Charles Pope Jr., Concerto.net, 30th July 2015
Canada’s National Youth Orchestra again gave a stunning summer performance in Ottawa during late July. As always, the orchestra comprised the cream of top young players, most of them already well launched on careers as orchestral musicians and future teachers. A good deal of the credit this year goes to UK maestro Michael Francis, no stranger to this city, having guest conducted the National Arts Centre Orchestra with brilliance and aplomb last November…
…Conductor Francis was in his element leading [Holst’s The Planets] work, and directed a performance which was worthy of an established professional ensemble. The opening movement Mars, the Bringer of War was appropriately brutalist. Venus, the Bringer of Peace was delicately serene; the very brief and soft first desk violin and cello solos were a highlight. Mercury, the Winged Messenger is characterized by Puck-like fidgeting until the strings take a turn dominating this scherzo-like movement. Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity may be best known of the seven movements and starts with bustling preparation leading to a parade-like march, constant bustling energy, then a march recap with strings. Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age incorporates a variant on Dies Irae leading to an ending more serious than ominous, and possibly suggesting the beginning of a near death experience. Uranus, The Magician, after a fine brass opening soon launches a seeming homage to Dukas’ The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, leading to another march (this one more military, and with ‘canons’ going off, thanks to the percussion), then soft strings before a ferocious, dissonant climax.
The final movement, Neptune, the Mystic, is mainly quiet and taut, until the off-stage chorus (thanks to absent female string players) brings this extraordinary, colorful work to a near silent climax, almost as startling as its brutalist beginning.
