Berlioz Symphonie fantastique

The Scottish Chamber Orchestra brought Berlioz with little restraint to the Usher Hall on Thursday evening in a theatrical opening to their 26/27 season. Maxim Emelyanychev conducted the double-Berlioz bill of Harold in Italy followed by Symphonie fantastique.

A very brief introduction from the back of the stage was about as restrained as the evening would get, before Harold in Italy, with Timothy Ridout as viola soloist, galavanted through the Usher Hall in more ways than one. Harold in the Mountains began pensive and pulsating, dark and dramatic, with string suspense led by the cello and built by the timpani. No sooner had it begun than did Ridout make his way slowly from the stage-side doors, almost on a catwalk, head held high, looking around him as he carried his viola, before his bow paved the way into light and bright strings. An arpeggiated harp navigated the background, with flutish whispers behind the viola. Ridout physically glided across the stage, wandering in and between the instruments and players, until we were watching and touring the orchestra with our eyes as much as listening to it.

After the interval, Symphonie fantastique pushed that theatricality further. The third movement built in solitude, with moments of floral levity from the clarinet creeping through the rolling timpani thunder, before the fourth released everything into a march, military motifs echoing across the stage through brass and strings. In the fifth, an ominous stage-side door opened to reveal tubular bells offstage. The horns carried the weight of the familiar procession while the slapped strings of the double basses treaded like a knell throughout the Usher Hall, before the violins themselves broke into the final raw, wild screeching and scratching. A suitably theatrical opening to the SCO’s 26/27 season.

Berlioz Symphonie fantastique by Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Credit Edinterval.