Willoughby Symphony Orchestra | Wonder
November 24, 2024, The Concourse Chatswood, NSW
Brahms Violin Concerto In D Major Op. 77
Beethoven Symphony No. 5 In C Minor Op. 67
I occasionally dream that I’m in Vienna just before Christmas in 1808. Snow is thick on the ground. I have invitations to soirée recitals – one by Johann Hummel one by Louis Spohr, both in luxurious salons with plenty of food and drink. But I’m aware also that that rumbustious character Beethoven is staging a hugely ambitious concert at the “Theater an der Wien” consisting of premieres typically of his own works only. It will be freezing cold, and the orchestra is nothing to write home about. A difficult decision but made easy when my wife Roswitha tells me that four of her friends including the ghastly Ermintrude Bloch are coming round for drinks – so the longer I’m out the better. Therefore, I’m present at what is now the most famous concert ever performed with premieres of Beethoven’s 5th and 6th Symphonies, his 4th piano concerto and his Choral Fantasia – all seminal works! I don’t notice the cold and am not fazed when Ludwig has to restart the Fantasia because of terrible orchestral blunders after only one day of rehearsals. I tell Roswitha about the concert she has missed and how the one piece that remains clearly in my mind is that incredibly powerful 5th Symphony.
Four years earlier, Beethoven’s Eroica symphony had revolutionised the music world with many orchestras saying it was too difficult to play while it was assumed that the stark discord in the first movement was a mistake. The Fourth Symphony was more traditional and more widely received.
The Fifth Symphony jolted the public out of its complacency with its sustained and relentless drama even in the slow movement with a restless Scherzo dissolving into a triumphant Finale featuring trombones for the first time in a Symphony. It seems that the composer is reasserting himself in face of his deafness and consequent isolation.
By contrast, Brahms’s violin Concerto was written at a high point of the composer’s life. He had formed a close relationship with violinist Josef Joachim, had found his music well-received and had a lifelong bond with Robert Schumann’s widow Clara. It was no doubt with Josef in mind that he composed his violin concerto and it was natural that he was the soloist at the first performance.
A quiet peaceful melodic opening soon shows typical dramatic features with sharp reminders and an extraordinary cadenza, full of double-stopping written by Joachim himself. A serene introspective Adagio is followed by a Gypsy rondo featuring glistening arpeggios.
Edward Walton is a native Australian now living appropriately in Austria. He has won numerous prizes including the Piccolo Violino and Grand Prix Virtuoso in Europe and was a finalist in the Australia Young Performers Award in 2022. Bearing an air of supreme confidence, his playing was faultless and faithfully reproduced Brahms’ dramatic intonations, I thought he really excelled in the aforesaid cadenza while his bond with the conductor was clearly apparent.
It goes without saying that the ever-present and effervescent conductor was Nicholas Milton who is not only chief conductor of the Göttingen Symphony Orchestra but also is leading the Klagenfurt State Opera in their production of the “Ring Cycle”. He has certainly galvanised the Willoughby Symphony Orchestra, I have heard both these works played by the London Symphony Orchestra and the WSO did not suffer by comparison. The bassoon and contra-bassoon play an important and prominent part of the symphony and they were truly excellent.
