RSNO Gershwin & Rachmaninov Usher Hall Edinburgh 21st November 2025 Review
RSNO Gershwin & Rachmaninov at the Usher Hall Edinburgh was one of the most musically varied concerts that I have been at this year. Opening this programme of music was perhaps one of the most important collaborations that the RSNO has, working with the young musicians of the Big Noise Wester Hailes project and their performance of “Mission Mars” and “The Journey Begins”. The pleasure that both are getting from this opportunity to work together is obvious on everyone’s faces.
The main repertoire tonight was
Antheil - A Jazz Symphony (1955 version)
Gershwin - Piano Concerto in F: arranged for Jazz Trio by Frank Dupree
Rachmaninov - Symphony No3
This choice of music was an important one for many reasons, an important one being the first half music from Antheil and Gershwin as it covers that period of the 1920s when jazz was not only evolving as a musical genre, but some composers were also exploring ways to bring jazz and classical music together in a new form. Another important aspect of the music tonight is that all three composers were working in the 1920s/1930s (and beyond) and they were aware of each other’s music.
I have to admit that, despite his high profile of this period and his friendship with some of the leading creative people of the day, musical futurist, George Antheil (1900-1959) is a new name to me. Here clearly was a gifted composer who was not afraid to shock his audiences by taking them into new sounds and sometimes very challenging musical concepts.
Originally written in 1927, Antheil’s “A Jazz Symphony” was in part his response to hearing George Gershwin’s ground-breaking “Rhapsody In Blue” from 1924. This 1955 version featuring a reduction of the score for regular orchestra is in many ways an interesting work, but clearly, it is a long way from the musical perfection of “Rhapsody in Blue”. Instead of a work that is a seamless fusion of classical and jazz concepts, “A Jazz Symphony” is more like little pieces of a musical jigsaw that are just that, little pieces, interesting on their own, but somehow not coming together to create a new picture. I find it odd that, when this work was revised in 1955, Antheil seems not to have taken the opportunity to explore the many different avenues that jazz music had taken over the three decades since his original work.
For George Gershwin “Piano Concert in F” performance, I have to step back a little bit and introduce everyone to a world class jazz trio comprising Frank Dupree - Piano, Jakob Krupp - Double Bass and Obi Jenne – Percussion with RSNO conductor Patrick Hahn at times completing a quartet on Piano. This arrangement for Jazz Trio was by Frank Dupree who also (if wearing the right type of shoes) stepped in to conduct the RSNO too.
This work is not only an exploration of how classical and jazz music can, in the right creative hands, effortlessly blend together, but also how that very defining sound of American Blues can add so much to everything.
For me, one of the highlights of this performance was simply the fun that this trio/quartet and the RSNO orchestra were having with this arrangement of Gershwin’s work. Obviously inside so many classical musicians, there is a jazz musician just waiting to break free.
Taking up the second half of this evenings music was Rachmaninov - Symphony No 3 in A minor (1936), and over the three movements of this work, and the performance time of some 40 minutes, it is clear that here is music from a composer at the peak of his creativity. It was interesting to read in the programme notes though that even Rachmaninov had to work hard to complete this symphony.
This work was written whilst Rachmaninov was in exile from his beloved Russia and many observers have written that this work is at its heart a light and shade longing for his homeland. That is obviously true in parts, but this work is far more than just that, it is also a celebration of life, full of colour and emotion, and for the composer being able to share all of this with his family and new-found friends. Yes, he deeply missed his homeland, but as he himself said, “his Russia was gone”. There is for me always that sense of relief (even joy) in having escaped the many horrors that were now grim daily life for the people unable to flee Stalin’s Russia as he had done. Every emotion, every colour of this work was brought out by the RSNO and Patrick Hahn, Conductor tonight.
Review by Tom King © 2025
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com
The main repertoire tonight was
Antheil - A Jazz Symphony (1955 version)
Gershwin - Piano Concerto in F: arranged for Jazz Trio by Frank Dupree
Rachmaninov - Symphony No3
This choice of music was an important one for many reasons, an important one being the first half music from Antheil and Gershwin as it covers that period of the 1920s when jazz was not only evolving as a musical genre, but some composers were also exploring ways to bring jazz and classical music together in a new form. Another important aspect of the music tonight is that all three composers were working in the 1920s/1930s (and beyond) and they were aware of each other’s music.
I have to admit that, despite his high profile of this period and his friendship with some of the leading creative people of the day, musical futurist, George Antheil (1900-1959) is a new name to me. Here clearly was a gifted composer who was not afraid to shock his audiences by taking them into new sounds and sometimes very challenging musical concepts.
Originally written in 1927, Antheil’s “A Jazz Symphony” was in part his response to hearing George Gershwin’s ground-breaking “Rhapsody In Blue” from 1924. This 1955 version featuring a reduction of the score for regular orchestra is in many ways an interesting work, but clearly, it is a long way from the musical perfection of “Rhapsody in Blue”. Instead of a work that is a seamless fusion of classical and jazz concepts, “A Jazz Symphony” is more like little pieces of a musical jigsaw that are just that, little pieces, interesting on their own, but somehow not coming together to create a new picture. I find it odd that, when this work was revised in 1955, Antheil seems not to have taken the opportunity to explore the many different avenues that jazz music had taken over the three decades since his original work.
For George Gershwin “Piano Concert in F” performance, I have to step back a little bit and introduce everyone to a world class jazz trio comprising Frank Dupree - Piano, Jakob Krupp - Double Bass and Obi Jenne – Percussion with RSNO conductor Patrick Hahn at times completing a quartet on Piano. This arrangement for Jazz Trio was by Frank Dupree who also (if wearing the right type of shoes) stepped in to conduct the RSNO too.
This work is not only an exploration of how classical and jazz music can, in the right creative hands, effortlessly blend together, but also how that very defining sound of American Blues can add so much to everything.
For me, one of the highlights of this performance was simply the fun that this trio/quartet and the RSNO orchestra were having with this arrangement of Gershwin’s work. Obviously inside so many classical musicians, there is a jazz musician just waiting to break free.
Taking up the second half of this evenings music was Rachmaninov - Symphony No 3 in A minor (1936), and over the three movements of this work, and the performance time of some 40 minutes, it is clear that here is music from a composer at the peak of his creativity. It was interesting to read in the programme notes though that even Rachmaninov had to work hard to complete this symphony.
This work was written whilst Rachmaninov was in exile from his beloved Russia and many observers have written that this work is at its heart a light and shade longing for his homeland. That is obviously true in parts, but this work is far more than just that, it is also a celebration of life, full of colour and emotion, and for the composer being able to share all of this with his family and new-found friends. Yes, he deeply missed his homeland, but as he himself said, “his Russia was gone”. There is for me always that sense of relief (even joy) in having escaped the many horrors that were now grim daily life for the people unable to flee Stalin’s Russia as he had done. Every emotion, every colour of this work was brought out by the RSNO and Patrick Hahn, Conductor tonight.
Review by Tom King © 2025
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com
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