Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment: Echoes of Hill and Horizon – Southbank Centre, London

 Conductor: Evan Rogister

Echoes of Hill and Horizon is an imaginatively designed immersive concert performed as part of Multitudes, a multi-arts festival at the Southbank Centre. The programme of traditional English pastoral pieces is played amidst an appealing light creation by Squidsoup (creative director Anthony Rowe). A grid of long strings of circular light bulbs hangs over the orchestra, with another higher installation suspended over the stalls. Programmed to respond to the beat of the music, the lights pulse in rainbow swathes of colour. The regularity of the bulbs has something of the pleasing symmetry of the current imaginative display of tulips at Kew Gardens, each standing out individually in a grassy orchard.

Lighting-wise, what works best is often clusters in shades of a single colour – the melancholy blues and turquoises for the G minor pavane of Warlock’s Capriol Suite, the apricot and peach shades in a section of Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending. For parts of Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis, chains of lights hang down like rosary beads, the final movement lit brightly in warm reds. What works less well is the over-literal application of lighting to music. So it’s not hard to guess how Fantasia on Greensleeves will be lit. The swooping flight of the lark, however, is strangely represented by a vibrant red. Dan Pearson, Rory Thomas-Lawton and Josh Sterckx, as designers of the live visuals, write that ‘the lark is visually rendered with a red heart and silver tail’. It’s an odd decision: it’s hard to lose our more common associations with the colour red with alerts and danger.

The lights are undoubtedly attractive, but over the course of 70 minutes, the novelty begins to wear off. What continues to grip throughout, however, is the wonderfully energetic playing of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Under the creative direction of Katherine Spencer, the instrumentalists seem genuinely thrilled to be part of the experience, all playing with great gusto.

Soloist Kati Debretzini gives a glorious interpretation of the lark, coaxing the most delicate, fragile notes from her violin, then bursting into lyrical warmth. The decision to have her play off stage at the start and disappear again towards the end creates a haunting evocation of the bird’s presence.

Guest conductor Evan Rogister is a delight to watch, his expressive gestures attentive to every nuance of the score. Watching conductor and orchestra is like hearing the pieces for the first time. This is especially so with double string orchestra of the Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis, the smaller orchestra II elevated at the back of the stage. Here, the imaginative lighting helps us to see the interaction of the two orchestras and appreciate Vaughan Williams’ beautiful layering of sound.

In the end, it’s the music that steals the show.

Reviewed on 22 April 2026

Multitudes runs until 30 April 2026