BBCNOW/Bancroft review – Conductor takes final bow in a fantastical program of vivid color and emotion | classical music

forBack in 2018, Ryan Bancroft jumped in as a last-minute replacement for the BBC National Orchestra’s tour of Wales. By September 2020, the US-born musician became the band’s principal conductor. During his six-year tenure, he has always been a commanding and calming presence on the podium, which was evident in his final concert in Cardiff in this role.

It opens with Stravinsky’s Song of the Nightingale, a symphonic poem composed of music originally opera and eventually ballet choreographed by Balanchine. Hans Christian Andersen’s story, set in imperial China, allowed Stravinsky to conjure exotic sounds, including gong and celeste. But it is the poignant fate of the Emperor, symbolized first by his infatuation with the real Nightingale – suitably enchanted by Matthew Featherstone’s flute – and subsequently usurped in his affection by a mere mechanical copy, that colors the score.

Stravinsky made an imaginative pairing with Rachmaninoff’s symphonic dances, with their similarly delicate balance between light and dark, life and death, in which the composer’s usual allusion to Dies Irae is countered by a quotation from his own Vespers, echoing his Russian Orthodox heritage. The ease of Bancroft’s rapport with the BBCNOW players was nowhere more evident than in the central waltz, infinitely flowing and fluid, while at the end of the final dance the echo of the tam-tam, carefully observed, was another indication of the subtle detail Bancroft found throughout. An emotional rollercoaster, no less.

Between these two came Brahms’s Double Concerto for Violin and Cello, equally imbued with profound reflections on life, having been conceived as a peace offering for the violinist Joseph Joachim. Here, one’s attention was captured by the close relationship between the soloists, long-time colleagues: the orchestra’s conductor, Leslie Hatfield, and former principal cellist, Alice Neary, engaged each other in their engagement with Brahms’s rich and expressive melodic interweaving as well as in their exchanges with the woodwind players, who often carry the chamber music virtuosity. The final rondo, whose theme was a tribute to Joachim’s Hungarian roots, moved from minor to major with a grace and commitment that was its own testament to friendship.