SSO PUTS CANADIAN PRIDE AND TALENT ON DISPLAY

When percussionist Bryan Allen walked onstage wearing a long orange-and-black patterned shirt – and with bare feet – the audience seemed to know they were in for something special.

By the time he was perched on one leg with a small smile on his face, controlling a timpani pedal with his free foot and rapping his mallets across small metal bowls and cymbals at a breakneck pace, they were enraptured.

Allen’s virtuosity was the crown jewel in the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra’s O Canada!, a powerful celebration of Canada’s 150th. A citizenship ceremony for 20 new Canadians was an early capstone to a program featuring all Canadian composers.

The concert opened with Derek Charke’s Élan: Sesquie for Canada’s 150th, an energetic romp paced by the precise rhythms of the violins. The music gave a sense of movement and wonderment with rising and falling melodic lines.

Next was Vincent Ho’s The Shaman. It begins with an element of mystery invoked by the seemingly unmetered play of the strings. As Bryan Allen began to cast Ho’s spell with an array of instruments, the music grew more primal as his frenetic percussive beats were accompanied by the fast-paced orchestra. It shifts wildly from calm intensity to passionate fever pitch — with Allen always at the centre, tapping his bare feet.

When a frenzied rush from the orchestra ended with a sudden, solitary drum strike by Allen, the crowd leapt to their feet.

After a first half featuring the citizenship ceremony and The Shaman, it was a steep drop in energy to John Oliver’s Raven Steals the Light. The theatrical piece just never felt as sharp as what came before, despite a rich opening fugue and beautiful lines from the woodwinds.

Nonetheless, it was a unique addition to the program, and Carol Greyeyes elevated the piece with her powerful narration of the First Nations tale that inspired the work.

The orchestra finished strong with the evocative Four Seasons of the Canadian Flag by John Burge, which reflects the seasons as portrayed in Maxwell Newhouse’s art installation of the same name. The music starts with a bright, short Summer enlivened by soaring horns. Fall felt like a slow dirge for summer, before moving through the dissonant Winter to the uplifting cellos and climactic trumpet fanfare of Spring.

The SSO, led by musical director Eric Paetkau, wowed the crowd on a journey through Canada’s musical past and present.

And after Vincent Ho high-fived Bryan Allen to end the night — and the SSO’s 86th season — the future looks pretty bright, too.