Conductor: Dr David Thornton
Soloists: Chris Robertson; Les Neish 
RNCM International Brass Band Festival
Sunday 25th January

It was entirely appropriate that the final work to be performed at this year’s RNCM Festival was Philip Sparke’s ‘Music of the Spheres’.

An era defining composition, it ignited a space race of bespoke contesting compositions, far too many of which have subsequently been designed with considerably less informed craftsmanship to dull audience's senses with their displays of sci-fi technique and flat-earth musicality.

This then was a timely reminder of its almost perfectly balanced calibrations to wow as well as wonder – and  just how difficult it remains to conquer, not only to conclude such a demanding concert programme, but with the British Open to come in September.

The defending champion will be more aware than most after a performance that understandably just waned in places (certainly not with the clarion call opening from the horn), although the close was of pile-driving intensity. 

Big bang start

Earlier they started with a ‘big bang’ courtesy of Peter Meechan’s athletic onomatopoeic opener that pulsated with energy and drive in its short dash to the finishing tape. 

Bleak landscapes and decaying atmospheres came to mind, but the end result was ultimately humane and warmly uplifting

It was followed by Chris Roberston as the commanding focal point of Torstein Aagaard-Nilsen’s very Nordic ‘Euphonium Concerto No. 2’  – a work of eerie atmospheres and jazzy inclinations, melancholy and multi-phonics.  

Bleak landscapes and decaying atmospheres came to mind, but the end result was ultimately humane and warmly uplifting, the outstanding soloist drawing the listener ever deeper into the music the longer it went on.

Finely measured

You were also left with much the same feeling with a finely measured rendition of ‘Royal Parks’.

Dr David Thornton brought telling emphasise to the emotive feelings of George Lloyd’s most personal brass band work – the sense of taking flight away from a troubled mind to open, and the longing for a return to the joyful holidays of childhood to close. 

The central core, beautifully shaped and led in the solo lines though remained as intensely raw as it did on the fateful day it so poignantly commemorates

The central core, beautifully shaped and led in the solo lines remained as intensely raw as it did on the fateful day it so poignantly commemorates – a reopening of a terrible personal reminiscence of death in its most cruel and pitiless form.

Sun tan suavity 

A world premiere of interest opened the second half with Helena Zyskowska’s short, but intensely textured ‘Ondinas’,  which captured the capricious mystical sprites of the abyss – dangerous even in a fleeting approach as they disappeared into the dark.

With an instrument the colour of David Dickinson’s sun tan he wasn’t hard to miss, but there was also a glowing magnetism to his playing 

Life affirming feelings abounded though with Les Neish as he delivered the world premiere of Dorothy Gates’ ‘Concertino for Tuba and Brass Band’  with nonchalant suavity. 

With an instrument the colour of David Dickinson’s sun tan he wasn’t hard to miss, but there was also a glowing magnetism to his playing – the clarity helped (as they did in the euphonium concerto), by ensemble accompaniment of sensitivity.  

The outer movements of dancelike agility and rhythmic precision were played with stylish vibrancy, the central lament based on the hymn tune ‘Take Time to be Holy’, shaped with intuitive tenderness. 

Iwan Fox