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A preview and a review of our concert with pianist Jill Morton on 2nd December 2006 at the RSAMD in The Herald
Perhaps, to avoid the anticlimactic and often despairing reality that accompanies
a birthday, one might think of adding a Piano Concerto to the list of requests.
Admittedly, the likelihood of being delivered a masterwork as sublime as the one Maxim,
son of Dmitri, Shostakovich received for his special day is fairly low. Happily,
though, and vicariously, we are able to experience some of the delight that might
have ensued as Maxim accepted his Piano Concerto No.2,
as the Glasgow Chamber Orchestra celebrated its fiftieth anniversary.
The nerve-wracking opening movement had the audience holding its breath as pianist
Jill Morton ripped through the pugilistic score, marching up and down the keyboard
in giant stretches one moment, and delicately reasserting the more minor, lyrical response the next.
Indeed, Morton's relationship with the piano was most striking; simultaneously she
had total command of the instrument and yet remained intuitively aware of its intimidating prowess.
Copland's Quiet City - a piece salvaged from an experimental drama the American
composer had written - was a jazz and folk-influenced tale of loneliness and anonymity
in the big city, and seemed to convey more hope than desperation. The open trumpet
octaves and single-line melodies that were bleakly self-referential and hard to
locate were played with great sensitivity by the ensemble and as we arrived all too
quickly at the finale - Beethoven's Symphony No.1 - there was the definite feeling
that this orchestra were out to impress.
As birthday celebrations go, this one definitely went with a succession of bangs.
