Les Martinets Noirs (2003)

Like the birds of the title, soloists David le Page and Cathey Leech soared and plunged through the sometimes busy, sometimes sultry, atmosphere to demonstrate McCabe at his best.

Obviously a succes were John McCabe's other persuasive large scale and smaller premieres: particularly the UK premiere, the very next afternoon, of Les martinets noirs, a brilliantly conceived Concerto Grosso for two violins - David Le Page and Cathy Leech - and orchestra delivered in an increasingly satisfying concert by the Orchestra of the Swan under its musical director David Curtis, who has pioneered an utterly admirable policy of commissioning new work and prising out the almost totally neglected old. Following some rather too stolidly legato Handel came an in all respects pleasing reading of Finzi's Romance for strings...a terrific Les martinets noirs ('swifts'), or as the composer puts it, 'Pucks of the air', almost as airborne as their previous night's fellows refused to levitate. McCabe writers, engagingly, of the 'vertiginous athleticism' of the swifts he daily observes during the Kentish summer in his garden at home. In the playful causerie of the two keening violin soloists , and their striking interplay with the various elements of orchestra, he constructs a kind of fascinating aubade on a grand scale. Les martinets noir feels as masterly in construction as it is airy and joyous to listen to.