Otaka BBC NOW Huw Watkins and Rachmaninov

Tadaaki Otaka, photo: Masuhide Sato, courtesy Askonas Holt

Huw Watkins The Moon at the Proms, Tadaaki Otaka conducting BBC National Orchestra of Wales, tyhe BBC National Chorus of Wales and the Philhamonia Voices.  It's real music, thank goodness, not made-to-order to fit BBC obsessions with non-musical targets. To prepare, Tōru Takemitsu's Twill by Twilight, a very good choice since it worked  with Watkins’s The Moon.  The programme, however, didn't at first seem to cohere. The Polovtsian Dances from Borodin's Prince Igor and Rachmaninov's The Bells on the surface bear little relation to the refined sensibility of Takemitsu and Watkins, but Otaka's performance showed why the two parts combined : bell-like sounds, obviously, but also more, of which, please read below.
Watkins is so well known that he hardly needs an introduction. And neither does Takemitsu, revered by many, including Oliver Knussen. Watkins has established a strong track record, as performer as well as composer.  Read his bio here from Schott,  his publishers. The Moon is a new venture in the sense that he's done lots of work for orchestra and chamber ensemble, but relatively little large scale work for chorus and orchestra. "Inspired by the fiftieth anniversary of the moon landing this year, my
new work for chorus and orchestra uses favourite poems by Percy B.
Shelley, Philip Larkin and Walt Whitman to explore the sense of wonder we identify with the moon and space. The piece tries to capture our experience of viewing the moon from Earth, and is also somehow about looking back at us here on Earth from above."  Bright, face-moving rivulets of sound - winds used to good effect - , introduce and illuminate the first choral section, where text is set so the words are occluded, in darkness, so to speak, suggesting mysteries. If the setting also evokes ancient hymnal, that, too, is reasonable : man has always revered, and feared, the unknown. I liked the way the highest voices in the choir "took off", so to speak, ascending over the mass. In the central orchestral interlude, bell-like percussion  and clear-toned winds created atmosphere, but there's more to this piece than impressionism. Forceful, dominant chords suggest the power of invisible forces - the moon may be distant and small but it controls the tides of the oceans on Earth. The music waxes and wanes, pulsating with a steady flow.  Zig zag figures (strings) dart : liveliness against a darker background. The instrumentation includes celeste, glockenspiel, and organ, for deeper resonance.  An attractive part for piccolo!  The chorus returned, in full force, before subsiding, slowly to hushed silence. As the voices faded, shimmering, magical bell-like sounds animate the orchestra. An affirmative coda - voices and full throated orchestra, in union.
In Rachmaninov's The Bells op 35, it's not just bells that ring out.  Oleg Dolgov's tenor rang out, magnificently, immediately establishing that the piece is about human beings, at different phases of life, the bells ringing out changes.  Natalya Romaniw (not Romanov, as the BBC had her down) is actually Welsh. She's regal, though not royal, and  a good choice for Otaka and the BBC NOW.  I have no idea how fluent her Russian is, but she sang with great clarity : a strong, operatic performance, bringing out the undercurrents of heroism that infuse the piece, which possibly meant more to Rachmaninov and his appreciation of Russian history than it might have to the poet Edgar Allen Poe. The third movement, The Loud Alarm Bells with its rousing choruses and high drama belong to a distinctly Russian sensibility.  In the last movement, the bells tolled with funereal gloom, for now the bells are iron, mournful and full of portent. Iurii Samoilov's baritone had the near-bass timbre this section needs to come over well.  The BBC NOW didn't need to have a "Russian" sound, Otaka drawing from his players brighter and more magical, even fairy tale lightness, which does, in fact, connect to Russian genres much better than heavy handed noise for its own sake. hence the connection between Rachmaninov, Takemitsu and Huw Watkins!  And so to the fantasy world of Polovtsian Dances from Borodin's Prince Igor.

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