Asher Fisch and WASO’s Mahler 8 wows with power and woos with finesse at Perth Concert Hall

A five-star rendition of Mahler’s “Symphony of a thousand” led by WA Symphony Orchestra and principal conductor Asher Fisch wowed with power but also wooed with nuance and finesse at Perth Concert Hall on Friday. Five choirs and two orchestras tested and acquitted the hall’s prized acoustics ahead of a two-year layoff for renovation. An opening blast on organ ignited a firestorm of voices in the hymn Veni, Creator Spiritus (Come, Creator Spirit), a paean of praise to the divine spark backed up by stentorian brass. Billed as a once-in-a-generation experience, the WA premiere of the late-Romantic composer’s eighth symphony was a work of generations, with students of Aquinas College Schola Cantorum joining UWA Symphonic Chorus, the WASO Chorus, WA Opera Chorus and Voyces ensemble. A total 240 singers complemented 110 orchestral players from WASO and the Australian National Academy of Music, with a constellation of opera stars in principal roles frosting the layer cake. The tsunami of song subsided to a single soprano, Anna-Louise Cole, then tenor Paul O’Neill, with soprano Samantha Clarke and mezzos Ashlyn Tymms and Deborah Humble drifting in, underpinned by baritone David Greco and backed by choirs in stalls above the stage, drawing in bass Derek Welton. Dynamic and tonal balance between cohorts of different disciplines was the work of months for choral directors Andrew Foote, Hugh Lydon and Robert Braham, with Fisch delivering the decisive synthesis of sound in the last hectic weeks; remarkably, his first time directing this work. A plea for courage summoned exquisite cameos from cor anglais (Jonathan Ryan) and violin (Laurence Jackson) in an atmospheric orchestral interlude tightly tuned to enhance the spell. Trumpeter Jenna Smith led a forceful brass chorale to spur fresh attack from the choirs, with scarlet-clad Aquinas choristers nestled behind the orchestra as if to feed the flames of the ancient Pentecostal anthem, affirming Mahler’s conversion from Jewish to Catholic faith. Triumphant waves of sound crashed time and again over the auditorium as the main theme returned, larger than life in aspiration and inspiration. Streams of choral harmony interwove with power and precision, energy spilling on to the stage in horns and brass as soloists surfed the spindrift to sustain cut-through and quality. At the last, Fisch thrashed the air to summon a magnificent Gloria; an ecstatic climax. Then silence. Such dramatic attack demanded more drama, and Mahler turned to Goethe’s Faust; a flirtation with evil turned around by the same saving power extolled in the anthemic opening. This was a more familiar version of Mahler, with magic in shimmering strings and plangent bass as woodwind chimed in to set the fateful scene; a mountain, a forest, spun out of flourishes. Horns lent darker tones, throwing to woodwind over purposeful pizzicato as clarinet (Allan Meyer) and oboe (Liz Chee) teamed in lyrical duet, and Mahler’s ethereal “music from beyond” swirled about. WASO warmed to the moment as the singers rested; lush strings and poetic woodwind firing up brass then fading to pathos in flute (Mary-Anne Blades) and clarinet over mystery in bass. Voices offered barely-there stage directions – holy anchorites in a rocky desert scene. Greco’s rich baritone took up the lead as Pater Ecstaticus, extolling the “eternal passion of delight”. Welton’s dark bass answered as Pater Profundus, a stark timbre reflecting dramatic text: “wild tumult roars”, yet with “harbingers of love. Horns underlined the agony and trumpets the ecstasy as Angels proclaimed “love from on high”; the cherubic Blessed Boys drawing assurance from the choir stalls above. Vignettes from the soloists populated the plot. Tymms, as a penitent, sang tenderly of “everlasting love alone”. O’Neill swelled the strain as Doctor Marianus, praising the Queen of Heaven, working towards Mahler’s (and Goethe’s) ultimate theme, the divine feminine; devotion shining through the drama in crystalline tone. Strings and harps (Yi-Yun Loei and William Nichols) stilled the hall for a hymn to the Virgin Mary, hushed and reverent, seeking mercy. Clarke led a chorus of penitent women, joined by Cole as Magna Peccatrix, the sinner who washed Christ’s feet with perfume, and Tymms as Mulier Samaritana, the Samaritan woman at the well, putting womanhood front and centre of the Gospel story. Humble redoubled colour as Maria Aegyptiaca, the ascetic Mary of Egypt, telling of victory through repentance. Cole, Tymms and Humble joined in a plea for forgiveness, picked up by Clarke reaching into Faust’s own fallen nature, with narrative and melodic lines circling the stage. A last appeal to the Mater Gloriosa (Glorious Mother) drew soprano Sara Macliver into the action, luminously descending from the heights for two blissful lines of encouragement and inspiration, rising to the heavens with trumpet, horn, violin and harp. More praise from Doctor Marianus, echoed in chorus, directed all, “Look up to the Redeemer’s gaze”, with celestial trumpets calling in horns for a majestic fanfare. Finally, keyboards settled the storm for a Chorus Mysticus to intone the mystery of faith, “the indescribable is accomplished, the ever-womanly draws us heavenward”; sopranos soaring to summon all for a breathtaking conclusion as the scintillating soundscape rose to a peak, shimmering and resounding through multiple standing ovations.