Simon Hale watches the CBSO take on the Beatles.
Sixty years ago Britain was in the grip of a new pop-cultural phenomenon involving female teenagers screaming uncontrollably with excitement – and its name was Beatlemania.
The frenzy began to characterise every gig by The Beatles at a time when the boy band were captivating the world with their brilliant original songs, musicianship and charisma.
Symphony Hall seemed full of lifelong Beatles fans with memories of those days – given the average age – as the CBSO joined four vocalists on an evening of what the conductor Stuart Morley called “a journey through their classic hits.”
The reaction on this occasion was decidedly on the passive side from the moment an overture introduced a medley of songs including She Loves You which in 1963 set Beatlemania on its way. The same again after the interval which began with an Entr’acte based on Let It Be.
The Symphonical Mystery Tour, as it was billed, comprised a set of twenty-six hits from across the Beatles seven years as a band – from the likes of Magical Mystery Tour and A Hard Day’s Night to a vocal refrain of She Loves You and Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.
Musical theatre singers Nicole Raquel Dennis, Damian Humbley, John Robyns and Alice Fearn (the latter playing Heidi in Dear Evan Hansen at the Alexandra Theatre the same week) sang the songs between them adequately and in a conversational way without arousing much passion.
Unfortunately, the mix of four singers with voices pitched on the higher side and a sound system that seemed to exclude a bass line meant that high notes such as in Back in the USSR and Paperback Writer sounded shrill with a piano and bass guitar rendered almost redundant.
At times solos songs such as Ticket to Ride and Octopus’s Garden were overpowered by an orchestra playing the same notes in arrangements aimed at replicating the original Beatles sound. It was not clear in the programme who was the concert arranger but more nuance in the orchestration and the singing would have made the evening far more interesting.
Attempts to involve the audience in singalongs to Hey Jude and Strawberry Fields Forever fell a bit flat, and the concert only moved to anyway near mania when it came to the encores when many rose to sing and sway to All You Need is Love.
At times you just wanted to watch Sarah Butt working tirelessly as BSL interpreter but judging by the applause the evening clearly left Beatles fans, if not exactly excited then at least happy.
The CBSO will perform Musical Magic with songs from the world of musicals at 7.30 pm on Friday January 31st; It’s a living thing: The Music of Jeff Lynne’s ELO at 7.30 pm on Saturday, March 8th, and the premiere of Guy Braunstein’s Abbey Road Concerto along with works by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Sir Edward Elgar and Benjamin Britten at 2.15 pm on Wednesday,
March 26th at Symphony Hall.
For tickets call 0121 780 3333 or book online at cbso.co.uk.