Halle Orchestra, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester

Lynne Walker
Thursday 17 October 2002 00:00 BST
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In what must have added up to the most expensive 10 minutes in the history of the Hallé, 100 or so orchestral musicians sat mute and motionless on the Bridgewater Hall platform while the spotlight focused on the counter-tenor Michael Chance and the lutenist Nigel North. Five songs from Jacobean England is not the stuff of which Hallé programmes are normally made, but this tribute to the King's Men and music in Shakespeare's plays was a fascinating highlight in the first of the Hallé's Bard-themed series, Such Sweet Thunder. How Chance's vocal expressiveness combines to give an impression of both intimacy and ethereal "distance" isn't easily explained. But from the spectral "Full fathom five" to the merry ballad "Get you hence", he captured the mood of each song vividly and North's empathy with words, music and singer was exemplary.

The opener, Elgar's overture In the South, was given a refreshingly unbombastic reading, the bulldoggish elements that inspired the initial theme kept to a merciful minimum. And after the musical representation of "drums and tramplings", what lingered in the memory was Timothy Pooley's tender account of the solo viola part, magically coloured by the most discreet glockenspiel accompaniment.

This would have been the season, admitted conductor Mark Elder before the concert, to programme Berlioz's dramatic symphony Romeo and Juliet, but for the moment we had to make do with its elfin Scherzo, preceded by the parallel speech in Shakespeare's play. Elder, always game to join in anything that's going on, spoke the brief introductory lines of Romeo and Benvolio as if to the stage born, before the actor Sam West gave a surprisingly measured account of Mercutio's quickfire description of the malevolent fairy, Queen Mab. With a surge of orchestral energy, the spell was taken up in an eloquent account of the Scherzo, its floating phrases pressed effortlessly onwards, the strings gossamer-like.

Finally, in a further celebration of Walton's centenary, Elder assembled his forces for Christopher Palmer's substantial reconstruction of Walton's film music for Henry V, A Shakespeare Scenario. From the Globe Playhouse to the ringing plains of Agincourt, Walton was inspired to flex his cinematic muscles and create music fit for the soldier-king played by Olivier himself.

The young King Hal is not a part that West has yet played and whether or not, in production, he would render the St Crispian's day speech in quite such a conversational style is debatable. With a welcome absence of gung-ho, however, West characterised his various roles with subtlety and sensitivity, chilling in his repudiation of old Falstaff at the Boar's Head, wistful in Pistol's farewell to Mistress Quickly, encouraging on Harfleur Beach for "Once more into the breach..."

Great film music this Henry V score may be, but that is what it remains. Despite Palmer's seamless stitching together of a patchwork soundtrack, and despite some basic lighting effects, and despite the music being stamped with every last ounce of pomp, pageantry and passion that Elder could muster from his gallant players and singers, it remains strangely one-dimensional as a concert piece. One longed for the full montage.

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