BBC SSO

City Halls, Glasgow

Keith Bruce

Four stars

Under the somewhat prosaic title “Two British Voices”, this concert, to be broadcast on Saturday October 24 in BBC Radio 3’s Hear and Now slot, showcased the music of Oliver Knussen and Ryan Wigglesworth, to whom the older composer has been something of a mentor, and who was also in firm charge on the podium for the evening.

There were more voices to be heard, however, most obviously that of adventurous soprano Claire Booth on Wigglesworth’s own Augenlieder, setting four contrasting but carefully complementary poems by Robert Browning, Egon Schiele, Arthur Rimbaud and John Berryman, and a suite from Knussen’s one-act opera version of Maurice Sendak’s children’s book Where The Wild Things Are. Although vastly different works, a playful use of words and other utterances for their sonic rather than literal meaning, made them ideal partners here, and Booth’s powerful theatricality the ideal instrument.

Another welcome solo voice was that of SSO leader Laura Samuel, missing from her usual place and soloist for the Scottish premiere of Wigglesworth’s Violin Concerto, a hugely demanding work that was a welcome opportunity to hear her virtuoso playing, with her string colleagues in impressive support, although there were moments when that balance might be even better appreciated on the broadcast, on the road to its distinctly “classical” conclusion.

There is a very particular clarity that the SSO strings bring to this orchestra’s performance of modern music, and it was the fore in Wigglesworth’s newest orchestral work, last year’s Etudes- Tableaux, made for the Cleveland Orchestra. Like the punchy four minutes of Knussen’s Flourish with Fireworks that opened the second half, the piece also provided a comprehensive work-out for the whole band.