I know from experience the SCO would rather be judged from what they do than by what they say.
They have told me this. But sometimes I wish they would shout a bit more about what they've got. Perhaps people might be more curious and interested than they think. Friday night's concert with pianist/director Robert Levin, the closing concert of the current SCO season, was reasonably attended, but should have been a sell-out.
Levin is an astounding communicator. Sometimes he says a lot; sometimes very little. But what he does and says is gold dust. Bluntly, what he and the SCO did on Friday night was staggering in its revelatory qualities. He interrupted his blinding performance of Mozart's D major piano concerto, K 451, one of the lesser-known concertos, by announcing that the showcase cadenzas, which he improvised, were not so much a display of how fast the soloist could play, as how fast he could think: an immensely interesting comment, reflecting clearly Levin's philosophy, attitude and, indeed, the amazing rapport between him and the SCO, as evidenced in the heart-stopping performance of the concerto.
But that wasn't the half of it, as Levin and the SCO demonstrated in a mind-blowing performance of Anton Reicha's conspicuously complex Overture In D major, a study in 5/4 time that, at its most elusive and tricky, makes Holst's Mars from The Planets Suite seem routine and symmetrical, and in a thrilling account of Schubert's Second Symphony which suggested a masterpiece in embryo. This team is a real force on the Scottish music scene.
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