Scholars lay on a heady experience with concert

What a difference 24 hours makes. Friday night’s concert by Tallis Scholars in the Bowhouse, St Monans, was excellent.

However, one mustn’t think their return on Saturday was anything but top quality.

The delivery was just as good, but it was the programme that was the chalk to the cheese, swapping Renaissance polyphony for 20th Century close harmony.

A capella choral music of Arvo Part and John Tavener is huge in character, full of substance and contains harmonies that might be close to the bone, but when delivered by the Tallis ensemble is a mighty heady experience.

Part’s Magnificat Antiphons had enough to satisfy the most ardent fan, most of which was under-pinned by the ensemble’s basses.

However, Part’s contribution to the evening was overshadowed, in my mind anyway, by Tavener’s Funeral Icos.

However, the concert’s sell for me wasn’t the Scholars.

It was three pieces for eight cellos by Part, Steve Reich and Krzystof Penderecki, played by the massed forces of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s cello section.

The last was the lovely serenity of Penderecki’s Agnus Dei. I thought string playing like that couldn’t be beaten, but mercurial double bassist Renaud Garcia-Fons certainly did, with improvisations totally out of this world.

Then the Scholars came up with a final ace. I have heard Allegri’s Miserere several times, but none was anything like this.