Alf McCreary: An evening of sound and fury with the Ulster Youth Orchestra at their summer concert
First, the very good news announced at the Ulster Hall concert on Saturday night.
The Ulster Youth Orchestra has been invited to perform at the Young Euro Classic Festival in Berlin in August next year – a rare honour indeed!
Previous Ulster Youth Orchestra (UYO) concerts have maintained a high degree of skill and commitment, and this year’s UYO more than maintained that level of performance. Much credit is due to their tutors, to the players themselves, and to all who made this concert possible after so much hard work.
Under their vastly experienced guest conductor Michael Seale, the associate conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra no less, the UYO tackled a challenging programme which began with the Shostakovich Twelfth Symphony titled the “Year of 1917”.
It was written by the Russian composer to commemorate Lenin and the revolution, though his relationship with the brutal Soviet authorities – because of the modernity of his music – was constantly on a knife edge.
It is one of the less accessible works in the vast portfolio of one of the greatest 20th century composers, but the UYO, with its leader Anna Jansson, rose to every challenge in a memorable performance of this complex work.
In the second half the UYO demonstrated its range in the rarely heard overture Othello by Dvorak, but the highlight of the evening for many was the spirited performance of the Modest Mussorgsky orchestral showpiece, Pictures at an Exhibition, orchestrated by Ravel.
Despite the composer’s tortured personal life, this work is one of the classics of the genre, and there was a wonderful performance by the UYO in all sections with their soloists. It ended on a literally triumphant note with “The Great Gate of Kiev”, sadly a city in the headlines due to the continued monstrosity of the Kremlin.
No-one is sure whether the Shostakovich “Year of 1917” was a tribute to Lenin, or a secret rejection, but the dark brutality of Russian leadership has not changed.
This was an evening of sound and fury which signified a very good UYO, and no doubt the players chosen to perform in Berlin next year will also bring great credit to their native province.
(This programme was also performed in Londonderry’s Guildhall on Friday evening.)