Concert
Britt Arend, harp;
Pierre-Louis Attard, violin;Miriam Cauchi, soprano;
Malta Philharmonic Orchestra/ Joseph Vella
Basilica of St George, Victoria

The Victoria International Arts Festival always begins à la grande; the current 18th edition no less, and no less grand is the impressive venue.

St George’s Basilica was packed and there was of course a lot of anticipation because apart from two orchestral rarities for local audiences, there were two world premieres of works by Joseph Vella, whom one barely needs reminding is a prolific composer whose inspiration is endlessly fresh.

The first rarity consisted of Debussy’s Danse sacrée et danse profane, performed with the briefest of breaks and featuring Britt Arend as solo harpist and the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra’s string section leader Emilia Wisniewska.

The harpist’s playing was stylish and elegant throughout this piece and the orchestra was in total and full support in a wealth of mostly gentle undulating music. The first part had an almost tangible sense of the sacred, sublime and timeless, while the slightly more briskly paced second dance had enough of a carefree atmosphere that contrasted very well with it.

Gravitas and grace offset each other well. Somehow quite a lot of both elements pervaded the first of two works by maestro Vella given their world premiere this evening. Ode to a Resurrected Violin, Op. 137 is dedicated to George Debono a medical gentleman whose passion is restoring and building string instruments.

An old, Italian violin reduced to a myriad fragments was given to Debono by Vella. The instrument was duly restored but as such instruments only really ‘live’ if played, the Ode is the result and it was entrusted to Vella’s own great-nephew Pierre–Louis Attard.

This up-and-coming young performer did justice to this work producing a tone worthy of the restored instrument, which has what struck one as being a silvery, smooth tone. The Ode is scored for solo violin and a string ensemble and the violin kept faith with the very cantabile texture underlining texture and melodic line.

At times the melody soared, hovered, descended and seemingly glided over a multifaceted musical landscape reaching a climax after which the music gradually relaxed even more before fading away into nothingness.

It must have been a challenge for Vella to set five poems by the late Alistair Chalmers and commissioned by the poet’s family. Vella named this song cycle, Dust on the Path, Op. 138, after the fourth poem in this group, from a homonymous book of verse posthumously published in 2013.

Vella is no newcomer to writing art songs and listening to soprano Miriam Cauchi’s interpretation of this cycle’s premiere was a touching and revealing experience

Maybe by being the most lyrical of the five, this poem could have been the main driving force behind the whole cycle’s composition. This poem and the other four selected portray a very wide spectrum of feeling. They vary in intensity but all glow with a deep sense of sincere sensitivity. At times very moving and disturbingly desperate, yet at the same time there is a joy in the beauty of nature such as the effect of the sea in Alone with a View (No.1), mountain and river in To a Mountain (No.3) or the sea again in Poetry on the Sea (No.5).

That the sea is so influential even in Talking Dominoes is inevitable and if the poet was an islander he was not insular and the composer is very much a kindred spirit.

Vella is no newcomer to writing art songs and listening to soprano Miriam Cauchi’s interpretation of this cycle’s premiere was a touching and revealing experience. Her masterly way of expressing each nuance was admirable.

Technical difficulties there were many, yet they were surmounted since this cycle was expressly written for her. The MPO did a good job too and there was a well-controlled balance between voice and orchestra. As with all new works one needs more than one hearing to appreciate as much as possible all the intricacies of such a work. One hopes that one day Dust on the Path will be recorded for posterity, and the Ode too for that matter.

The closing work was Paul Hindemith’s massive three-movement symphony Mathis der Maler. A rarity indeed, this work was being given only its second performance in these islands. The first was in Malta some years ago and also directed by Vella.

The MPO was in its element here in this fine example of 20th-century programme music. The elegiac central and proportionally very brief Entombment is flanked by the colourful opening Angelic Concert and the frequently dark and menacing, big The Temptation of St Anthony.

The music unfolded smoothly, reaching tremendous climaxes with a brass section a little bit over the top.

Given the acoustics one less f would not have been amiss. Rejoicing and jubilation preceded the final admittedly very exciting climax.