On 22 March the English Symphony Orchestra and Kenneth Woods premiere David Matthews’ Early Spring at Cheltenham Town Hall. The 8 ½-minute work for chamber orchestra is an evocation of the changing seasons, with a special attention reserved for Matthews’ beloved birdsong. The work is dedicated to Woods and the musicians of the ESO.
It opens with an oboe solo with the gentle accompaniment of harp, celesta and crotales; it is succeeded by the song of a Dunnock, on piccolo. Faster music follows on woodwind and strings, with their music interrupted by the song of a Chiffchaff. Solo trumpet and brass fanfares follow, before a clarinet evokes a Blackbird over sustained strings. The mood of the opening then returns, as does the song of the Dunnock, and the work concludes with its initial oboe solo.
Matthews was previously the ESO’s John McCabe Composer-in-Association in 2018/19, when they joined with the Orchestra of the Swan for a year-long focus on his music to mark his 75th birthday, giving performances of his Symphony No.9, Double Concerto for violin and viola (with Sara Trickey and Sarah-Jane Bradley, Variations for Strings, and Romanza with violinist Zoë Beyers.
In 2022 they premiered Matthews’ Shiva Dances – a 13-minute work for string quartet and string orchestra commissioned by the Elgar Festival. Its title refers to the Hindu god of creation and destruction, whom Matthews heard referenced in a talk by Aldous Huxley; the figure evokes “the idea of the infinite energy dancing timelessly and forever through this world.”