SINFONIA OF BIRMINGHAM AND PERSHORE ABBEY -- A DREAM TEAM
SINFONIA OF BIRMINGHAM
Pershore Abbey ****
Pershore is a gratifyingly parking-friendly town, with plenty of free spaces available to the visitor, not least in the vicinity of its magnificent Abbey. This splendid building chose the equally splendid Sinfonia of Birmingham to perform the first concert there since the beginning of the pandemic, and the atmosphere could not have been more welcoming.
The programme was all-Nordic, yet both works were conceived on Mediterranean shores. Nielsen's Helios Overture, inspired by a visit to Greece,, sounded a little unwarmed-up at the outset, but soon settled under Michael Seal's wise, communicative and unextragavant baton. Seal balanced volume and detail with a sure sense of structural growth, securing an almost Russian sturdiness of sound at full chordal passages.
Sibelius' Second Symphony , engendered in Italy, drew from the strings, authoritatively and ent...