The Proms season began with a curious mélange that was neither a bang nor a whimper. Its festive spirit was duly acknowledged with the Birthday Fanfare for Sir Henry Wood by Sir Arthur Bliss – a work honouring the Proms founder on his 75th birthday in 1944. Pleasantly tuneful, if unremarkable, its two-minute pageant for brass and timpani never had a chance to make anything more than a fleeting impression. But there was a neat and unbroken segue into Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture, given a restrained outing that had all the elements of a water colour, its polished surface beautifully sculpted, all cloudless skies with hints of an Atlantic swell emerging periodically. Overall, a leisurely affair that suggested a rose-tinted evocation of the composer’s visit to the Island of Staffa in 1829 when he suffered from seasickness. If anything, this gentlemanly approach from Sakari Oramo and the BBC Symphony Orchestra made sense of Mendelssohn’s concerns that his music might taste “‘more of counterpoint than of train oil, seagulls and salt cod”.
Much of its composure transferred itself into Sibelius’s Violin Concerto with Lisa Batiashvili joining the BBC players for an undemonstrative traversal. She opened in a confessional manner, a half-whispered first utterance that immediately set the tone for a wonderfully transparent account that privileged intimacy over dramatic tension. Dynamics were generally subdued, and it wasn’t until the finale when restraint gave way to less inhibited expression. At least that was the impression from my seat, and possibly a different experience for radio listeners. Throughout, the orchestra were superb collaborators, and if the pizzicato cellos and violas were barely audible near the beginning of the Adagio, the movement concluded as delicately as one could wish for. Matters really came alive during the characterful closing Allegro, Batiashvili bringing impish glee to her virtuosity, the whole vividly dance-like. A shame the audience felt the need to applaud between each movement and had the gentleman behind me not decided to work his way through a crisp packet during the first movement, I might have enjoyed the performance more.
No disruptions for the world premiere of Errollyn Wallen’s BBC commission; The Elements – a work based, according to the composer, on the “building blocks of sound”. That said, the work unfolded as a succession of unrelated ideas, variously jazzy, classical (Henry Purcell appeared briefly) and saccharine; fashioned into a well-orchestrated collage (including plenty of percussion, a referee’s whistle and finger clicking required by the audience) that was certainly fun, if forgettable, but fulfilled the brief as an occasional piece.
Given the rare performances of Vaughan William’s Sancta Civitas (Holy City) one might think this work, premiered in 1926, was intended as an occasional work too. The work, which draws on The Book of Revelation for its apocalyptic texts and transports us to a mystical realm, marks a shift away from the composer’s pastoralism prior to the Great War and brings us closer to the brooding tone of later works such as Job: A Masque for Dancing and the Fourth Symphony.But Sancta Civitas was supposedly the composer’s favourite of his choral works yet remained in the shadows for nearly century until its Proms premiere a decade ago, having baffled early critics for its austerity and textural complexity. Its neglect would not have been helped by Walton’s daringly jazz-influenced Belshazzar’s Feast (with which it shares the lament of the fall of Babylon), premiered in Leeds just a few years later when it became a huge critical and public success.
Yet Sancta Civitas is an atmospheric and superbly designed work (its choral scoring having echoes of Holst’s earlier Hymn of Jesus) that seems tailor made for the Albert Hall. Oramo drew out all the work’s visionary grandeur with complete assurance, superbly controlling the combined forces of the BBC Singers and Symphony Chorus, members of London Youth Choirs, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and two soloists. Without any reservations, Oramo made a compelling case for this underrated oratorio, if not quite persuading me the work is a masterpiece, but providing every reason for more frequent performances. And it would be difficult to imagine a finer performance than this one, with baritone Gerald Finley in excellent form and tenor Caspar Singh making the most of his all-too brief appearance in the closing bars. Not least was the exemplary contribution from the young singers high up in the gallery where their angelic voices floated down in perfect accord with those of the BBC Singers and Symphony Chorus. On this showing, Sancta Civitas may now find new audiences.
David Truslove
First Night of the Proms 2025
Bliss – Birthday Fanfare for Sir Henry Wood; Mendelssohn – Overture ‘The Hebrides’; Sibelius – Violin Concerto in D minor; Errollyn Wallen – The Elements; (BBC commission: world premiere); Vaughan Williams – Sancta Civitas.
Lisa Batiashvili – violin; Gerald Finley – bass-baritone; Caspar Singh – tenor; BBC Singers; BBC Symphony Chorus; Members of London Youth Choirs; BBC Symphony Orchestra; Sakari Oramo – conductor
Royal Albert Hall, Kensington, London 18 July 2025
All photos by Chris Christodoulou.