Above and featured image : Richard Tognetti AO, Artistic Director of Australian Chamber Orchestra forthe last thirty years.
When something is transfigured it is defined as being ‘transformed into something more beautiful and elevated’. The fortuitous changes in pandemic life that brought the popular Australian Chamber Orchestra back to live concert-making for five recent nights also sees many joyous transformations occur.
In a series of events which breathed healthy, well-managed and super-safe air into the once-darkened, now transformed City Recital Hall, the ACO strings launched back onto the stage from which they had been distanced to perform two chamber music works transformed into string orchestra versions on a very elevated level for our re-entry into ACO concert life.
In this way, like the protagonists dealing with shocking predicament in Richard Dehmel’s 1896 poem, Verklärte Nacht, eager masked audience and too-long isolated string players shared a quartet by the virtuosically consistent excellence of Mendelssohn and intricacies of tension in a famous emotional soundscape by Schoenberg, both finding much beauty in these altered-chamber-music guises.
William Barton’s collaboration with ACO on voice, guitar and didgeridoo was a beautiful transfiguration of orchestral treatment to start this different but special night. Here, the conversation in atmospheres with ACO’s players was a rewarding one, developing the melody of Barton’s lullaby-inspired melody Kalkadunga in gentle gestures across the orchestra and between strings and guest soloist.
This work and ACO’s collaboration with Barton for this return illustrated the continued potential for merging of First Nations and Western Classical stylistic traditions. The concept of healing and calm in this work’s extemporised-feeling exchange resonated well at his time of upheaval in the performing arts.
As we found our way cautiously but gratefully back to this reduced-capacity concert hall, with ACO’s other regular Sydney venue, the Sydney Opera House lies in concerning dormancy.
We were rewarded however with some surprisingly fine textural transfigurations on stage at Angel Place for the two well-known works in this shortened concert sans interval. There was plenty of exuberance to welcome us back to live orchestral performance.
As in the text of Dehmel’s Transfigured Night, many musicians and regular members of audiences have “felt a grievous longing for life’s fullness”. There is so much evidence in the arts industry where it seems “life has taken its revenge”. However, the standing and facemasked ovation at the end of the hour-long concert I attended transfigured this night at this darkened time.
Above : Composer, vocalist and instrumentalist, William Barton.
Mendelssohn’s hopeful and sparkling String Quartet in D major Op 44 No 1 was perfect fare to include in this concert. Here the transformation of Mendelssohn’s chiselled flamboyance and deeper intimations to string orchestra in the arrangement by ACO’s Richard Tognetti maintained Mendelssohn’s clarity, character, balance and poise.
The sparkling, conversational and extemporised nature of this work’s opening movement survived the expansion excellently, bringing relief, lightness and happiness at the reunion with these players and the fine response of the City Recital Hall acoustic.
The work’s third movement was also a highlight with regards to rendering Mendelssohn’s achingly elegant melodic and textural tightness on an orchestral scale. Follow this mesmerising movement, ACO brought the work to an energetic, spirited and jubilant conclusion.
Schoenberg’s early work, Transfigured Night (1899) with its complex, shifting arcs of atmosphere was originally written for the taut texture of string sextet. The huge and heightened range of colours and expression within the composer’s 1917 string orchestra arrangement was quite seamlessly presented by ACO here.
Admirable was the orchestra’s clear and accessible trajectory of Schoenberg’s musical fragments as well as instrumental suggestions of the extra musical narrative back and forth across the ensemble. ACO delivered the big picture of this shimmering work with welcome finesse.
There was a generally live addressing of its challenges and undulating emotions throughout. There was a thrilling contrast between exquisite stillness and soft playing with larger climactic moments.
This work and the entire short, diverse event formed a substantial offering for our re-entry into the essential world of live music. It was wonderful to once more be around the infectious flair of Australian performers such as ACO. May similar cases of such entertainment appear exponentially in all areas of the country.