Laurence Kilsby (tenor), Christopher Parkes (horn), Sinfonia of London / John Wilson

Vaughan Williams Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis (1910)
Britten Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings Op.31 (1943)
Bliss Music for Strings B66 (1935)
Delius arr. Fenby Late Swallows (1916, arr. 1962)
Elgar Introduction and Allegro Op.47 (1904-05)

Barbican Hall, London
Wednesday 22 October 2025

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

One can only commend John Wilson and Sinfonia of London for, in addition to an ambitious recording schedule for Chandos, frequently taking its programmes on tour – as has been the case with this judicious selection of works for string orchestra tonight being heard in London.

There could hardly be an acoustic less suited to Vaughan Williams’s Tallis Fantasia than that of Barbican Hall, yet Wilson went a good deal of the way toward making it succeed by having the main string body – and solo quartet – to the front of the platform with the subsidiary group arrayed along its rear. The outer section were taken slowly and almost impassively, but there was no lack of impetus or fervency as the central phase built cumulatively towards its climax.

The relatively modest number of strings seemed ideally suited to Britten’s Serenade. Laurence Kilsby (who made a fine contribution to Bliss’s The Beatitudes at this year’s Proms) brought real tenderness to Pastorale and ardour to Nocturne, while Christopher Parkes was suitably plangent in Elegy and dextrousness itself in Dirge. Tenor and hornist joined delightfully in Hymn, then Wilson drew playing of fastidious poise in Sonnet. Just a little unsteady in the Prologue, Parkes excelled in the offstage Epilogue with its ethereal reprise of that opening music – so rounding off a performance that proved affecting and unaffected in equal measure.

Live and in the studio, Wilson has affirmed a commitment to the music of Bliss which could hardly have been more evident than in Music for Strings which formed the centrepiece of this concert. It had been written for the Vienna Philharmonic to premiere at the Salzburg Festival and, if its formidable technical demands no longer sound forbidding, there can have been few performances of this virtuosity or insight. Trenchant and impulsive, the opening Allegro was followed by an Andante whose sustained eloquence never excluded lightness of touch – with the speculative transition into the final Allegro as deftly handled as the Presto with which this work surges to its headlong close. Not merely a timely revival, this was no less a vindication.

Introducing this second half, Wilson had remarked how Delius’ music needs to be coaxed into yielding up its secrets as surely as it needs selling to the musicians. Late Swallows succeeded on both fronts. As arranged by Eric Fenby from the composer’s only mature string quartet, it takes its place among the latter’s most haunting evocations, and not least in a central section whose rapt intensity brought an emotional frisson that tangibly held its listeners spellbound.

Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro may, by contrast, be a piece that plays itself but it still calls for interpretive input of a high order. Wilson responded with an unusually swift reading such as emphasized its nervous intensity and often volatile changes of mood, though there was no lack of cohesion or underlying momentum in a performance that took such testing passages as the central fugato assuredly in its stride prior to a glowing apotheosis then decisive close.

A performance, moreover, as set the seal on a memorable evening’s music-making. All these pieces, save the Britten, have been recorded by Wilson and Sinfonia of London for Chandos, their advocacy of Bliss hopefully continuing well beyond this 50th anniversary of his death.

Click here to read Arcana’s review of English Music for Strings, the Chandos album containing the Bliss and Vaughan Williams works performed in this concert.

Click also on the links for more information on the Sinfonia of London and their conductor John Wilson, along with soloists Laurence Kilsby and Christopher Parkes. For more information on Bliss, you can visit the Arthur Bliss Society

Published post no.2,697 – Friday 24 October 2025