When that final cut-off point arrives, when the Great Reaper pays us all the inevitable visit, are we really any the wiser as to the next step, what follows, what lies beyond? We can but speculate. And composers in their turn have attempted to sketch out aspects of this unknown territory, the approach to it as well as its own distinctive contours. Not necessarily only in old age: Richard Strauss, Lili Boulanger and Olivier Messiaen each confronted the question of human mortality while still in their twenties.
This concert, given by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales with additional choral forces, conducted by Ryan Bancroft as his tenure as principal conductor draws to a close, was yet another instance of remarkable programmatic planning, something at which the BBC excels, and which is sadly not reflected in most concert seasons.
Boulanger’s Vieille prière bouddhique makes use of a French translation of an ancient Buddhist text, and is cast for a tenor soloist and SATB chorus. Its subtitle of a daily prayer for the whole universe references the essential message: each creature and being is on a path to individual destiny, overcoming pain and attaining happiness, and moving freely towards the ultimate state of existence. In just eight minutes this piece with its ethereal choral textures not only set a reflective mood for the evening, but with its descending whole tone scales so reminiscent of Debussy, its delicate harmonies and exotic-sounding flute solo placed it firmly in the tradition of French elegance. James Way, singing from memory, contributed a clearly-voiced third stanza solo, and the combined forces of the BBC National Chorus of Wales and London Philharmonic Choir achieved an outpouring of ecstasy in the final stanza, capped by a blaze of brass.
Like Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, with which it is contemporaneous, Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater was written not in Latin, but in the vernacular. Both composers were motivated less by a strong religious faith than by a commitment to nationalist identity. Originally conceived as a requiem, Szymanowski dedicated his work to his young niece, tragically struck on the head by a falling effigy on her visit to a monastery in Lviv. Many influences can be felt: the mystical asceticism of the early Hellenic Church, contrapuntal Renaissance practices, the folk music of the Tatra region, the heavy chromaticism of Scriabin as well as Stravinsky’s neo-classical phase.
Bancroft directed a highly sympathetic view of the piece, attentive to its contemplative and prayerful qualities, and alive to its flashes of ecstatic radiance. The six sections of this Stabat Mater are clearly defined, with the three vocal soloists only singing together in the final movement. The Norwegian soprano Mari Eriksmoen’s narrative line in the opening movement was sensitively echoed by the angelic women’s voices, and she gave extra point and emphasis to Mary’s lamenting and grieving in the line “Rozpłakana, poszarpana”. The reference to “the blessed Mother of the only-begotten”, with an angelic matching of female soloist and choral forces came like balm to a troubled soul.
The baritone makes his first appearance in the second movement, “Quis est homo qui non fleret”. This performance benefited enormously from the strong and vibrant voice of Szymon Mechliński, making his Proms debut, his Slav diction superbly authoritative. Together with the full chorus, he made the final line of this movement (“Zanim Bogu dusze dal”), at which point Christ gives up the ghost, dramatically telling.
In the third movement, “O Eia, Mater, Fons Amoris”, the mezzo-soprano soloist, here ably taken by Paula Murrihy, extended the mood of mourning, with bassoons and low horns contributing a sombre accompaniment, amplified by a strong articulation of grief in the concluding stanza. The fourth movement, “Fac me tecum pie flere”, for the two female soloists and a cappella chorus, demonstrated a particularly hushed, spiritual intensity.
Szymanowski’s very effective writing was to the fore in the fifth movement, “Virgo virginium praeclara”, not only in the discursive elements for the baritone soloist, again finely conveyed by Mechliński, but also in the use of plaintive oboes and mesmeric quality of insistent orchestral tolling. It reached a rousing climax of full orchestral panoply and organ, graced by the fervent choral singing, for the closing reference to the Day of Judgement.
The composer himself described the opening to the sixth movement, “Christe, cum sit hinc exire”, given to the soprano solo, as the most beautiful melody he had ever managed to write. Indeed, the entire movement is imbued with a quiet radiance, here gaining much from the very soft, angelic singing of the women’s voices as well as the touches of instrumental contrast, such as the doleful duet between mezzo and cor anglais.
There is a peculiar intensity that comes from any writing for human voices. Yet there was no lack of instrumental magnitude in the two purely orchestral works that made up the second half of this concert, continuing the theme of glimpses of the afterlife. Messiaen’s four symphonic meditations, L’Ascension, represent a very pictorial approach to contemplative music. It was like looking intently at icons or frescoes or gazing at stained-glass windows in great Gothic cathedrals. The first movement has a prominent role for brass and woodwind, creating a spare, austere feeling, but also in the blocks of sound an almost Brucknerian reverence as the rising motifs stretch into the spaces above. Here, the tuning of the brass was not quite impeccable, the playing overall just a little too careful, the inherent majesty not fully conveyed at a very flowing tempo.
The two middle movements have a lot of energy. Bancroft made the culmination of the second movement, the “Serene Hallelujahs of a Soul Seeking Heaven”, very illustrative, rather like watching a gigantic flock of birds suddenly taking off into the higher reaches. In the third movement the combination of chattering brass chorales and string counterpoint, imitating waves that suddenly rise and fall, breezes that pick up and then abate, drew comparison with Debussy’s La Mer, and in the vigorous writing for cellos and double basses there was more than a hint of Bartók.
Messiaen’s masterstroke was to write a concluding movement solely for strings. The BBC Welsh players quickly established a feeling of calm and serenity, like ascending a ladder slowly stretching into infinity, accompanied by gentle waves of ecstasy and the flutters of an expectant heart.
Strauss’s Death and Transfiguration, the first of the composer’s tone poems with a detailed programmatic description, owes much to his fascination for a painting by an unknown representative of the Flemish School which shows a man on his deathbed. When he lay on his own deathbed in 1949, Strauss himself commented: “Dying is just as I composed it in Tod und Verklärung”. Its six sections are full of contrasts, an opening Largo with ensuing Allegro molto agitato elements, an oboe harking back to childhood, plucked double basses like heartbeats and a stroke of the tam-tam signalling death. It’s the kind of score Bancroft is very effective at realising: his control was always apparent, yet with sufficient expressive eloquence to make individual moments tell, all without a hint of indulgence.
Death is the Great Leveller. Nobody has ever returned from the distant and alien region towards which we are all heading. Albert Einstein suggested in a letter written in the last year of his life that the distinction between past, present and future is merely “a stubbornly persistent illusion, meaning that in the grand scale of the universe a separation between moments doesn’t exist”. The moment of our own passing? It fills some with dread, others with a sense of resignation, and those blessed with religious belief untrammelled joy. In the meantime composers will continue to explore, as they have done previously, the greatest mystery of all.
Alexander Hall
Afterlife: Visions of the Beyond
Lili Boulanger – Vieille prière bouddhique; Szymanowski – Stabat Mater; Messiaen – L’Ascension; Richard Strauss Tod und Verklärung (Death and Transfiguration)
Mari Eriksmoen (soprano); Paula Murrihy (mezzo-soprano); James Way (tenor); Szymon Mechliński (baritone); BBC National Chorus of Wales; London Philharmonic Choir; BBC National Orchestra of Wales; Ryan Bancroft (conductor)
Royal Albert Hall, London, 23 July 2026
All photos © Mark Allan