Perth Festival Classical music preview: A world-class programme awaits

May 3 2011 by Alison Anderson, Perthshire Advertiser Tuesday

THIS year marks the 40th Anniversary of Perth Festival of the Arts and the festival has come a long way since its early years.

The festival now encompasses a line-up of world-class artistes with performances to suit all tastes in music.

The highlight of the Festival is always the final Gala concert and this year Perth welcomes the world-renowned American violin virtuoso Joshua Bell who will be joined by the cellist Steven Isserlis and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields for the Brahms Double Concerto, which will be a truly memorable experience.

The Academy, under the direction of Ian Brown, will also be performing Haydn’s Symphony No 13, and Mendelssohn effervescent ‘Italian’ Symphony. This concert is not to be missed and will again highlight the tremendous kudos Perth Festival now have on the international stage.

If that isn’t enough, Joshua Bell and Steven Isserlis will also be performing a chamber concert with Jeremy Denk piano the previous evening in an all Schubert concert. This will feature the Arpeggione Sonata, the duo for violin and piano in A, and the wonderful Trio in E flat. Again, a great coup for Perth Festival of the Arts with two nights of high quality music making played by these acclaimed international artistes.

Other concerts feature the Bolshoi Symphony Orchestra, under conductor Alan Buribayev, with an all-Russian programme featuring extracts from Tchaikovsky’s opera Eugene Onegin and Prokofiev’s ballet suite Cinderella. This world famous ensemble will also feature two of the Bolshoi Opera’s principal singers.

The popular Coffee Concerts are at 11am on Wednesday and Thursday, May 25 and 26, and feature this year’s Artists in Residence, the Tippett Quartet.

They have two interesting programmes with the first featuring music from the film composer Bernard Hermann, whose 100th anniversary is celebrated this year. His most famous score is for the Alfred Hitchcock film ‘Psycho’ and the Tippett Quartet will play a suite from the film – so expect some scary sounds in this intriguing programme!

The second Coffee Concert has more familiar fare with Haydn and Beethoven quartets but also a performance of Tippett’s first quartet. Both concerts are preceded by coffee served from 10.30am.

As in the format of recent years, English Touring Opera arrives at the Festival for two nights (May 20 and 21) with first Mozart’s late operatic masterpiece La clemenza di Tito. This epic opera is sung in English and given an updated 1920/30s look.

The following evening is a Puccini double bill: Il tabarro (The Cloak) and Gianni Schicchi.

These two contrasting operas are wonderfully dramatic pieces featuring a moody romance and a sparkling comedy to give any operagoer a wonderful evening. Both nights have a free pre-opera talk in Redrooms Theatre Bar at 6.30pm prior to the performances.

This 40th anniversary year sees a welcome return to ballet at the festival with the Peter Schaufuss Danish Dance Company in Sir Frederick Ashton’s version of Romeo and Juliet accompanied by Prokofiev’s dramatic music. The work is faithful to Ashton’s choreography but with a modern twist – Schaufuss recreates the work in 2010 with a 21st century staging.

As always, youth music plays an important part in the Festival with daily lunchtime schools concerts in St John’s Kirk at 12.30pm and a special ‘local’ musician concert by violinist Ben Norris on Saturday lunchtime at 11am. Ben, from Glenfarg, is currently pursuing a professional career in London.

Finally, two concerts with an unuaual classical music flavour will both interest and enlighten the audience: Penguin Café perform their own unique music in a classical/folk style and for those who like their music with a touch of comedy there is a return of riotous Rainer Hersch. On this occasion the Tippett Quartet and musicians from the Scottish Royal Academy join him to form his Classical Comedy Orchestra and Hersch will no doubt be giving his usual wonderful mix of irreverent comedy and classical music.

This 40th Festival has a plethora of great music featuring world-class musicians: it is, indeed, something for everyone.