Christ Church Cathedral
Haydn – Symphonies Nos 6, 7, 8.
Under its artistic director Monica Huggett, the Irish Baroque Orchestra (IBO) have been making frequent forays beyond their notional period boundary and into the
Age of Enlightenment.
The kind of artifices with which Huggett can vivify the IBO's core repertory of Bach, Handel and Vivaldi were applied last summer to Haydn's Symphony No 60 (Il distratto) with quirky yet thoroughly convincing results.
It was harder to be persuaded, however, by last Friday's performances of three of the composer's earlier essays in the genre.
The use of harpsichord continuo in Haydn's music remains controversial, but it must be said that the IBO's decision to dispense with it on this occasion had an exposing effect on the string section of eight period instruments.
Last January, Dublin's Orchestra of St Cecilia began a six-year survey of Haydn's 108 authenticated symphonies on modern instruments, wisely offering one early, one middle, and one late work per programme.
In presenting symphonies Nos 6, 7 and 8 – an early triptych titled Le matin, Le midi and Le soir for reasons not readily apparent in the music – the IBO had set themselves a considerable interpretive challenge.
All three are in major keys, and follow closely corresponding four-movement plans.
To be sure, Huggett's instinct for characterising individualities was evident in the details.
Much was made, for example, of the interrupted cadences in the minuet of Symphony No 6, and of the sparrow-like interjections on solo violin in the first movement of Symphony No 7. Yet, notwithstanding the playfully expressive solo contributions made by most members of the orchestra, a feeling of routine gradually set in that served to emphasise the similarities, rather than the differences, between the three works.
