“Their Moment is now”, said conductor Jonathon Lo at the end of Orchestra Victoria’s outstanding performance at the Hanson Dyer Hall on Saturday, July 25. The night before, they had held their Meet @ The Market performance at the North Melbourne Meat Market. Here Jonathon Lo and the orchestra were up on a large dais with the audience around three sides. We were treated to an informal insight into the program for the Friday night concert, drinks and nibbles in hand. It was rather like being in an enormous lounge room with an orchestra before us. Alice Keath was the guest presenter and talked with Jonathon Lo about the works, the composers and the orchestral demands.
Beginning with Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin, Jonathon Lo discussed the subtleties of Ravel’s orchestration, getting the orchestra to play sectional parts to demonstrate the effects. The sound in the Meat Market is very dry, quite exposing of the orchestra who performed flawlessly and with good grace (given the audience was kind of breathing down their necks). We heard a couple of contrasting movements: the Menuet and the Rigaudon. Ravel orchestrated four movements from his piano work, composed to honour the memories of friends killed in World War 1.
The orchestra then gave us Georg Philipp Telemann’s Trumpet Concerto in D in its entirety with Orchestra Victoria’s Section Principal Trumpet, Mark Fitzpatrick, as soloist. He played brilliantly on a piccolo trumpet, which he briefly discussed with the audience. Mark Fitzpatrick repeated the Telemann Concerto on the Saturday might in the Hanson Dyer Hall, where the livelier acoustic gave his playing added lustre.
The final work “for inspection” at the Meat Market was Louise Ferrenc’s Symphony No. 3. Jonathon Lo took us through two movements, demonstrating the validity of claims that Ferrenc was and still is a composer of serious import.
On the following Saturday, Orchestra Victoria presented the full concert at the Hanson Dyer Hall as part of their Southbank Series. The Hanson Dyer Hall retained some of the intimacy of the of the Meat Market concert with the added benefit of a friendly acoustic that lifted the orchestra’s delivery to new heights.
In talking with Jonathon Lo one learns that the orchestra’s long experience as a pit orchestra for ballet, opera and film has helped it develop a tight, collegiate sound. The orchestra looks happy on stage and passes phrasings and ideas around with spontaneity and generosity. This was particularly important in the Ravel, as these works tend to be built on small cells of ideas that are brought together to form longer arcs of sound, passing timbral and musical developments around the orchestra. Delivering a brilliant sheen, the players always kept the sound buoyant. This kind of teamwork is distinctive and results in impressively tidy attack, totally responsive to Jonathon Lowe’s engaging conducting.
It is about time that Louise Ferrenc’s Symphony No. 3 stopped being a revelation. So much brilliant music has been written by women composers across the centuries it is tantamount to a crime that is has been pointedly neglected until now. Ferrenc’s symphonic writing is quite conservative in style yet deeply original in ideas and dramatic structure. It moves from restrained lyricism to thunderous utterances that really make you sit up and take notice. Sometimes referred to as “the female Beethoven”, Ferrenc shows that she was no shadow of any other composer.
The whole Orchestra Victoria program was dedicated to their long-standing trombonist of 46 years, Scott Evans, who was in the audience. Two of the trombonists from the orchestra spoke movingly at the beginning about the importance of Scott Evans to their playing and their own careers in the orchestra. Others spoke about Scott’s importance in keeping the players connected. From comments by others in the orchestra on the night, it was clear that this band was more than a collection of people doing a job; this orchestra has close-knit bonds within it which is reflected in their unique sound. Jonathon Lo has brought a freshness and enthusiasm to their playing; it is palpable. As Jonathon Lo said in his own praise of the orchestra at the end, “their moment is now”. It does seem as if Orchestra Victoria is beginning a new and exciting chapter.
Photo credit: Tim Neal
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Nicholas Tolhurst reviewed “Prismatic Echoes”, presented by Orchestra Victoria at the Meat Market on July 25 and at the Hanson Dyer Hall on July 26, 2025.
