William Dart review: New Zealand Symphony Orchestra at Auckland Town Hall

NZSO New Zealand Symphony Orchestra Poem of Ecstacy concert at Michael Fowler Center Wellington 28 October 2023. Madeleine Pierard

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra’s promotion for its Poem of Ecstasy concert, featuring a rapt, glamorous Madeleine Pierard in a luxuriant sylvan setting, was an eye-catcher.

And it proved to be an exhilarating evening, with conductor Gemma New exploring the NZSO’s seemingly limitless palette to produce one of my most satisfying town hall experiences this year.

The many dances within Kenneth Young’s Dance introduced a spirit of celebration, the musicians doing crisp justice to the New Zealander’s finely gradated colour play.

Scriabin’s 1908 The Poem of Ecstasy offered total immersion in the swirling mysticism of this eccentric Russian. Yet its spectacular walls and mists of sound still allowed solo lines to emerge and thrill.

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra conductor Genna New. Photo / Sylvia Elzafon

Despite the composer’s highly individual harmonic language, this volatile score can occasionally sound like Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde dressed up with a wash of French impressionism. And, despite the pages of high-flown poetry that inspired it, Scriabin’s ecstasy climaxes in a blaze of C major, with the considerable power of eight horns and five trumpets at its core.

Later, there would be an equally memorable finale with the second of Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe suites; a shimmering wonderland, just as sumptuous in its surges as Scriabin, but more persuasively subtle in its tinting.

The programme’s boldest touch had Debussy’s short flute solo Syrinx followed by Sibelius’ rarely heard Luonnotar, a stirring symphonic poem for soprano and orchestra.

Principal flute Bridget Douglas, dramatically spotlit above the orchestra, effortlessly captured Debussy’s languid nymph. Alas, despite the conductor’s earlier request for no applause, what should have been a magical segue to whispering Sibelian strings did not eventuate.

Madeleine Pierard, more soberly gowned than on the pastoral poster, was riveting, her burnished soprano, with more than a hint of mezzo to it, riding the work’s two octave range without any strain. Her animated presentation of its dramatic legend must have many wishing that they could see its English translation in an old-fashioned hold-in-the-hand programme.