Three Choirs festival review – impressive opening salvo full of crackling energy and exuberant fireworks

Gloucester Cathedral
A packed crowd greeted this year’s curtain raiser for a delightfully Tiggerish premiere of Gavin Higgins’ Fanfare Americana, an exhilarating Elgar’s First and a joyful rendition of Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast

So shocked were the worthies of the venerable Three Choirs festival by the eunuchs and concubines littering William Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast that they banned the work for 26 years (the powers that be finally unpursed their lips sufficiently to allow it to be performed in 1957). These days it’s a hot ticket judging by the enthusiastic crowd packing out Gloucester Cathedral for this opening concert. It’s also a significant test of any group of singers, and one that this year’s Festival Chorus passed with flying colours.

The UK premiere of Gavin Higgins’ Fanfare Americana opened proceedings, a likable work celebrating the can do attitude prevalent in the US. Whooping brass and tubular bells propelled vast wodges of sound into the resonant cathedral acoustic that exploded like exuberant fireworks. Adrian Partington led the Philharmonia Orchestra in a delightfully Tiggerish account.