Conductor: Ian Porthouse
Soloist: Ben Goldscheider
2025 RNCM International Brass Band Festival
RNCM Manchester
Saturday 25th January

Two works, contentious in very different ways, provided the audience with considerable musical food for thought on Saturday afternoon at the RNCM Festival.

The musical defence of ‘Prague’  by Judith Bingham, and ‘Homage to Julian Assange’  by Ed de Boer was prepared with forensic understanding by Ian Porthouse, allowing the music to speak for itself in absorbing nuance and consideration. They emerged from the examination greatly enhanced in stature.

Ignorant opprobrium

The quality of Bingham’s writing for the medium has never been in doubt, yet ‘Prague’s’  use as a test-piece over 20 years ago led to an outcry of ignorant opprobrium that cast it as a contemporary pariah.  

Two long decades later its darkly evocative language now sat comfortably in its more appreciative surroundings; the gritty atmosphere of an ancient city, turbulent and troubled by religion, myth and invasion seeping from the score as the ensemble showed obvious understanding of successfully cracking the performance code to opening the seven locks that protected the ancient crown of Bohemia from tyrants, malevolent Golems and ideologue fascists. 

the gritty atmosphere of an ancient city, turbulent and troubled by religion, myth and invasion seeping from the score as the ensemble showed obvious understanding of successfully cracking the performance code to opening the seven locks that protected the ancient crown of Bohemia from tyrants, malevolent Golems and ideologue fascists. 

Julian Assange also unlocked a Pandora’s Box of mayhem with his whistleblowing website WikiLeaks. And whilst his personal reputation remains open to considerable question, his own turbulent existence over a five-year period of self-preservation isolation has a fascination of its own – and especially the psychological imprisonment of his mind during years of solitary confinement.

Youth to release

Broken into 11 short sections, it spoke of a life from a youth of almost naïve idealism (in the form, much like his introduction to his ‘Vita Aeterna Variations’, of a simple theme), through imprisonment and final frenetic fugue release – the thematic development based on idee-fix cryptogram of his surname.  

Played with assured, erudite intensity, it was questioning, although not overtly over-complex in its demands (the use of xylosynth adding to dramatic effects), unlike the man but perhaps more like his on-line revelations.  

Played with assured, erudite intensity, it was questioning, although not overtly over-complex in its demands (the use of xylosynth adding to dramatic effects), unlike the man but perhaps more like his on-line revelations.      

Glorious stature

The glorious stature of the playing of soloist Ben Goldscheider was a much simpler delight to appreciate. 

Fresh from his appearance in Oslo where he performed Gavin Higgins’ ‘French Horn Concerto’, here he stepped back in time to present Edward Gregson’s classical structured work (written in 1971 for Ifor James), with commanding eloquence.

The Waltonesque finale was a romp of joyful playfulness – Goldscheider commanding the spotlight with his precise tensile lightness of strength.

The balanced dialogue in the symphonic opening movement between the ensemble and performer bubbled with energetic questioning, before becoming darker in burnished passion in the middle section, its climax throbbing with intensity. The Waltonesque finale was a romp of joyful playfulness – Goldscheider commanding the spotlight with his precise tensile lightness of strength.

Road of exploration

Much like Julian Assange, the decision to take a different road of exploration formed the basis of the inspiration behind Philip Sparke’s 2024 European Championship set-work ‘A Road Less Travelled By’  (which may well be travelled by many more Championship bands later this year if the whistleblowing rumours are correct).

Cast in three linked movements, it is classic Sparke – superbly crafted in virtuosic and musical intent, and delivered as such by a band familiar with its extensive requirements (the main soloists in particular playing with a cultured musicality) – the dynamic spectrum and tonal colouring of the ensemble never forced or overstated.

Iwan Fox