Nigel Westlake’s The Glass Soldier

My review notes for this time last year record a concert by the Australian Youth Orchestra and, in the same week, the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra with Missa Solis – Requiem for Eli by Nigel Westlake. Both were very fine performances, and so it was gratifying recently to hear the AYO playing the music of Westlake, in a concert that also included Ravel and Stravinsky. Westlake’s score, The Glass Soldier, written to accompany Hannie Rayson’s 2007 play, was inspired by the life of a young Australian, Nelson Ferguson, who served in France as a Field Ambulance officer in World War I. Both Ferguson’s daughter and his grandson Don Farrands (who commissioned the work) were in the audience, lending the story poignancy – and verifying some of the significant events captured in the music. Westlake’s program notes for The Glass Soldier were illuminating but hardly needed, as the music throughout was so evocative of the story. The opening movement both had the sense of a journey tentatively beginning, while suggesting (through subdued percussion and brass) the nearness of war. ‘The Age of Destruction’ which followed encompassed the bleakness of the battlefields, as well as its terrifying clashes. Conductor Arvo Volmer and the orchestra gave a performance that was both exciting and well judged in conveying the many moods and contrasts of the work. There were fine solos and section work, so many in fact that one can only praise the whole ensemble. It is hard to think how the performance could have been significantly bettered. The same could be said of the second item on the program, Ravel’s Concerto in D for the Left Hand, with its particular challenges for the pianist. The lower strings that introduce the work had an ominous sound, perfectly realised by the orchestra – and so forming a link with the war story that was the Westlake. A reminder too that the pianist Paul Wittgenstein himself had lost his left hand in the same war and courageously commissioned works such as the Ravel so he could continue performing despite his shocking injury. Soloist Kristian Chong showed from the outset how brilliance could be achieved with just one hand. The work is technically demanding, for example with the melody mostly part of chords that seem to run the full expanse of the instrument. Lush orchestration easily made a place for the piano, played with delicacy and technical prowess by Chong as each movement segued easily into the next. A brilliant section with staccato notes and chords was followed by a number of duets” featuring the soloist and excellent members of the orchestra. Chong was given a final moment in the spotlight with a dazzling cadenza, before the work ended rather abruptly (unlike most Romantic piano concertos). But it was the overall performance of Chong and the AYO that stayed in the memory, and drew enthusiastic applause from the audience. After interval the orchestra played more Ravel, in the gentler shape of Mother Goose: Suite, and finally Stravinsky’s The Firebird: Suite. The Stravinsky naturally posed the greater challenge for the orchestra but it was well met, the climax of the work – heralded by French horns, and drawing in all the instruments – a sensational finale for the concert. The future of classical music in Australia is in good hands with performers of this calibre. Rating: 4 stars out of 5   Nigel Westlake’s The Glass Soldier Australian Youth Orchestra Conductor: Arvo Volmer   WESTLAKE – The Glass Soldier RAVEL – Concerto in D for the Left Hand RAVEL: Mother Goose Suite STRAVINSKY – The Firebird Suite   Melbourne Town Hall 19 February