{"id":5031,"date":"2019-03-16T10:19:17","date_gmt":"2019-03-16T10:19:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.larkreviews.co.uk\/?p=5031"},"modified":"2019-03-16T10:19:17","modified_gmt":"2019-03-16T10:19:17","slug":"hastings-philharmonic-orchestra-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/?p=5031","title":{"rendered":"Hastings Philharmonic Orchestra"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><strong>St Mary in the Castle, Hastings, Friday 15 March 2019<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>A cold night and very little heating in St Mary in the Castle seemed to reflect the three northern composers, though the warmth of the music and the immediacy of the scores certainly made up for any drop in temperature.<\/p>\n<p>This was essentially a concert for string orchestra, which drew on the ensemble strengths of the ensemble and the excellent balance which they create. It was also unusual for its guest conductor, Scott Sandmeier, making a welcome addition to the many professional musicians working with the company. His light touch and accurate control showed fine rapport with his players.<\/p>\n<p>The concert opened with Grieg\u2019s <em>Holberg Suite, <\/em>the <em>Praeludium<\/em> providing bite and the <em>Gavotte<\/em> really bouncy rhythms. The <em>Sarabande<\/em> reflected a more English serenity with overtones of Finzi. After the interval we moved from Norway to Finland with Sibelius\u2019 highly introspective <em>Impromptu for strings<\/em> before the familiar warmth of Tchaikovsky\u2019s <em>Serenade for Strings. <\/em>The emotional impact of this, after the Sibelius and the Philip Glass was most touching.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-5032\" src=\"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1072\" height=\"712\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga.jpg 1072w, https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga-300x199.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga-768x510.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga-1024x680.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Stephanie-Gurga-452x300.jpg 452w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1072px) 100vw, 1072px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>But it was Philip Glass\u2019 <em>Tirol Concerto<\/em> which really blew the cobwebs away. This is an unusual work as only the long second movement feels like Glass\u2019 core minimalist compositions. It has a wonderfully timeless quality, based on a gently unfolding <em>Passacaglia <\/em>which the pianist elaborates and entwines in ever-evolving musical lines which never reach a conclusion. It is as far from conventional melodic creation as one could wish, and does not so much end as simply stop. Magnificently played by Stephanie Gurga, she also brought a lively humour to the outside movements where Glass indulges himself in jazzy rhythms and syncopations. It is surprising the work is not far better known. It would have made a splendid addition to the heavily romantic agenda for the Piano Concerto Competition!<\/p>\n<p>Brian Hick<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>St Mary in the Castle, Hastings, Friday 15 March 2019 A cold night and very little heating in St Mary in the Castle seemed to reflect the three northern composers, though the warmth of the music and the immediacy of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/?p=5031\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5031"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5033,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031\/revisions\/5033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.larkreviews.wickedlemon.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}