Festival Music
Ensemble Marsyas
St Cecilia's Hall
Keith Bruce
four stars
SMALL wonder that the season of early music in the newly-restored St Cecilia's Hall, the oldest purpose-built music room in the country, has proved such a hot ticket. The transformation in the venue is astonishing, its capacity probably (against the usual trend of such things) actually slightly increased, and its comfort and ambience immeasurably enhanced, without losing any of its unique oval charm. There could be no better way for the Festival series to begin than this recreation of an Edinburgh Musical Society concert of the mid-18th century by bassoonist Peter Whelan's group, with the man here directing from one of the valuable harpsichords in Edinburgh University's collection.
The printed programme was a little light on detail, but it would seem this was a notional rather than specific recital, from an era when Italian player and composer Francesco Barsanti was in residence in the Scottish capital and working with the Society. Two of his Concerto Grossi bookended the programme, notable for their incorporation of horns (Alec Frank-Gemmill and Joseph Walters) and timpani (Alan Emslie) alongside the strings, with the stirring second movement Allegro of the opener a real muscular wake-up call for the tea-time audience.
The programme showcased all the instrumentalists, with Cecilia Bernardini at the top of her game on the five-movement Handel Sonata Opus 5 No 4. Her fellow fellow violinist Colin Scobie grabbed the spotlight immediately afterwards, with his performance of Barsanti's arrangements of three Scottish folk tunes for soloist and harpsichord, cello and theorbo accompaniment. On the first of these he was joined by mezzo Emilia Renard, whose sparkling contribution was to play the role of another Italian settler in Edinburgh, castrato Ferdinando Tenducci, with songs from Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice and Handel's Alcina.
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