What a bright start to a wonderful evening of 20th century music.
Gershwin's An American in Paris is a blend of two different cultures and the Wolsey Orchestra captured both with the brashness of the big band and jazz sequences, plus the sensitivity of the orchestra, in a way that delighted the audience.
Kerenza Peacock is an Ipswich-born young musician now making good on the international stage and
was greeted enthusiastically when she came out to play solo in Barber's Violin Concerto.
The second movement is particularly beautiful and melancholic and she achieved a
breathtaking intensity, sustained in the quicksilver but all-too-short last movement.
Rachmaninov wrote his Symphonic Dances in the last years of his life, at the start of the Second World War, and while they do not necessarily have the fireworks of his earlier works they are full of beauty and innovation.
William Carslake was in total control of the orchestra's forces and mesmerised with his sensitive interpretation and expressive conductor's dance on the podium.
Unable to put on their regular Spring concert at the Ipswich Corn Exchange whilst it is being refurbished, the Wolsey Orchestra were faced with a dilemma. Where can a symphony orchestra put on a concert in Ipswich during the month of February? Indeed future concerts are under threat as current plans state that the Corn Exchang is to be regularly mothballed during the late winter months. As a result Suffolk's major metropolis is now unable to host symphonic concerts and other large scale cultural events for a significant part of the concert season.
The Wolsey's answer to their dilemma, for this year at least, was to downsize to a small chamber orchestra and stage a delightful programme to a sell out audience at St Peter's by the Waterfront. Conductor Andrew Morley, on his third engagement with the Wolsey, is obviously very popular with the orchestra, with whom he exhibits extraordinary rapport. He is clearly a colossus of ability and musical leadership and with youth on his side is destined for success in the highest echelons of professional music making.
The evening opened with Mozart's Overture to Don Giovanni, whose brooding dramatic tensions and contrasts were brilliant exploited and conveyed by Andrew Morley who coaxed a wonderful response from the Wolsey with every nuance and sweep of his baton. Indeed this was merely the prelude to a joyful evening of music making that went on to encompass highly distinguished accounts of Mendelssohn's scintillating "Italian" symphony and the sublime Pastoral vision of Beethoven's 6th Symphony.
Ipswich is fortunate to host an orchestra of this calibre - ideas to support its mission of providing large scale and high quality symphonic concerts in Ipswich throughout the year to our letters column please!
Wolsey Orchestra is a member of the Ipswich Arts Association.To find out more about the Association, its members, events and activities, and to read Images magazine online, visit www.ipswich-arts.org.uk
The Wolsey Orchestra is a member of the National Federation of Music Societies
