Music

SCO/The Sixteen

City Halls, Glasgow

Keith Bruce

five stars

SIMPLY put, Friday's Glasgow premiere of Sir James MacMillan's Stabat Mater by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra with The Sixteen was one of the major events in Scottish music this year, so why was the venue not packed to the gunwhales? After a sell-out in Edinburgh the previous evening, there should have been no empty seats for this significant reunion of composer and orchestra, and the Scottish unveiling of what will surely be seen as one of the prolific MacMillan's most important works.

It was premiered at the Barbican last year, and recently released on disc on the choir's own label. The founder and conductor of The Sixteen, Harry Christophers, is clear that MacMillan's setting of the 13th century Latin verse about the lessons of suffering of Mary at the Crucifixion stands as modern masterpiece, and his direction of it revealed its riches with an intensity that exceeded even the fine recording with the Britten Sinfonia. There was a compelling vibrancy about the live performance of the instrumental score and the 26-strong vocal ensemble sounded enormous in the acoustic of the hall with soprano Julie Cooper's pure-toned solo contributions utterly stratospheric.

The composer himself was not only present but conducted the propulsive opening performance of Tryst, the first work of his that the SCO played, and, like oft-played percussion concerto Veni, Veni, Emmanuel, surely still MacMillan at his most "modern". In a lovely touch for those of us who knew her, the SCO had also reprinted a superb early programme note on the piece by the late Lynne Walker.