London Times lauds Nicola Benedetti and James MacMillan for World Premiere of Violin Concerto No. 2

Nicola Benedetti gave the solo part of James MacMillan’s Violin Concerto No. 2 a consoling richness

Scottish Chamber Orchestra / Emelyanychev Review - This was the Birth of a Masterpiece
By Simon Thompson
London Times
September 30, 2022

It’s a coincidence that James MacMillan’s Violin Concerto No. 2 should receive its world premiere only a few days after the premiere of the anthem that he wrote for the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II. Yet it felt strangely fitting because the hope and spiritual consolation that MacMillan provided for the service in Westminster Abbey was every bit as present in his new concerto, a radiant jewel of a piece that seemed to inhabit a multitude of human emotions while guiding the listener through them with luminous clarity.

MacMillan builds his concerto from the three chords of its opening, chords that open up a universe of mysteriously infinite possibilities, and which launch 25 minutes of music that is by turns serene, adventurous and threatening. The musicians of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, directed with laser-like focus by their principal conductor Maxim Emelyanychev, inhabited a vast aural space while the violin line hovered, shimmering over the top. The soundscape moved ceaselessly from lyrical beauty through martial energy to a gorgeous ending that faded to nothing over chirruping flutes.

Often exquisitely tender, the violin line was brought to life by the woman for whom it was written. Nicola Benedetti, the concerto’s dedicatee, gave the solo part a consoling richness, shining out of the loneliness and, towards the end, duetting with several orchestral soloists like a developing conversation. She was as expressive in the music’s glimmering pianissimos as in its episodes of wrenching passion.

Orchestra, soloist, conductor and composer seemed united in music of total conviction and core-shaking power. This performance gave the audience that rare feeling of being present at the birth of a masterpiece.

The orchestra brought the same conviction to a searing performance of Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique Symphony, making it sound like chamber music in the wiry transparency that they brought to it, with the strings ditching the vibrato at key climaxes to underline the music’s intensity. Emelyanychev drove it with the energy of a man possessed, but began the evening with a suave shimmy as he and the orchestra brought pinprick accuracy and a mischievous twinkle to John Adams’s The Chairman Dances.

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