There’s extra cause for celebration this year as Music in the Round’s annual May Festival of music gets underway in Sheffield, for 2025 marks the twentieth anniversary of MiR’s revered, award-winning chamber group, Ensemble 360. Fittingly, two works composed specially for the group were on the programme tonight, one by Huw Watkins, one by Aileen Sweeney, both in the audience, along with the big, beautiful Octet by Schubert (not in the audience).
On the festival bill this year, besides Ensemble 360’s own festival performances are Evelyn Glennie, Mozart, Britten, Jasdeep Singh Degun and his sitar, Vaughan Williams, Avril Coleridge Taylor, Bach, Elgar, a gloriously Giddy Goat, members of the Elias String Quartet – original members of Ensemble 360 themselves, Scottish folk fiddling, a Battleship Potemkin, a Mother Goose and Music for Curious Minds – and, of course, lots more.
It was back in 2005 (when, as oboist Adrian Wilson reminded us, Tony Blair was PM and both he and pianist Tim Horton had more hair) that the late Peter Cropper, ever fervent and ambitious, brought in this unusual line-up of eleven world-class players to take over the laurels of his celebrated Lindsay Quartet. The bold combination of piano with both string and wind ensembles allows stunningly broad repertoires of works to be performed, from solos, duos and trios through to octets, nonets and full-team elevens. Apart from three sturdy originals, players have changed once or twice over the years and guest players drop in, too, yet the pinnacles of stunning musicianship, team spirit and passion remain pretty constant.
Having all eleven musicians together is a rare treat and Huw Watkins’ Broken Consort gives scope to all. Composed for the group, the work had its world premiere in Sheffield in 2008. The four self-contained movements (Lament, Study, Sicilienne and Finale) are played by different instrumental groups with a brief introduction or interlude preceding each, played by all. These striking links are most compelling as squealing, piercing fanfares burst forth, full of alarm, disquiet and urgent panic (ideal, according to Huw, for his friend’s ring-tone.) The catchy, recurrent motifs are echoed elsewhere, too, in a work that contrasts spiky, fragmented plink-plonk-plucks of discord and restlessness, and changes in tempi and dynamic that are often stop-start and abrupt, with smoother, more soothing times. In Lament the beautiful ebb and flow of superbly blended strings against tumbling, tinkling piano notes evokes a meditative melancholy, while Sicilienne conveys, too, a sense of lament as plaintive oboe interacts with strings. The passionate playing of the piece tonight certainly did it exciting justice.
It was a live world premiere tonight for Aileen Sweeney, Scottish composer, arranger, podcaster and accordionist, with ten-minute work, Equinox. A single piano note begins a piece that proceeds at first with sparse simplicity (and not entirely because Aileen’s finger had undergone a blender accident before she sat at the piano to compose!) A cold, solitary feel is evoked as brittle string-plucks drop in, and soon the piano develops a short, rippling riff that becomes stuck in an agitated loop. This both mesmerises and drives to distraction as it repeats and repeats – repeats and repeats – and repeats and repeats. But Equinox is a piece in which it’s only when you reach the immensely exhilarating finale that you more fully understand and appreciate the significance and effect of what went before. Eventually escaping the wintry, stuck-in-time loop, the trio moves on with glorious, uplifting energy and drive, leaving the endlessly bleak, static days of dark February behind as we head, full of life and purpose, towards the longed-for equinox, carried along on a heady flow of brightness and utter elation that leaves us, in the end, filled with breathless joy and optimism. Mission accomplished!
Schubert’s exciting Octet was written quickly in 1824, with its first public performance in 1827, the year before he died, aged 31. To rival Beethoven’s renowned Septet, as requested, Schubert added a second violin to the line-up of clarinet, bassoon, horn, violin, viola, cello and bass. Full of rich flow and flourish, the work’s orchestral range and breadth provides a great showcase for the fine players as lots of glorious horn, melodious clarinet and shimmering strings take us on an hour-long, six-movement journey through dynamic dramas of mood and elegant, harmonious loveliness. The extended variations bring special delight, as does the teasing, chirpy intrigue of the jaunty, tuneful finale: like an incipient sneeze, it threatens to deliver on various occasions before finally finishing with full-blown flourish, concluding a great programme of music, delivered with panache and delighting its audience immensely.
Ensemble 360’s achievements over the past two decades have been considerable as they continue to enrich lives, just as Peter Cropper envisaged, taking intensely passionate, top-quality music-making into recordings and Radio 3 programmes, into community learning and participation projects, and into phenomenal, in-the-round concert performances both for adults and children – and even for babies! (The magical joy of Concerteenies concerts with bubbles, balloons and heavenly music enthrals young and old alike.) A magnificent children’s story repertoire has built up, too, with lively narrations of superbly illustrated books brought further to life by exciting, intricate music from resident composer Paul Rissman, which brings in extensive interaction with the children. Another long-term, frequent contributor to concerts, workshops and projects is nationally treasured baritone, Roddy Williams, no less. And what a huge void there would be without them all! Here’s to another twenty years – at least!
Eileen Caiger Gray
