Conductor Daniel Blendulf
Piano Paul Lewis
Soprano Morgan England-Jones
Mozart Piano Concerto No.27 in B flat, K595
Mahler Symphony No.4
A heavenly and joyous start to the QSO’s 2019 season!
The Queensland Symphony Orchestra are back with the first of their popular Maestro series kicking off with Heavenly. The two pieces were chosen to lift your soul as an invigorating start to 2019 with Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.27 and Mahler’s stirring Symphony No.4.
The Concert Hall was full to the brim when visiting Scandinavian conductor Daniel Blendulf took the stage. Unfortunately, he was positioned behind the open lid of the Grand Piano for the first half so we did not get to witness his conducting style, or indeed if there was even a conductor! However, all the focus was on the international renowned pianist Paul Lewis, who is the 2019 Artist-in-Residence and has numerous accolades, including being awarded the Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2016. He was accompanied by a smaller than usual orchestra, as both pieces were written for less instruments, focusing on the piano in the first half and the soprano in the second half with less Brass.
No. 27 was Mozart’s last piano concerto and his final public appearance, as he died the same year in 1791 at the young age of 35. Paul Lewis’ beautiful recital of the Piano Concerto No.27 in B flat, K595, was welcomed with four raucous encores, after which Paul finally capitulated by treating the audience to a short but sweet piano solo.
The second half was much more dramatic, with Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No.4 in four movements, highlighting the powerful voice of the soprano Morgan England-Jones. Mahler wrote the symphony in 1899 incorporating an earlier 1892 piece, Das Himmlische Leben (The Heavenly Life), which was the inspiration for the later symphony. Das Himmlische Leben was originally a part of an anthology of German folk music and poetry which he titled Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Youth’s Magic Horn), and so had an Austrian folk theme with child-like musical interludes.
The first movement used sleigh bells to imitate the bells of a jester’s hat and the folk melody was highlighted with pizzicato from the strings and a flamboyant woodwind melody. More folk music follows in the second and third movements with a timpanic crash, ending with a luscious harp as heaven approaches in the fourth movement.
Mahler described the fourth movement “as looking through the eyes of a child and their view of Heaven.” Despite the song being in German, the QSO fortunately provided the Libretto with a translation in the program enabling all to follow the moving poem. Mahler was to quote “All we can do is dream of what it would be like to be children once again, without a care in the world”.
The last line of the concert was “Die englischen Stimmen Ermuntern die Sinnen, Daß alles für Freuden erwacht” (The angelic voices gladden our senses, so that all awaken for joy). All who attended the QSO’s first Maestro concert truly had “their senses gladdened” by the “angelic voice” of Morgan England-Jones and were “awakened with the joy” by the start of the new 2019 QSO season!
See the Queensland Symphony Orchestra website for the upcoming concert dates: https://www.qso.com.au.
Concert Hall, QPAC
16th Feb, 2019
Dr Gemma Regan