious apotheosis to a fascinating programme, and one of the most compelling, exciting and revealing versions of this symphony I’ve heard in a long time. Not only did Wigglesworth's no-nonsense opening command instant attention, its explosive chords were the incendiary device setting in motion a drama that unfolded with propulsive inevitability.
Out of that emerged the most scintillating, insightful details – an amplified flute line perhaps, an inner horn poking through the texture, a complete viola section grabbing the initiative. Such ongoing delights extended into the well-paced Marcia funebre, the electrically-charged Scherzo with its horn-fest of a Trio, and a finale whose triumphalism bore its fair share of Beethovenian belligerence.
And what a complementary contrast to the concert’s pre-interval coupling of Harrison Birtwistle’s Night’s Black Bird and South Korean composer Donghoon Shin’s cello concerto Nachtergebung, both alluding to a world of mysterious, ethereal wonderment. Wigglesworth played shrewdly on these shared qualities, harnessing Birtwistle’s kaleidoscopic starbursts within its eerie bubble, and in Shin’s concerto – played with effortless imagination by cellist Jaemin Han – creating sheer magic out of its exotic, sometimes jazz-inspired, sound world.
The SSO is now on tour to South Korea.