The juggernaut that is Harry Potter shows no sign of abatement, if the crowd at the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in Concert was anything to go by. Robes were worn, house colours abounded, wands were wielded – and more on wands later.
Back when Half-Blood Prince premiered, the score by Nicholas Hooper, who’d also done the previous film, Order of the Phoenix, was greeted with some trepidation. Indeed every note of music contributed by Patrick Doyle and Hooper himself after John Williams’ original tunes thrilled the muggle world had been subject to intense scrutiny, and not a little criticism.
Admittedly, Order of the Phoenix was by most accounts a light-on affair. The consensus has been that Half-Blood Prince is an altogether better effort, capturing the increasing darkness of the story as the day of reckoning approaches, though, like its predecessor, it has some unevenness that doesn’t work in its favour.
So to the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s performance of the score. Conductor Vanessa Scammell is no stranger to this format, and is well liked by the ASO, which is among the best bands in this space, having given some truly memorable accounts of film music these many years past.
At its best, Half-Blood Prince positively throbbed with intensity. The scene where Death Eaters attack and destroy the Wesley home, ‘Into the Rushes’, was edge-of-seat thrilling, as was the slaying of the reanimated dead, ‘Inferi in the Firestorm’ in a dark and dangerous cave.
There was devastating sadness, too, as in the mourning over Dumbledore’s tragic death, when the Hogwarts crowd raised their wands (and the audience turned on their phone torches) to banish the Dark Mark from the sky.
But there were times when the music itself made a memorable performance difficult. The moment before ‘Dumbledore’s Farewell’ mentioned above, has an electrifying build-up but at the climactic moment, as Dumbledore is slain and falls from the tower, it fades away to nothing. So much for the death of one of the wizarding world’s great heroes.
There’s not much lighter fare in Half-Blood Prince, but the few jolly moments were effectively captured, like the tour through the Weasley brothers’ joke shop with ‘Wizard Wheezes’ and the credit-covering ‘The Weasley Stomp’. It’s great to see the orchestra tilting and tapping along in these rousing numbers.
Read: Musical review: Murder for Two, Arts Centre Melbourne
So, the customary impeccable performances from Scammell and the ASO and a magical night had by all, for most of whom the inner workings of the score matter not a wave of the wand.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in Concert was performed at Adelaide Entertainment Centre on 17 August 2024.
