Summer Pops

Press, 10 February 1988, Page 8

Summer Pops

IBM Summer Pops. The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra conducted by William Southgate, in the Town Hall Auditorium, February 9, 8 p.m. Reviewed by Paul Goodson. I approached this concert with some doubts concerning the programme fare, which comprised almost entirely sweet courses. Nor am I entirely convinced that the two halves were well integrated either in content or musical styles. The opening item, John Ritchie’s “Overture: Papanui Road” is, like all his works, extremely well crafted with not one superfluous note. It is an engaging, warm-hearted piece: astringent without being coarse, and brimming with quirky melodicism that never becomes flaccid or self-indulgent. To my ears it is also more consciously and sympathetically evocative of locale than some of Lilburn’s and Larry Pruden’s “scenic” studies. Notwithstanding the gains in weight and brilliance from the N.Z.S.O. players, who negotiated the rapid impressionistic changes with precision and zest, memories of a previous performance lead me to feel this “Overture” is better handled by a smaller ensemble. Mendelssohn’s E minor violin concerto, though a comparatively late work, is so expressive of youthful vitality and genius as always to seem appropriate in the hands of a young soloist, especially one as technically assured as Adele Anthony. Sure-fingered and clean of bow thfeughout, she imbued th£j lovely canta-

bile lines of the central movement with serenity and poise, and brought pleasantly giocoso quality to the Finale. Hers was a thoughtful rather than a passionate approach, however, and experience should bring more compelling projection and flair, even in winsome, piano passages, and encourage greater independence from conductor and accompanying body. The orchestra gave well-scaled and accurate, though not particularly lyrical, support. It is easy, when listening to the vocal and instrumental “medleys” — ghastly word — that comprised the second half of the programme, to lose sight of the true relationship between, semi-inde-pendent Tin Pan Alley hits and fullyintegrated, popular — particularly Broadway — musical theatre. A “Top of the Pops” selective approach is the only realistic one for a concert of this nature, but obscures the extraordinary achievement of a form which completely eclipsed nineteenthcentury European operetta. But there was variety enough all the same in the lilting eloquence of Sondheim’s “Send in the Clowns,” the jostling jazz-inspired syncopations and beguiling melodies of Cole Porter, and the more hard-hitting commercial panache of Andrew Lloyd Webber. William Southgate’s taut arrangements and Malcolm McNeill’s relaxed and personable vocal style caught something of the dynamic yet elegant facets of this imaginative and diverse form.