The Scottish Chamber Orchestra, founded in 1974, made its first major foreign tour just four years later. Based, like the players, in Edinburgh, I was the only critic to be invited on this enthralling trip to Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria - and to chronicle what I heard and saw. The Scotsman was amenable. My expenses were being paid. It was the first time a Scottish orchestra had ventured into Eastern Europe. Roderick Brydon - still in place as its admirable Edinburgh-born musical director, though alas he would not be there much longer - conducted every concert.
The interesting Michael Roll, winner of the first Leeds Piano Competition, played Mozart. Budapest, Bucharest, and Sofia were the principal destinations, but there were some unexpected diversions - to Brasov, not far from Dracula’s castle, where Andras Schiff, another early Leeds contestant, was in the audience, and to Bekeszaba, a salami town in the far east of Hungary, with earth roads but a passable hall. It was a long bus ride from Budapest. Memories of the hotel now escape me, but musically the place was virgin territory, and the coffee bat frequented by members of the orchestra carelessly served salt in its sugar bowls.
It was possible - just - to imagine Bartok and Kodaly once turning up there in quest of rare folk songs, and indeed Bartok’s Divertimento and Kodaly’s Galanta Dances formed part of the orchestra’s repertoire. Brydon, with his flair for these composers, was still in his heyday, as indeed was Michael Roll, who subsequently vanished into obscurity.
At that time the SCO had yet to cultivate its relationship with international conductors and soloists, but what it did it did well. Its new administrator, the flamboyant Australian Michael Storrs, was busily reshaping the orchestra’s destiny, and was assiduously hiring soloists who could also conduct. One of these, the violinist Jaime Laredo, would soon take the players on a mammoth American trip, performing Vivaldi’s Four Seasons all the way, with immense success. By then, and on tours even farther afield, it was no longer the orchestra Brydon helped to found, but it was certainly going places.
Meanwhile Budapest seemed triumph enough. The city, still under communist oppression, had a faint air of Janes Bond about it, especially in the tea room and ornate subterranean baths of the Gellert Hotel. In the centre of town there was a historic art nouveau restaurant, modelled on Maxim’s in Paris, though the food was nothing much. Hungarian violinists serenaded the Scottish players after their concerts in the handsome Liszt Hall. Lunch at the residence of the British Consul on the heights of the old town consisted of food flown in by diplomatic bag.
Flying to Bucharest by the erratic Tarom Romanian Airlines, or so it was said to be at the time, seemed perilous. Take two valiums suggested Michael Storrs to the players before departure. En route a pair of air stewardesses fiercely fought with each other, their quarrel accidentally amplified by loudspeakers throughout the plane. In Bucharest there was a louche young audience and a Romanian music critic asked me if I could find a place for him on a Scottish newspaper. Later, still pleading earnestly, he wrote to me at The Scotsman.
It was easy to see why he wanted out. At the opera house, in the midst of what looked like a depressing season, I saw a dreadful production of Mozart”s Seraglio, supposedly enhanced by a gratuitous corps de ballet. On the square near Bucharest’s simulation of Paris’s Arc de Triomphe, a soldier prodded me in the stomach with his gun and told me to move along. My crime was that I had been standing still. Olivia Manning’s great Balkan trilogy, which I been reading throughout the trip, made me hope to eat carp but none came my way.
Sofia, however, was a delight. With its spacious walkways, impressive buildings, and airy views of distant mountains, it hardly mattered that the only food was meatballs. At the end of the tour, the place was a tonic. Travelling with a small orchestra, I discovered, was nicer than travelling with a big one. It was not the last trip I would make with the SCO. Spain, France, America, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan, with further experiences to record, still lay ahead.
2 March 2015
The interesting Michael Roll, winner of the first Leeds Piano Competition, played Mozart. Budapest, Bucharest, and Sofia were the principal destinations, but there were some unexpected diversions - to Brasov, not far from Dracula’s castle, where Andras Schiff, another early Leeds contestant, was in the audience, and to Bekeszaba, a salami town in the far east of Hungary, with earth roads but a passable hall. It was a long bus ride from Budapest. Memories of the hotel now escape me, but musically the place was virgin territory, and the coffee bat frequented by members of the orchestra carelessly served salt in its sugar bowls.
It was possible - just - to imagine Bartok and Kodaly once turning up there in quest of rare folk songs, and indeed Bartok’s Divertimento and Kodaly’s Galanta Dances formed part of the orchestra’s repertoire. Brydon, with his flair for these composers, was still in his heyday, as indeed was Michael Roll, who subsequently vanished into obscurity.
At that time the SCO had yet to cultivate its relationship with international conductors and soloists, but what it did it did well. Its new administrator, the flamboyant Australian Michael Storrs, was busily reshaping the orchestra’s destiny, and was assiduously hiring soloists who could also conduct. One of these, the violinist Jaime Laredo, would soon take the players on a mammoth American trip, performing Vivaldi’s Four Seasons all the way, with immense success. By then, and on tours even farther afield, it was no longer the orchestra Brydon helped to found, but it was certainly going places.
Meanwhile Budapest seemed triumph enough. The city, still under communist oppression, had a faint air of Janes Bond about it, especially in the tea room and ornate subterranean baths of the Gellert Hotel. In the centre of town there was a historic art nouveau restaurant, modelled on Maxim’s in Paris, though the food was nothing much. Hungarian violinists serenaded the Scottish players after their concerts in the handsome Liszt Hall. Lunch at the residence of the British Consul on the heights of the old town consisted of food flown in by diplomatic bag.
Flying to Bucharest by the erratic Tarom Romanian Airlines, or so it was said to be at the time, seemed perilous. Take two valiums suggested Michael Storrs to the players before departure. En route a pair of air stewardesses fiercely fought with each other, their quarrel accidentally amplified by loudspeakers throughout the plane. In Bucharest there was a louche young audience and a Romanian music critic asked me if I could find a place for him on a Scottish newspaper. Later, still pleading earnestly, he wrote to me at The Scotsman.
It was easy to see why he wanted out. At the opera house, in the midst of what looked like a depressing season, I saw a dreadful production of Mozart”s Seraglio, supposedly enhanced by a gratuitous corps de ballet. On the square near Bucharest’s simulation of Paris’s Arc de Triomphe, a soldier prodded me in the stomach with his gun and told me to move along. My crime was that I had been standing still. Olivia Manning’s great Balkan trilogy, which I been reading throughout the trip, made me hope to eat carp but none came my way.
Sofia, however, was a delight. With its spacious walkways, impressive buildings, and airy views of distant mountains, it hardly mattered that the only food was meatballs. At the end of the tour, the place was a tonic. Travelling with a small orchestra, I discovered, was nicer than travelling with a big one. It was not the last trip I would make with the SCO. Spain, France, America, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan, with further experiences to record, still lay ahead.
2 March 2015
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