Timpani and drum ripped across the high raked stage at Winthrop Hall to summon serried brass as WA Symphony Orchestra unleashed Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man on Friday.
Trumpets split the stratosphere to ignite more percussion then horns; sparse chords filling out with trombones and tuba, their plangent tones warming the air under a languid beat from principal conductor Asher Fisch.
Disparate voices blended in power as a resounding gong signed off a cobweb-clearing cadence.
The bar set high, WA composer James Ledger introduced the world premiere of his Concerto for Clarinet, a 12th commission for WASO over 20 years.
Soloist Ashley Smith held the stage through the first warbling glissando from bass to high harmonics, shadowed by fellow clarinetists Alex Millier and Som Howie from the wings of the stage, layering colours over piano (Adam Pinto) and strings.
Fragmentary phrases rang like raindrops on tuned percussion as Smith rose through the range in silvery trills, the clarinet cohort supplementing his solo bravura with echoes and reflections.
Brass and double-basses lent depth as Smith led in scintillating soliloquies, showering shards of sound for his orchestral colleagues to embellish; ever-changing yet thematically linked through the timbre and range of the instrument. Gadfly runs explored new corners of the hall, fading to a whisper.
Solemn bells flipped to darker solo motifs in the Recitative middle movement, bolstered by ominous low brass featuring Wagner tubas, with harp (Marshall McGuire), flute and chimes for relief.
Minimal direction from the podium let Smith choose and sustain his tempo, meandering through mesmeric meditation with magisterial focus and control.
As a work conceived and developed by fellow academics Ledger and Smith, this will surely serve as a teaching aid, not least in its study of contrasts between clarinet and other voices.
Smith made the most of contrast in the Cadenza, trilling to quasi-polyphonic effect over disjointed ensemble chords; as if a beehive somewhere had lost its disembodied spirit and the soloist had captured it in agile, beguiling flourishes and tonal variations.
Fisch’s steady beat led in the Finale, a kaleidoscopic cacophony riven by rhythmic outbursts and ensemble interventions. Insistent, pulsating energy infested every section as Smith skated across the top, projecting to the back wall in haunting banshee wails then settling mid-register for a manic, frenzied climax and shotgun conclusion.
A livewire encore of Serban Nichifor’s Carnyx for Solo Clarinet maintained the rage, racing through arpeggios and straddling the range in the nearest woodwind might come to double-stopping. As if the students didn’t have enough to take in already.
After the interval and so much excitement, Rachmaninov’s Second Symphony seemed comfortably familiar, the gradual rollout of the opening Largo clearer and more grounded.
Love and loss were leitmotifs, captured with aplomb in just a few notes from cor anglais (Jonathan Ryan) before lush tones in clarinet, horns and strings picked up the pace.
Brass and percussion stiffened the sinews then fell back for more mellow strings and woodwind, returning to spice the mix with fatalistic strains.
Antiphonal peals from trumpet (Jenna Smith) and bass trombone (Jack Noble) summoned a storm, distilled by Fisch to a breezy pastoral scene then dissolving in a spring shower.
Bell-like horns announced the Scherzo second stanza, an expansive romp with serene vistas through the late-Romantic soundscape. Fisch rang the changes in dynamics and tempo with finger-tip precision, down to a velvet cadence.
The Adagio third movement dawned sweetly sonorous in clarinet (Allan Meyer), the lead passing to cor anglais then oboe (Liz Chee) over a string serenade, rising like a tide on thundering timpani (Alex Timcke) then resiling through clarinet, horn and solo violin (Riley Skevington), oboe and flute (Andrew Nicholson).
Horns (David Evans and Rob Gladstones) alternated with woodwind in recapitulation of the theme, drawing ethereal echoes from strings, resolving to a full orchestral afterglow.
Fanfaric splendour broached the ebullient Finale, settling to Rachmaninov’s renowned resonance, exploited by cellos and horns then falling back to violins.
Renewed drive from woodwind and brass stirred scurrying strings, ebbing and flowing across the stage in heroic striving towards an inexorable end, gloriously anthemic in conclusion.
Asher Fisch and WASO return to Winthrop Hall for Mahler’s Ninth Symphony on October 9 and 10.
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