KZNPO CONCERT: MARCH 8, 2012

Alison Lowell

A pleasure to listen to a performance of mellow and melodious Strauss composition. (Review by Michael Green)

Alison Lowell, the principal oboist in the KZN Philharmonic Orchestra, was the soloist in the orchestra’s latest concert in the Durban City Hall. She played a distinct rarity, Richard Strauss’s Oboe Concerto in D major, a work written four years before the composer’s death in 1949 at the age of 85.

It is an agreeable composition, mellow and melodious, and it was a pleasure to listen to Alison’s performance. She is one of the orchestra’s fairly recent acquisitions, an import from the United States, and her abilities as an orchestral player have been apparent for some time. In this concerto she made full use of the opportunity to demonstrate her gifts as a solo performer.

The composition has an interesting history. At the end of the Second World War, Strauss encountered American soldiers in his home town in Bavaria. One of those soldiers was a professional oboist. He and the old composer became friendly, and this concerto was the eventual outcome.

The music is quite different from the lush, grand (or grandiose) tone poems of Strauss’s earlier years. It opens with an elegant, casual theme for the oboe, and this mood persists through the three movements, a meandering stream of gentle melody.

Alison Lowell displayed a pure tone and remarkable breath control in what is by all accounts a very difficult work for the oboist, and she was given a well-deserved ovation at the end.

Under the visiting Japanese conductor Yasuo Shinozaki the orchestra opened the concert with a brilliant performance of Beethoven’s Leonore Overture No. 3, in musical terms a bold and impassioned plea for freedom. In the 21st century its impact is still profound.

After the interval came Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 3, “the Scottish”, written after a visit to Scotland about 180 years ago and dedicated to one of his greatest admirers, Queen Victoria. It is a lovely, picturesque work, and the orchestra delivered it with great zest. - Michael Green