“Emotion was forefront in Mark Elvin’s tone poem ‘On This Day, In This Life’. ”

Review by Louise Dumas

March 23rd  2024

The Capitol Theatre, Horsham

Conductor: Steve Dummer
Leader: Rachel Ellis
Soloist: Sophie Mather 

Elvin: On This Day, In This Life 

Stravinsky: Violin Concerto

Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5

Drama and emotion characterised the programme chosen by conductor Steve Dummer

with the HSO.

Stravinsky’s only Violin Concerto from 1931 comes from his neoclassical period when

harmonic style was expressed in contemporary language: an ultra-modern treatment of

old forms used spiky dissonance, asymmetrical rhythms and idiosyncratic orchestral

spacings. This creates a serious challenge for the orchestra who must achieve

cohesion amidst the chaos whilst exploring and demonstrating the textural complexity

involved. Here, the Horsham musicians succeeded dramatically. Soloist Sophie Mather

played with a beautiful assurance in the difficult, abstract music, a score which

commands attention and respect, if not love. Particularly fine was the violin/flute duet

and final Capriccio with its echoes of Bach.

Emotion was forefront in Mark Elvin’s tone poem ‘On This Day, in This Life’. Six orchestral

‘snapshots’ depict first waking to walking, dancing, running and finally coming to rest.

Gentle soft sounds of dawn build into long breathed melodies and exciting crescendi

before falling away as the light fades. It is attractive, contemporary music, accessible on

first hearing: it employs familiar rhythms and conventional musical idiom. Into the pot

goes a big band sound, a fairground, a tango, a march, a pop group, a chorale. It felt as if

the orchestra - and certainly the audience - enjoyed it very much.

Like all Tchaikovsky’s six symphonies, strict form is overtaken in the Fifth by streams of

melodic invention. Steve Dummer and the orchestra revelled in the colour and

originality of this famous composition, all the players gracefully combining to ensure its

perennial freshness – notably the solo horn. 

Wonderful music making under the baton of Steve Dummer. Lucky orchestra, lucky

Horsham.