Conductor: Sora Elisabeth Lee
Soloist: David Pipe (organ)
All five pieces in the programme for the Orchestra of Opera North’s latest programme in the Kirklees Concert Season were French, written, with one exception (1910), in the 1880s, but you would find it difficult to find many similarities between Augusta Holmes’ romanticism or Maurice Ravel’s delicacy and what David Pipe called the “wall of sound” that Saint-Saens set up in his monumental Organ Symphony.
Sora Elisabeth Lee proved a splendidly detailed and sensitive conductor, very business-like to begin with. The first half was made up of four relatively short works, the real novelty among them Holmes’ La nuit et l’amour. Holmes is one of several female composers (her contemporary Louise Farranc among them) who are only now getting the attention they deserve, but this piece of charming Gallic romanticism made limited impact.
The best known piece in the first half was Saint-Saens’ Dance macabre, all retuned violin (the leader Katie Stillman), xylophone rattling the skeletons and brief individual features for individual instruments, all carried off with the utmost skill. In Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite the orchestra (and Lee) explored the detail hidden in the light scoring, but relished the exoticism of the third movement, Laideronette, with shades of the Orient creeping in via passages for woodwind and percussion, dramatic use of gong, cymbal and glockenspiel.
The real joy of the first half, however, came with Chabrier’s Fete polonaise from his opera, the gloriously bizarre Le Roi malgre lui. Brass fanfares announced the start, followed by a totally mazy passage for strings. The action stopped, started again, became wildly syncopated, changed tempo constantly – outstanding section work, presided over by the disciplined Ms Lee and a wonderful finish to a first half which, though full of felicities, could seem rather bitty.
After the interval all had changed: one piece which, we guessed from the precision and attack in the Chabrier, was able to “raise the roof”, as Gary Walker put it in his welcome page. But Saint-Saens knew that the final movement of his Organ Symphony was going to blow the audience’s mind – and made us wait. The symphony’s two-movement form sees a distinct break halfway through each movement, resulting in the traditional four movements, and in the first movement we have an allegro full of dynamic contrasts and mighty climaxes followed by a subdued adagio, strings with organ warming up for its major impact by supplying discreet harmonic support.
The second movement seems to create tension throughout, the four-handed piano a relief from the fugue that finally builds, then with a mighty chord on the organ we’re off into every possible variation on the great tune which is now unleashed. David Pipe conjured mighty sounds from the Father Willis organ and among all the splendid sections the often-neglected trombones were magnificent, as was Blair Sinclair in his solos all night.
Reviewed on 22 January 2026
