Prom 46: RCM and Sibelius Academy with Sakari Oramo@ the BBC Proms

Jean Sibelius
The Wood Nymph

Lara Poe
Laulut maaseudulta (Songs from the Countryside)
BBC commission: world premiere

Gustav Holst
The Planets

Anu Komsi
soprano

Royal College of Music Chamber Choir

Royal College of Music Symphony Orchestra

Sibelius Academy Symphony Orchestra

Sakari Oramo
conductor

Whether planned meticulously or not, this last week at the Proms has been a chronological musical history week: Bach (Monday), Mozart (Tuesday), Beethoven (Wednesday); 19^th Century (mostly, Thursday); 20th Century (Friday and Saturday), before culminating in a world premiere in Saturday’s Prom, celebrating the skill and musicianship of the next generation of players from both Britain and Finland. Nestled in between lost-and-found Sibelius (rather like the lost-and-found Julius Eastman Second Symphony the night before) and anniversary Holst, was a scintillating new work from Finnish-American composer, but currently London resident, Lara Poe, which had its own historical hinterland in evoking Finnish dairy farming in the early and middle years of the 20^th century. Thrillingly orchestrated with a fresh ear for instrumental sonorities, Poe’s Laulut maaseudulta (‘Songs from the Countryside’) was a gift for soprano Anu Komsi and inspired by the singer’s kulning (‘cow calling’) before Sibelius performances at the BBC Symphony’s Total Immersion Day in 2022 featuring the Finn’s tone poems.

Even then the tone poem we heard tonight – The Wood Nymph – was not heard at the Barbican, and it was only its second-ever Prom outing.  An early work (1894-5) this ‘ballad for orchestra’, not rediscovered until 1990, is something of a wild ride, suffused with Sibelian musician fingerprints, which follows our hero Björn as he fatefully meets the titular sylvian sprite, eventually losing his soul to her.  Sibelius opens and closes with orchestral energy – Björn’s fanfares to start, developing into a storm, and surging, funereal power to end – with a more intimate central section for solo cello and horn.

It was principals from the Finnish contingent of players from the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, where Sakari Oramo is Professor of Orchestra Conducting Studies and Orchestral Education, that led in the first, all-Finnish, half of the concert, with their Royal College of Music leaders swapping places for the Holst. The stage was fullest here – building from the ever-present line up of ten double basses and swelling brass, wind, horn and percussion departments and adding the organ. This was a thrilling performance of Holst’s seven astrological studies of our solar system, The Planets,from a dangerously war-mongering Mars to the icy strangeness of Neptune with the otherworldly voices a little too present from where I was sitting, but beautifully faded at the end. Miraculously, we almost escaped the danger of applause between movements – perversely it was between the quiet ending of Uranus and the start of Neptune that an unwelcome smattering of applause like a brief meteor shower upset the silence.  Oramo ensured all Holst’s ingenious instrumental and rhythmical fingerprints were securely in place in lingering Venus, cheeky Mercury, opulent Jupiter (no hint of sentimentality here, all for the better) and the oscillating eeriness of Saturn. The organ glissando in Uranus may have been a little over the top, but better that than underplayed.  Helsinki gets to hear this magnificent performance next week.

In between was Poe’s Songs of the Countryside, seven movements with texts by Poe’s grandmother (the programme included a lovely colour reproduction of a drawing and poem from her grandmother’s childhood) and poems by her aunt. Pivoting on the middle movement depicting a storm, which only is fully unleashed after Komsi’s description of its anticipation, the first three movements introduce us to the cow herd, name by name, the long third movement describing ‘difficult individuals’.  Afterwards we hear about two horses, both affected by the war – one retreating into stables if a plane flew over, the other refusing to cross a bridge – then the refugee Karelians who bring their own herd, before moving on. Finally, a poem about the forest, ending in a perfectly placed and pitched pianissimo top note from Komsi. 

In her interview in the programme Komsi remarked that she was surprised how the ‘vocal part is not so complicated – the really difficult parts are in the orchestra’.  Under Oramo the score teemed and glistened, both nostalgic and pleasingly novel at the same time. Poe was there to acknowledge the genuine ovation.  I hope to hear the work live again soon.