RSNO & Frank Dupree, Edinburgh review: 'unforgettable'
This collaboration between the RSNO and Frank Dupree yielded some mesmerising results, writes David Kettle
RSNO & Frank Dupree, Usher Hall, Edinburgh ★★★★★
If anyone had needed reminding just how joyful, inspirational and downright entertaining a classical concert can be, Friday’s Usher Hall offering from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra would have left them with no lingering doubts. In fact, it was very much an evening of collaborations, the first of which came when RSNO players were joined by the enthusiastic and deeply committed young (in some cases, very young) players of Big Noise Wester Hailes, who clearly lapped up the adulation and gave their all – musically and physically – in two short but effective pieces.
The first half proper, though, was devoted to classical jazz (or jazzy classical), and ushered on stage a German jazz trio headed by pianist Frank Dupree, who ended up on the conductor’s podium for the opener, Antheil’s madcap Jazz Symphony, leaving keyboard duties to RSNO Principal Guest Conductor Patrick Hahn. It fizzed with raucous, cartoonish life (plus a decidedly dirty trumpet solo from RSNO principal Christopher Hart), but it was nothing compared to the Gershwin Piano Concerto that followed – rearranged by Dupree as a concerto for jazz trio and orchestra, for which he and Hahn swapped positions (and shoes – you had to be there).
Though Obi Jenne’s intricately ticking drumkit contributions sometimes distracted from Gershwin’s orchestral detail, it was a dashing, indulgent, thoroughly mesmerising performance that showcased Dupree’s flamboyantly athletic, undeniably brilliant keyboard prowess, as well as showing off the RSNO’s vivid, punchy playing under Hahn’s eager direction. The orchestra’s percussionists joined Hahn and the jazz trio for a sultry, simmering nonet encore of Duke Ellington’s Caravan, which just about brought the house down.
There was a danger that Rachmaninov’s Symphony No. 3 after the interval might have felt like a far more strait-laced anticlimax – not a bit of it in Hahn’s urgent, compelling account, one driven by the RSNO’s radiant, vibrant, high-definition performance. Unforgettable, from start to finish.
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