Hidden Acoustics

Just sometimes you can see something more clearly by looking at it indirectly, like a flickering star in the night sky coming into focus only if you watch it out of the corner of your eye. This is roughly the premise of Ruth Palmer's Hidden Acoustics tour - examining architecture through its acoustic properties. Or, to put it another way, playing lovely music in interesting buildings.

The Bodleian Library is more usually associated with hush than noise, only rarely hosting concerts and then usually private ones. But both the Divinity School and Convocation House need good acoustics so that a speaker may be easily heard. Both have ornate, vaulted ceilings with stone gatherings which hang down like the stems on a bunch of flowers. These are indeed highlighted by the solo violin music: the first phrases of JS Bach's Partita No3 in E Major shower notes into the air like fingerprint dust, settling upwards into all the nooks and crannies. You can almost see them.

The music doesn't just illuminate the space; it seems to bring the audience into sharper focus too. It was an intimate size of gathering, and the clear, straightforward introductions Palmer gave the pieces fitted the informal mood. When we moved into Convocation House for the second half and could see our fellow listeners' faces in the new layout there was an air of friendliness and geniality. And the noises (coughing, seats creaking though thank goodness no mobile ringtones) seemed almost part of the concert, and less like something we all had to pretend to ignore.

Palmer's playing is excellent. She seemed to be able to hit the sweet spot of every note, even in the most fiendish runs of Partita No2's Ciaccona movement. Every so often I wanted the tempo to be stricter, but only because I like to feel the movements' dance origins. I loved the contrast between the different movements, and the feeling of the solo instrument, and her interpretation in particular, being both spare and rich at the same time, like the prose of Raymond Chandler.

Sandwiched between the Partitas was a Sonata I didn't know at all, by Eugène Ysaye (whose dates are 1858 - 1931, though I couldn't find when he wrote this piece). I'd guess it's best known by violinists looking for solo repertoire, and most often played as a foil to Bach. The first movement references the Preludio from Partita No2, but quickly descends into scribbly madness. It's called Obsession and absolutely lives up to its name. How many instruments have a piece which demonstrates exactly what it would be like to lose one's marbles? I admired Palmer using this perfect excuse to sneak some quite avant garde music in under the radar.

On first sighting, Palmer looked thin to the point of fragility, and her dress had a slightly Miss Havisham quality. But the strength and confidence of her playing utterly belied any hint of wispiness. I was utterly won round by her choices, matching the music and the acoustic: the bright E Major for the Divinity School glowing orange in the evening sun, the dark D Minor for the oak panelling of Convocation House. For the encore she took us all out into the Quad, for a different tone yet again. As the audience huddled into their coats Ruth Palmer seemed oblivious to cold, and I hoped people outside were just a little unnerved, hearing ghostly music drifting up from a locked building.

Good music in good venues is surely a winning formula for a tour. It continues at various spectacular venues (details at www.hiddenacoustics.com), and there's also a CD, of Bartok and the darker Partita, recorded in the church at Inner Temple. With luck Ruth may revisit the Bodleian before too long, and if she does, she's well worth seeing!

Jen Pawsey (DI Reviewer), 12/05/11

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