UK NEWS

TRULY A FESTIVE FEAST FOR THE MUSICAL SOULD

Royal festival hall

Wednesday June 13,2007

By Peter Whitehead

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THE glittering gala concert at London’s new Festival Hall, refurbished at a cost of £115million, was designed to challenge audience, performers and the auditorium.

The original space, a product of utilitarian 1950s architecture, was notorious as an acoustic dead end.

But it has been transformed: Now you can hear the tiniest tinkle on a triangle, and sift out every instrument in a clashing crescendo.

For the gala concert, we were served up what might be called a musical tasting menu.

There was good, filling fare – a magical Purcell’s Fairy Queen by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and a stupendous performance of Beethoven's Ninth by the Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonic Chorus and London Philharmonic Choir.

But we were also challenged by the odd course of snail porridge: Ligeti’s ethereal Atmosph`eres and Ives’s complex The Unanswered Question – tough music that would test the most sophisticated tastebuds. The finale was a triumph, surprisingly, because Ravel’s Bolero is not the most highly regarded score.

But, in the dynamic hands of Marin Alsop, it showed what a truly ravishing piece it is as it hunted to a cataclysmic climax, with players from four orchestras all having the most tremendous fun.

It was a contrast to the astounding premiere work by Julian Anderson which opened the concert, a choral kaleidoscope of moods and colours around the word “Alleluia” that brought out the goose pimples.

The Royal Festival Hall has had a disappointing history. It was too mean and uninspired to be the modern cathedral of music that was intended.