Lewis, BBC Philharmonic, Storgårds, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester review - adding the Moon to The Planets

The first piece by Grace-Evangeline Mason I heard was six years ago, a simple song in a multi-composer “Manchester Peace Song Cycle” performed at the Royal Northern College of Music when she was studying there.

It was striking because of its eloquent melody and evocation of child-like joy. Subsequent experience has confirmed the impression that she writes music that immediately communicates, that is often about something, rather than abstract (and she’s not afraid to tell us that), and that it does what it says on the tin.

Her ABLAZE THE MOON, premiered by the BBC Philharmonic in the 2023 London Proms, was in the opening programme of their new season at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, conducted by John Storgårds. It’s written for a large orchestra and shows a mastery of complex textures and orchestral timbres – and it’s definitely about something: the image of the Moon conjured in a poem by the American writer Sara Teasdale. It even follows the poem line by line in its description of the Moon, as like a flower in a blue sky. The fundamentally tonal language is enhanced by a variety of orchestral effects, some far from traditional, and growing complexity through resonant brass-heavy chords contrasting with evocative wind and string writing.

It was an inspired idea to put the six-minute piece alongside Holst’s The Planets (which requires a slightly larger orchestra, in fact). For one thing, hearing them side by side suggests that Mason may have learned a few things from Holst’s brilliance as an orchestrator. For another, since The Planets is also about something – maybe more hidden than heart-on-sleeve – namely the associations of the seven planets in the traditions of astrology, there is sense in adding the Moon to the mix. There’s been more than one attempt to add to Holst’s work by inventing music based on scientific astronomical knowledge (by referencing Pluto, for instance, or even going further into the Solar System): but the Moon, as a heavenly body often felt to influence our lives and moods, is a better candidate by far.

For The Planets suite itself, Storgårds (pictured above) brought a skilled and analytical ear. Each piece of the popular work was given with such impact that the spontaneous applause after Mars (which he did not encourage and hardly dared acknowledge) was repeated on all but two occasions afterwards: only by segue’ing quickly from Mercury to Jupiter and from Uranus to Neptune did he avoid it coming every time. There’s no harm in letting people enjoy themselves and show it: it means you’ve caught a Saturday night audience that wants to have a good time.Storgårds has a knack of adding tension in Holst’s reprises (clearly so in both Mars and Jupiter) and managed to build “Uranus, the Magician” to such a degree that it felt like the real high point of the whole work. There were lovely solos from guest principal horn KyuSung Lee, leader Yuri Torchinsky and principal cello Peter Dixon.

The concert began with a beautifully judged performance of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3, with Paul Lewis as soloist. This wasn’t one of those approaches to Beethoven that takes everything hell-for-leather: the opening Allegro con brio seemed quite a moderate speed, and it enabled Lewis (pictured above) to present the piano role in thoughtful style, with a mix of classical elegance and occasional mystery and surprise (something shared with the orchestra’s way of playing, too). There was a sense of dialogue between solo and tutti, and when Beethoven’s glorious cadenza came it ran a range from pure rhetoric to tender romance.

The Largo movement was likewise almost leisurely, creating a sense of awe, and the final Allegro fully at ease, as if simply letting the hair down and enjoying the ride.

The Mancunian audience at this point had brought a variety of respiratory problems into the hall with them, such that the tender beauties of the music were (at least as heard in the hall) at times almost obliterated by the barrage of coughs and wheezes. Interestingly, Paul Lewis was not averse to adding a little in the way of sound effects himself, by way of occasionally bringing the winkle-pickers quite audibly down on the pedals, as if to emphasize a point. 

• This concert will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 on 30 September
• More classical reviews on theartsdesk