Eroica By Heart - Aurora Orchestra NNF 2024
A unique, and wholly immersive, audience experience
After an opening Saturday filled with spring sunshine, as the Norfolk & Norwich Festival's Welcome Weekend drew crowds to locations around the city for a packed programme that included everything from aerial circus acts to a traditional Lancashire folk play, and even a mimed environmental lesson in disappearing species, our attention in the evening turned to music, and two performances within Norwich Cathedral of Beethoven's Symphony No 3 - the ‘Eroica‘.
Performed by London-based Aurora Orchestra, and billed as 'Eroica By Heart', this was Beethoven as I have never before experienced it. Aurora was founded in 2005 by Nicholas Collon, and is thought to be the first orchestra worldwide to perform memorised symphonies in their entirety. In other words, no music stands, no sheet music or i-Pads. Just Collon and his orchestra musicians, and in the atmospheric surrounds of Norwich Cathedral, playing an entire Beethoven symphony from memory. Whilst some seating was available, the majority of the audience were standing – picking a spot from which to listen. The majority seemed to be drawn forward towards the centre of the nave, where the orchestra were assembled, although others stayed further back towards the west window and main doors.
Beethoven's 'Eroica' was first performed in 1805, rapidly becoming a landmark piece, marking the transition from classical to romantic symphonic style. Nicholas Collon introduced each of the four movements to us, starting with the Allegro Con Brio, with its powerful opening major chords taken up by the entire orchestra, and filling the cathedral space with the magnificent sound of almost 40 musicians playing from memory with a palpably enriched sense of unity and understanding. For the second movement, the funeral march, Collon switched the positioning of the strings, moving them to where the brass and woodwind had previously been, and bringing those players down to the front instead. For the third movement, the lively but short scherzo, members of the audience were invited to mingle with the orchestra, sitting amongst them as they played. And for the final movement, the three-part set of variations and fugue that bring the 'Eroica' to a conclusion, Collon moved another eight or nine musicians out into the spaces occupied by the remainder of the audience.
Call it a gimmick if you will, but to be able to listen to a live concert with the orchestra actually around us is a unique live experience that becomes rather like watching a surround-sound movie. Even though many modern concert auditoria have open-planned stages that go some way to removing the fourth wall, this performance became a totally immersive experience, and one that can only be achieved if musicians are able and willing to be moved, quickly and easily, without the encumbrance of music stands and scores. The result was a unique, and wholly immersive, audience experience. Purists will argue that the whole process is nothing more than an unnecessary distraction, or a gimmick, and that the rearrangements interrupt the natural flow of the piece. But for me, this was a stunning, and innovative, way to kick off the music programme at this year's Norfolk & Norwich Festival, and I absolutely loved it.
Bravo, Nicholas Collon! Bravo Aurora! Bravo, NNF!
