MUSIC REVIEW: Vernon Handley and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra

Feb 11 2008 by Glyn Mon Hughes, Liverpool Daily Post

IT SEEMS as though English music – for the concert hall, at least – divides into two camps.

There’s the flag-waving, foot-tapping jamboree of the Last Night of the Proms, or there’s the rather more delicate, thoughtful and somewhat soul-searching works of the kind championed by veteran conductor Vernon Handley.

And this was a typical Tod programme: Bax, Britten and Vaughan Williams.

The highlight had to be Britten’s utterly serene Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings.

Soloist Ian Bostridge was exceptional. A confident performance and a voice which was as powerful as it was pure with an almost total lack of vibrato and a piercing clarity which brought the work to life.

Frank Lloyd’s near- perfect horn playing, too, brought an extra dimension.

Bax’s fanciful tone-poem The Garden of Fand moved from dreamy transparency, through intense drama to complete repose while the Fifth Symphony of Vaughan Williams brought something of another world to the performance.

The opening prelude worked up to a frenzy, yet it was not without that typically English reserve. Some great moments for the brass in the condensed scherzo led into the extended and quite beautiful romance.

Handley really knows how to get the best out of an orchestra. And when he is with friends – as he obviously is with the RLPO – it’s a musical experience no one should miss.