Bryn Terfel/Britten Sinfonia review – deep, unaffected sincerity

Barbican, London
With works by Bach, Gerald Finzi and Ivor Novello – plus a warming Christmas carol – this concert confirmed music’s power to console in troubled times.

‘The oboe obbligato that comforts and sustains sounded ravishing as played by Nicholas Daniel’

Breathtaking … Bryn Terfel and the Britten Sinfonia at the Barbican Hall, London.
Breathtaking … Bryn Terfel and the Britten Sinfonia at the Barbican Hall, London. Photograph: Mark Allan


Bryn Terfel
’s recital with the Britten Sinfonia opened Live from the Barbican, a series of concerts, both livestreamed and with a live audience, that runs until mid-December. The programme examined music’s power to console and unite in times of crisis, both personal and collective, opening with Bach’s cantata Ich Habe Genug, calm in its acceptance of mortality, and closing with Ivor Novello’s patriotic exhortation to Keep the Home Fires Burning, composed shortly after the start of the first world war. In between came Gerald Finzi’s Shakespeare cycle Let Us Garlands Bring, another wartime work, dating from 1942, followed by more Ivor Novello, interwoven with Welsh folk songs.

We don’t automatically associate Terfel with Bach, though he sang Ich Habe Genug with the deep, unaffected sincerity that he brought to the programme as a whole. As you might expect, lines were beautifully shaped, words carefully pointed. His soft singing at “süssen Friede, stiller Ruh”, at the close of the second aria, was breathtaking, and the oboe obbligato that comforts and sustains sounded ravishing as played by Nicholas Daniel.

Ravishing … Terfel, left, and oboist Nicholas Daniel.
Ravishing … Terfel, left, and oboist Nicholas Daniel. Photograph: Mark Allan

Let Us Garlands Bring came in Finzi’s second version for string ensemble rather than the more familiar original with piano accompaniment, which if anything heightens the reflective quality of the great setting of Fear No More the Heat o’ the Sun round which the cycle pivots. Terfel was at his best here, countering the elegy’s contained sadness with the wit, charm and elegance of the songs that surround it.

The final group, juxtaposing Ivor Novello with Welsh folk songs, done with wonderful directness and not a trace of sentimentality, found Terfel in his element. There were more exquisite oboe obbligatos in the folk songs, this time from the young Myfanwy Price. Terfel’s final encore was the Austrian Christmas carol Still, Still, (“Why not?” he asked the audience) sung with wonderful warmth of tone.

Tim Ashley, The Guardian, 5 October 2020

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