Usher Hall, Edinburgh
Rating: ***
Michael Torke's funky post-minimalist style lends itself so well to writing for percussion it is surprising that he hasn't composed anything for that medium before. Composed in close collaboration with Colin Currie, Rapture for Percussion and Orchestra - his first new work as the Royal Scottish National Orchestra's associate composer - is wonderfully idiomatic.
Torke's idea of using the solo part as a sharp focus, with the orchestra adding depth and colour, is an ingenious one. But by "shadowing" the percussion - rather than supplying a melodic or harmonic dimension - the orchestra is invited to play a part that is in places almost mechanical. Problems arose when, reiterating the vigorous gestures of the solo part, standard orchestral timbres - in particular, unison strings - sounded feeble and ill at ease with themselves.
Any orchestra would be hard put to match Currie's dazzling virtuosity. But over-cautious playing, with cross-rhythms and syncopation stilted and wooden, flattened the outer movements rather more than they could take. The central slow movement, where the drums give way to brighter, more sensuous writing for marimba and vibraphone, fared much better and was finely shaped and balanced. The audience's response by far exceeded polite applause for a new work: Currie, Alsop and Torke were called back five or six times to whistles and cheers.
If the RSNO had sounded a little repressed in the Torke, Alsop's account of Mahler's Fourth Symphony provided some clues as to why this might have been. Mahler's finicky performance directions can be inhibiting, even apparently contrary. The precision and assurance of Alsop's approach suggested considerable time spent studying the score and trying to absorb the logic of all those tempo changes. It was a performance that had vision as well as accuracy, and there was some marvellous playing: not a phrase was shaped carelessly or insensitively.
The problem was pacing: with each movement starting on the pedestrian side, gentle dips in tempo became slumps, and even the most beautifully crafted phrasing was unable to sing. Where time was supposed to stand still - just before the transition to the finale - Alsop was at her best.
Mahler's setting of the Wunderhorn poem The Celestial Life evokes a wide-eyed sense of childish wonder. Janice Watson's soprano is a little on the fruity side of childlike, but her natural manner and relaxed stage presence suited the finale well.
