Britten Sinfonia, Leeds Town Hall

THIS unusual programme was drawn from the highways and byways of 20th century American music and tailor-made for Sarah Connolly, one of today’s most acclaimed British singers.

The concert opened with Elliot Carter’s Elegy for Strings, a piece of intense and heartfelt expression. This is “early” Carter composed in 1943 by a man who was still writing new music at the time of his death in 2012 at the age of 104. The two dozen strings of the Britten Sinfonia directed from the leader’s desk by violinist Jacqueline Shave gave a shining performance that conveyed a sense of vast open space permeating so much American music. Richard Rodney Bennett was born and trained in England but became a surrogate New Yorker in 1979.

Bennett’s nostalgic song set A History of the Dansant, composed in 1994, evokes in accessible modernist style, the dance halls of the 1920s. The text is taken from the poems of Meg Peacocks, the composer’s sister. Sarah Connolly clearly relished singing these verses although I sometimes had to strain to catch her words. This was the only time during the evening that I missed a conductor who would have fine-tuned balance between the singer and Bennett’s exuberant orchestration.

There were no such problems of balance with Copland’s ballet Appalachian Spring, composed in 1944. The Britten Sinfonia’s performance of Copland’s soulful music created translucent textures that seemed to hang in the air. Barber’s Adagio for Strings was bathed in light and came across in all its manifestations of sadness and contemplative reflection.

The official programme ended with Connolly and the Britten Sinfonia performing Aaron Copland’s setting of Six Poems of Emily Dickinson. Connolly sang off the words with ravishing tonal colours and her superlative trademark legato phrasing. The orchestra directed by Shave radiated energy and jewel-like delicacy.

As an encore, Connolly sang two numbers from the American Songbook composed by Harold Arlen. The depth of tone of the Sinfonia’s accompaniment belied its modest size. Connolly had the audience eating out of her hand.

By Geoffrey Mogridge