The Axe Vale Orchestra’s excellent concert in Colyton Town Hall focused on Music and Landscape with two very evocative English works and, in the opinion of many radio listeners, one of the greatest of all symphonies. 

Gustav Holst came from a line of professional musicians and despite his name was, like his parents, British-born. He loved England, rambled widely and was much influenced by such luminaries as Vaughan-Williams and William Morris.  He collected many English folk songs and incorporated some of these into his Somerset Rhapsody No 2 which the AVO played.  They caught the shimmering opening beautifully and the oboe d’amore melody was superb.  The flute tune and the march like tune which followed were nicely captured.

George Butterworth always fills me with sorrow; that such a special talent should have been allowed to fight in the trenches, where he was shot by a sniper, is beyond belief.  The high string chords which open the Shropshire Lad Rhapsody were really chillingly played.  The poems by Hausman which it is based on are rather bleak in character, too.  The conductor Walter Brewster caught the ebb and flow of this work so well. 

What can one write about Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony?  It was revolutionary, but then, so was most of his music.  It was not only the musical techniques but also the images which the music conjures up, with individual instruments invoking particular sounds: clarinets for the cuckoo, timpani for the thunder and so on.  Needless to say, the AVO coped more than adequately with all this. 

The opening had a fresh and bucolic feel especially the clarinets and there was some suave detail (the conductor is a clarinettist).  And how lovely actually to be there and to pick up all the gorgeous detail in the score; the cellos seemed to have some rather fiendish passages especially in the opening movement.  The relaxed amble of the second movement nicely blended the instruments, especially the woodwind. The following peasant dance had plenty of rustic thump followed by the extraordinary storm movement with the timpanist having fun. The transition to the final feelings of thanksgivings after the storm was a real joy. 

Well done to the AVO and we’ll see you at the Minster, Axminster on 19 May.  I think we may be hearing from the excellent Walter Brewster again.