The standards of the wind players in the ranks of the Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestra are always very impressive and occasionally one of them comes to the fore as a concerto soloist.
On Saturday, principal bassoonist Victoria Chandler performed Vivaldi’s concerto in E minor for her instrument, displaying complete command from the sonorously melancholic adagio to the virtuosic passagework of the final allegro movement. She has an impressive background as a professional player ... and it showed.
This was a concert that moved from Vivaldi to Mendelssohn and Tchaikovsky. The weakest string playing of the night came – perhaps surprisingly, perhaps not – in the opener, with the intonation and articulation being very saggy. Some of the discoveries that have been made in recent years about early 18th century technique ought perhaps to be absorbed before the Phil attempts baroque music again.
However, the transition to classicism and then romanticism was negotiated with panache. This is obviously where the hearts of the orchestra’s string section lie and in Mendelssohn’s Symphony No 4, dubbed The Italian, there was plenty of precision and enjoyable interaction with the woodwinds and brass.
Conductor Benjamin Ellin achieved a balance that seemed to be spot on for this classical style and the atmospheric second movement had a very appealing tread.
The concert concluded with a very good - indeed, uplifting - account of Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony in which the string sections achieved a good body of tone and were impressive in the pizzicato movement.
The work offers plentiful opportunities for the winds to shine and all were well taken –from the oboe solo that opens the second movement to the brassy blare of the motif the opens, closes and punctuates the work.
