Music

RSNO

Teatro Sociale, Bergamo

Keith Bruce

four stars

FOR the logistical challenges that come with an appearance at the top of the old town in this lovely city in North-east Italy, the RSNO brought a revised programme that featured a reduced orchestra of 40 strings and Nicola Benedetti as sole soloist.

With instruments decanted into a smaller vehicle for the journey up the cobbled streets, and players making their way to the historic theatre on foot, there was work to be done on the balance of the performance in a brief rehearsal before Benedetti played Leonard Bernstein’s Serenade, the composer’s classically-inspired five-movement love ode, which will be a feature of her schedule all summer. Both virtuosic and wistful, it also has a crucial role for principal cello Aleksei Kiseliov in the Adagio, so sat appropriately in the slot vacated by the Beethoven Triple Concerto, although its mood could scarcely be more different. The same might be said for the opening pairing of the Waltz and Polonaise from Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, like Britton’s Sea Interludes derived from an opera score but an altogether brighter and lighter way to showcase the ensemble under conductor Peter Oundjian.

If those works both suited the theatre setting, where the onstage “shell” for concert performances projected an orchestral sound that seemed to emphasise the top end of the spectrum, that equation also worked surprisingly well for the Brahms symphony in the second half, with a collective relaxed confidence in the performance producing more propulsion at crucial junctures.

There was no lack of oomph in the encores either, when more musicians squeezed onstage for the pairing of the Waltz from Khachaturian’s Masquerade and John Fahey’s arrangement of Eightsome Reels. It is a winning combination that always guarantees to see audiences leave with a catchy melody looping in their heads and smiles on their faces.