A concert of contrasts

9:07am Tuesday 26th August 2008

You might naturally assume that the cynical and sometimes pessimistic poetry of AE Housman would lead to its being set to music in a similar vein. You would be wrong, as tenor Adrian Thompson, along with players from the Philharmonia Orchestra, proved in his Huntingdon Hall recital. The two works performed, Vaughan-Williams’ cycle On Wenlock Edge and Ludlow and Teme, Ivor Gurney’s cycle from 1919, combined very well in spite of their stylistic difference and it was interesting to hear the same poetry evoking quite different musical responses. Both are settings of lines from Housman’s A Shropshire Lad and both are scored for the same combination of voice, piano and string quartet, and neither met with Housman’s approval – he particularly hated the Vaughan-Williams work.

Thompson was in excellent form, overcoming the demanding vocal line with ease, and presented the Gurney song cycle as the more lyrical work of the two, in contrast to the more declamatory and dramatic setting of Vaughan-Williams, and his work could at times be taken for arrangements of folk song. The Vaughan-Williams was given and emotional and dramatic reading, almost symphonic in its intensity, well supported by the instrumentalists.