A Delightful Concert
St. Mark's Church, 14th July 2023
A good-sized audience gathered at St. Mark's Church, Harrogate for this first concert of Harrogate Philharmonic Orchestra's 2023/24 season, due in no small way to the appealing programme content. The orchestra, directed by Jeremy Carnall with guest leader Chloe Fletcher, were joined by violinist Ethan Shum.
A regular feature of HPO's concerts is the inclusion of lesser-known orchestral pieces and this concert was no exception with the concert starting with Gustav Holst's Folk songs from Somerset. Whilst this work was first performed in 1906, it was then lost for over a century until it turned up in 2017 in New Zealand where it was performed a year later! This characterful performance by HPO was one of the first modern UK performances of this attractive work which makes use of ten different folk songs. The use of so many contrasting tunes allows Holst to include considerable variety of texture and orchestration with the HPO woodwind section regularly given the chance to shine with particular prominence given to the first oboe – the Sheep Shearing Song was beautifully performed by Gill Hart. Three of the tunes in this piece were later reworked by Holst into his A Somerset Rhapsody but this earlier piece is definitely one that now deserves to be heard more often.
The main work in the first half of the programme was the ever-popular Violin Concerto in E minor by Felix Mendelssohn, first heard in 1845, with 14-year old soloist Ethan Shum. For a number of years, HPO has sponsored the Concerto Class in the Harrogate Competitive Festival with the winner being given the opportunity to perform a concerto with the orchestra – Ethan had won this class earlier in 2023. The Mendelssohn concerto is a real tour de force for the soloist (and at times the orchestra too!) and a successful performance requires a phenomenal technique and a high level of maturity throughout. From the opening entry of the solo violinist, the audience were left in no doubt that Ethan was more than up to the challenges of this virtuosic work. For me, the highlight was the opening Allegro molto appassionato movement when soloist and orchestra were as one with a real sense of forward momentum with conductor and orchestra responding to every nuance in the solo part. Ethan's execution of the many tricky passages in this movement (especially the cadenza) was stunning. This movement leads without a break, via a well sustained single bassoon note, into the central Andante movement. This was beautifully played by Ethan, again with impeccable technique and intonation. This movement also requires a level of intensity and emotion which will no doubt develop further as Ethan matures as a soloist. Virtuosic display was once again to the fore in the final movement – a lively Allegro molto vivace – when the audience were once again mesmerised by the technical prowess displayed by the soloist throughout. If there were occasional moment where the sense of ensemble wavered slightly, this was more than compensated by the real sense of excitement and momentum maintained throughout this exhilarating movement. The sustained applause at the end this performance clearly demonstrated the audience's conviction that we had just witnessed a star in the making!
By Kevin Paynes