Sigur Rós & the SCO Edinburgh review: 'majestic'
This concert made for intense and often demanding listening, but the musical connections forged between Sigur Rós and the SCO were a revelation, writes David Kettle
Sigur Rós & the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Edinburgh Playhouse, ★★★★★
Why’s the Scotsman sent its classical guy to cover a rock gig? Because, in truth, there was precious little of a traditional rock gig to Icelandic post-rock trio Sigur Rós’s concert-long collaboration with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra at Edinburgh’s Playhouse, one of the final gigs in what’s been a three-year international tour for the band.
For a start, orchestra and band felt on an entirely equal footing. The Sigur Rós guys were firmly embedded within the SCO’s ranks, with conductor Robert Ames out front, taking his cues from frontman Jónsi Birgisson or keyboardist Kjartan Sveinsson, then passing them on with beautifully supple guidance to the SCO players. Plus there was no jumping around from the all-seated audience, and respectful hush for the band’s soaring ambient anthems. Importantly, however, there was little sense of a collision of cultures or even musical styles here: the SCO musicians played as if they’d been immersed in Sigur Rós’s slowly evolving, inexorably building music all their lives (several had), allowing time for its grandeur to expand to almost overwhelming proportions, only to dissipate again.
There was a gratifying mix of material from right across the band’s output, too. Opener Blóðberg had the SCO strings breathing together in tender but forceful swelling harmonies, the ideal sonic backdrop to Birgisson’s almost whispered vocals (and he managed to sort out some early mic issues quickly). Starálfur from their name-making album Ágætis byrjun drew a few appreciative gasps from the audience, and got a performance that beautifully captured its moving mix of joy and fragility.
If the concert’s first half often focused on atmosphere and even darkness, the second half was brighter, and a little poppier. Alongside a joyful Hoppipolla, Sé lest slid seamlessly from a mini-gamelan of keyboard and percussion to a marching brass band, gleefully conveyed by the SCO players, and Ára bátur made for an appropriately majestic close, building to ever greater sonic magnificence (including resplendent contributions from the SCO Chorus) before quickly evaporating into thin air. Intense, certainly, and often demanding, but its new musical connections were a revelation.
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