MUSIC

Rusalka

Theatre Royal, Glasgow

Rowena Smith

FOUR STARS

STAGINGS of Dvorak’s operas are a rarity in the UK such that the familiarity of his most famous work rests on the popularity of a single aria rather than performances of the whole. Yet in this captivating production of Rusalka – the company’s first – Scottish Opera makes a persuasive argument for the inclusion of work in the repertoire.

Dvorak drew on Eastern European folk tales for his story of a water sprite whose love for a prince leads her to seek mortality with tragic consequences. It’s a story familiar to most as The Little Mermaid - although without any Disney-type happy ending. The opera is ripe with psychological and sexual overtones as the innocence of nature is juxtaposed with the sophistication of the mortal world although this is nicely underplayed in Antony McDonald’s production, originally staged at Grange Park Opera. This may be a disturbing tale of suppressed female sexuality as embodied by Rusalka’s mute, passionless sprite made mortal but it is also a fairytale and not without moments of dark humour.

As the sprite caught between the magical and mortal worlds, Anne Sophie Duprels captures the fragility of Rusalka’s burgeoning desire and her bewilderment, both through her singing and mute gestures. Peter Wedd is an ardent prince – a rather less nuanced role – while there is strong support elsewhere: Williard White’s imposing Water Goblin, Leah-Marian Jones’s pantomime villain of a witch and Natalya Romaniw’s scene-stealing turn as the feisty foreign princess.

Famous aria aside, Rusalka is memorable as much for its orchestral scoring as for its vocal writing and in the pit music director Stuart Stratford draws out the richness of Dvorak’s orchestration, particularly its lush woodwind writing from the Orchestra of Scottish Opera.

NYCoS National Boys Choir

Perth Concert Hall

Miranda Heggie

Three Stars

As an organisation which produces and supports choral singing of the highest level, the National Youth Choir of Scotland seems to have got their formula completely right. Tuesday’s National Boys Choir concert showcased one part of the middle tier of the ‘NYCoS pyramid’, where boys aged 10 - 16 from every corner of Scotland took to the stage of Perth Concert Hall to display the fruits of a 6 day residential course. With three parts to the group of young singers, the afternoon began with the Changed Voices Section, formed for boys to continue singing through vocal transitions. Their sound is fresh and warm, although an identifiably Scottish accent does occasionally creep through! With some new commissions by contemporary Scottish composers, the Junior Corps section, made up of younger boys newer to singing, brought boundless enthusiasm to their performance. Conducted solely by Junior Corps Assistant and NYCoS alumna Alison McNeill, this was again an example of the holistic approach to supporting the future of Scottish choral music. She had a succinct conducting style, commanding the boys’ undivided attention.

The second half of the performance saw the main National Boys Choir, a group of more experienced male singers with unchanged voices, sing with a clear and polished sound in two pieces by Gustav Holst -songs of the Lumbermen and Ship-builders respectively - before they were joined by the Changed Voice Section for the premiere of Ken Johnston and Jim Maxwell’s song suite All Those Men Who Marched Away. Based on tales from the first world war, the work portrays the anguish of war in a poignant but simple manner, expertly accompanied by Stuart Hope. NYCoS National Girls Choir will perform on Sunday 10th April at the Caird Hall in Dundee.

BOOKS

Irvine Welsh

Aye Write, Royal Concert Hall

Lesley McDowell

Four stars

Listening to Irvine Welsh talk about his average day in Chicago where he lives now – get up at 6am, write for three hours, run or do some boxing, lunch, take the day’s writing to a local café run by friends – you wonder if he’s had to work hard at staying this grounded. He was back in Glasgow to publicise his latest novel, The Blade Artist, about the fortunes of one of his most compelling characters, Begbie, from Trainspotting. He’s relaxed, chatty, happy to be here. What doesn’t come across is the amount of work he has to do to maintain it all: the regular books, the rounds of publicity, the forthcoming film of ‘Porno’ which will also see him on set. In other words, he makes phenomenal success look natural. But it’s there in a few quiet assurances – the endless re-writing (‘I’m a cut-and-paste guy’), how lonely he felt when he first went to the States, his writing beginnings when he snatched free, and not-so-free, moments whilst working for Edinburgh council, the trouble he has with tender, loving scenes that make him feel something, ‘when I can’t suspend my disbelief’. When he first started to write, he said, he found it hard ‘to get past myself, my own life’ until he realised how ‘boring’ it was. Only the difficult characters, the ones that challenge him, keep him interested. And all that success? Maybe he’ll bring about a reunion with Begbie and Renton in the future, he teased, if the bank balance starts slipping down. We laugh – but I’m not entirely sure he’s joking. Nothing, he was at pains to tell us, ever comes that easy.