Delyana Lazarova was the winner of the
first Siemens Hallé International Conductors Competition in February last year,
and became the orchestra’s Assistant Conductor last September.
Breathtakingly talented, she also exudes
personality, even on film, and though she might have hoped for more live concert-hall
exposure as the result of her competition win and new two-year appointment, she
certainly makes up for that in Episode 7 of the Hallé’s ongoing series of
filmed performances for this lockdown season.
It is in fact her official Hallé concert
debut, made in the same cinematic style in and around the Bridgewater Hall as
the most ambitious of Sir Mark Elder’s concert films here, with Maestro Arts
and Stephen Portnoi’s sound team giving us the same quality product to watch at
home. (The subdued lighting of the last film in the hall has been turned up enough
to let us see the players properly without losing that sense of atmosphere that
dimness engenders).
Delyana Lazarova has the technique of
musical direction at her fingertips: a clear beat and communicative gestures,
with an expressive face (and a smiley one), and even her eyebrows convey
meaning. More than that, she injects energy and tension into music that needs
it, and calm and relaxation into the other sort.
Sir Mark talks about her qualities in the
conversation-piece clip that begins the film, referring to her control and
poise (there’s a brief excerpt from her competition-winning performance with
the orchestra at Hallé St Peter’s just over a year ago) – and also the sense of
passion that comes over in her music-making. I’ll go with that: the first piece
in this programme is her own choice, the Overture by Polish 20-century
composer Grażyna Bacewicz, opening with scurrying strings (led by Paul Barritt)
in celebratory style and introducing an eloquent and still passage for wind
players before its return to liveliness. It was wartime secret-drawer music
when it was written (1943, under occupation), but what a spirit of hope and
courage it catches – one that Delyana responds to with zeal.
She talks as enthusiastically and urgently
as she conducts, bridging the gap between the Bacewicz overture and the Suite
from Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring music.
(It’s the 13-instrument version, the soundworld
of the original ballet, incidentally the same one that Manchester Camerata
members filmed and recorded in the Stoller Hall in January for Radio 3 and released
as a one-day-only stream on 24th February).
The Hallé principals and soloists (and
notably Gemma Beeson on piano) play with tenderness and affection for Delyana
Lazarova, producing a delightful and sweetly evocative sound – the Bridgewater
Hall acoustic helps what is effectively a chamber music score to take a mellow
tinge, like a stage performance seen through a gauze. The conductor has just
told us she’s going to ‘let you see those characters and hear the story’ of the
ballet, and she does just that, with the ending of the bride-and-groom interlude
lovingly caressed.
Our concert-film continues with oboe
Virginia Shaw, trumpet Tom Osborne, percussion Erika Őhman and Delyana herself briefly
introducing Shostakovich’s Symphony no. 1 – a piece for these
challenging times, as Virginia puts it. It’s also one of those major works the Hallé
has the credit for premiering in the UK (under Harty back in 1932).
If its overnight success in the Russia of 1926
has one simple explanation, it could be that it was pretty advanced music that
was not just clever but also moving. Delyana Lazarova presents it with a
twinkle in the eye but with a darker presence also, the central movements
giving opportunities for solo virtuosity in the orchestra to shine, and by the
end her interpretation provides a degree of gravity in the orchestra’s playing
that may not have been noticeable before but is deeply impressive.
Link: https://www.halle.co.uk/ Available until 1 July.
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