Category: Reviews – Concerts

Orchestra of Swing, courtesy of “The Duke”

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Orchestra Wellington presents:

NIGHT CREATURE

GERSHWIN – An American in Paris

BERNSTEIN – Three Meditations from “Mass”

MARGETIC – Music for Wind, Brass and Percussion

ELLINGTON – Night Creature

Andrew Joyce (‘cello)

Mark Donlon (piano) / John Rae (drumset) / Miguel Arnedo-Gomez (bongos) / Patrick Bleakley (bass)

Marc Taddei (conductor)

Orchestra Wellington

Town Hall, Wellington

Sunday, 26th May 2013

The only clue I had to what we might be in for, during the course of the oncoming Orchestra Wellington’s concert with the overall name “Night Creature”, was George Gershwin’s An American in Paris, which I knew reasonably well.

I had not heard any of Leonard Bernstein’s “Mass” – though I remember reading a review of the composer’s own recording many years ago, one whose description of the work’s full-on theatrical, somewhat confrontational style put me off ever wanting to get to know it.  Such an attitude on my part was bound to catch up with me, sooner or later…..

Duke Ellington’s was a name I knew far better than his music – my Take the “A” train days of listening almost exclusively to swing I still recall with great pleasure, but of course Ellington’s was a creative spirit which explored realms far removed from swing. His three-movement suite Night Creature resulted from a 1955 commission by conductor Don Gillis and the Symphony of the Air (the old NBC Symphony), and used a quartet of saxophones and a jazz combo, emulating a kind of baroque concerto grosso arrangement – intriguing, to say the very least.

As for New Zealand-based composer Karlo Margetic, and the Bartok-like title of his new piece Music for wind, brass and percussion, I had heard some of his music before and remembered enjoying the experience, most recently a work for Piano Trio called Lightbox, premiered in 2012 by the NZ Trio.

So, the evening’s music promised a tantalizing assemblage, one whose parts I was determined I would give every chance to make a positive impression – even the Bernstein! In the event (thanks partly to the stellar playing of ‘cellist Andrew Joyce) Bernstein’s Three Meditations from “Mass” provided some of the most beautiful and heartfelt-sounding moments of the concert.

Having thought such dismissive thoughts about the piece I was pleased to find myself enjoying the music thoroughly. It all began with xylophone-like chimes, and an anguished, questioning ‘cello solo, the themes and ideas of the opening between the soloist, orchestra and organ. I was particularly taken with Andrew Joyce’s handling of the ‘cello’s beautifully rapt final utterances, even if the effect was all but spoilt by a persistent audience cougher.

The next piece’s opening was a slow and portentous pizzicato march, into which the orchestra joined, building the tensions with plenty of volatile excitement, aided and abetted by the organ at one scalp-pricking point! Through it all, the solo ‘cello kept an “eye of the hurricane” aspect, alongside menacing side-drum rolls and a final orchestral crash.

Straightaway, the drumbeat led into the final Presto, the soloist responding first with a disjointed cadenza-like recitative, and then taking up the drum’s dance-rhythm. I loved the cheery, angular folksiness of the dance, whose energies eventually gave way to the ‘cello’s taking up of a passionately romantic theme , supported beautifully by the orchestral strings. The “working-out” of these things reminded me in places of the composer’s “West Side Story” in its bitter-sweet, volatile mood. To finish, the ‘cellist played cadenza-like fragments imitating birdsong, as the percussion persisted with its “motto” rhythm in the background. Irrespective of the music’s wider context, I thought the work engaging and thought-provoking.

The concert had begun with music of quite a different mood, Gershwin’s An American in Paris, here thrillingly given what I can only describe as the “full” treatment by Marc Taddei and his players. From the start, the energies of the piece came at us in great and colourful waves, with brash auto-horns and whipped-up tempi at the climaxes. Played with such sharply-focused detailing the quieter interludes, when they came, made an enormous impact of withdrawal, the traveller’s sudden bouts of homesickness made all too heart-rending by the beautiful string- and wind-playing (Matthew Ross’s violin solo a bitter-sweet joy).

At first I thought the energetic bits needed a bit more “swagger” and point, and to rely less upon sheer speed of execution in places – but the trumpet-solo episode (superb!), counterpointed by the saxophone choirs, had such rhythmic “schwung”, such a delicious and infectious immediacy, that I capitulated, head-over heels, to it all from that moment onward! The orchestra strings played with plenty of stylish heart-on-sleeve emotion, matched by energetic wind and brass detailings which surged and flowed through the precincts of the Town Hall in grand fashion. It might have been a little too “over-the-top” for some people, but I loved it.

Again the trumpet-playing captured all the swagger of the rollicking theme which struck up in response to the solo violin’s chromatic angstings, inspiring the orchestral strings to respond in kind. At the end, the great restatement of the earlier trumpet theme by the full orchestra had more of a jazzy, spiky aspect than a “symphonic orchestral” one, a detail not lost upon the droll-voiced tuba with his brief concluding solo. In all, a terrific achievement!

Karlo Margetic, Orchestra Wellington’s Emerging Composer-in-Residence wanted to write a piece that contributed to the repertoire for wind and percussion ensemble, or as he put it in a pre-concert interview, “orchestra without strings”. As a clarinettist in various ensembles, Margetic would often enjoy first-hand the writing for winds within the framework of full orchestral pieces, and wonder why there wasn’t more stand-alone repertoire for the combination – “…such an amazing sonority!” he would think to himself – so he decided he would do something about it in the most practical possible way.

His work, Music for wind, brass and percussion, did surely and exactly what the title suggested it would do. Here were the unique sound-characteristics of the ensemble through its constituent parts and its combination of those parts, presumably as its composer imagined would happen. And it was surely no accident that the piece began with the sounds of clarinets weaving their lines throughout the textures, as the other instruments awaited their turn to try a folkish falling theme, despite the snarling aspect of the trombones, warning their fellows not to get too cocky with their new plaything too soon.

But to no avail – the theme became thoroughly energized through all this attention, and began arcing shreds of melody through the air like shooting stars,underpinned by crashes, explosions, and rolling timpani. Margetic certainly didn’t neglect his percussion, enabling it to glint and sparkle in places, roar and rattle in others, as this theme rolled around the stratospheric regions belonging to each instrument group. The panoply of sounds thus created made for a wonderful effect, both lyrical and dramatic, its melodic contouring not unlike the well-known thirteenth-century chant “Dies Irae”.

As the melody developed, the tensions around and about it receded, provoking a final ensemble-roar in passing, and leaving a muted voice whose tones had perhaps underlined the whole of the interaction – having done, it melted away along with the other resonances. On this showing, I thought the work a great success – coherent throughout, beautifully shaped and contoured, interestingly coloured (those “amazing sonorities”, no doubt!) and always suggesting spontaneity, however much was pre-ordained.

Conductor Marc Taddei belatedly talked to his audience before the orchestra began the final item of the concert, Duke Ellington’s Night Creature. Taddei wanted to draw people’s attention to the idea that classical music didn’t exist entirely of itself, but drew inspiration from popular music, and cited “The Duke” as an example of a musician who “thought across” categories as both a performer and composer. Apparently, Night Creature was written because its composer wanted to get a symphony orchestra to “swing”.

“Swing” it all most certainly did, the work launched by the jazz combo (piano, double-bass, drum-set, bongos) playing part of another Ellington-inspired work, music which “set the scene” for what followed, without a break. The first part of Night Creature was just as evocatively titled Blind Bug, the “nocturnal dance” scenario somewhat nightmarish, the textures dominated by the brasses and saxophones, with the strings providing a kind of atmospheric backdrop.

The following Stalking Monster had well-defined rhythmic trajectories set by low piano notes, winds and strings, the music droll, rolling-out and evocative. At the other end of the sound-spectrum were powerful toccata-like exchanges between brass and timpani, though these also joined in with the rhythmic drolleries, the muted brasses extremely characterful. Solos from both saxophone and trombone were an exciting feature, and even the strings got to do a bit of “funky” towards the movement’s end.

Finally Dazzling Creature stirred some glamour and sex into the mix, a depiction of the “Queen” of all the night creatures – a muted trumpet announced the erotic “charge” of her presence, strings delineated her seductive movements and the winds underlined her exoticism. Having established this “Mistress of a Modern-day Venusberg” and her thralldom over all, the music swung with the saxophones, and hit its straps with the brass choir. And, how the composer did enjoin us in his programme note on the music to relish his depiction of “the most overindulged form of up-and-outness”! I’m certain that “The Duke” would have been pleased had he been there – for all of us, players and listeners, it was “swing” with a vengeance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wellington Youth Choir – stories for the telling

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Wellington Youth Choir presents:
Storytime

Choral Music from The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, The Prince of Egypt, and by Samuel Barber, Trad. (arr. Philip Wilby and Gustav Holst), Schumann, John Bratton and Jimmy Kennedy (arr. Andrew Carter), Eric Whitacre, Saint-Saëns (solo), David Williams, Anthony Hedges and the Lighthouse Family (arr. Isaac Stone)

Wellington Youth Choir, conducted by Isaac Stone

St. John’s in the City Church

Friday 24 May 2013

A varied concert of items telling stories was given by the Wellington Youth Choir, under its Acting Musical Director.  It began in great style, with ‘The Circle of Life’, from the movie The Lion King; the music by Elton John and Lebo M, with lyrics by Time Rice.  Drums and other percussion instruments plus whistling opened the piece, along with a very good male solo.  The choir had impressive control of dynamics.

Unfortunately a few singers had the heads so deeply in their music scores that perhaps the conductor could never catch their eyes.  However, I detected very few false entries; the choir was always disciplined and together.  An excellent soprano solo followed, and then Isaac Stone played the African drums in front of him – altogether, an exciting performance, with the choir providing a strong, confident and pleasing sound.

The special lighting was rather strange, plunging the back row of the choir into too much shadow.  Isaac Stone soon acknowledged that they couldn’t see the music, and so more lighting was provided, which had the added bonus that the audience could read their programmes.

Another piece from the movies, ‘Beauty and the Beast’ from the film of the same name, had Juliette Irwin as soprano soloist; the performance featured a lovely unified sound from the women, whereas the men had less of that quality, and sounded uncommitted.  However, rhythm and timing were spot on.  The men’s singing improved in the louder passages.  The quality of the harmony singing was usually fine, and in tune.

Barber arranged his Adagio for Strings for voices, as Agnus Dei, more than thirty years later; they are both extremely well-known.  This performance was rather faster than others I have heard, but proved to be a very effective and sensitive one.

The first of two arrangements of traditional songs, ‘Marianne’ and ‘I love my love’, was in six parts, but maintained good balance, attention to dynamics, and matching vowels.  Tuning and ensemble were again very fine.  Another feature of the choir was that for the most part, the singers stood very still, so there was no distraction from their concentration on getting across the mood of the songs superbly well.  The latter song was somewhat slower than I’ve heard it before, but this enabled the choir to bring out the delightful clashes of the interval of a second, and their beautiful resolution.  Difficult harmony set low in the voices appeared to present no problems.

‘The Recruit’ by Robert Schumann was new to me.  The performance was notable for outstanding attack and the absolutely unanimous movement of the words in this lively song.

Homemade refreshments in the interval were welcome, since the church was unheated – hard to take on an evening of 10deg. outside temperature.  Nevertheless, there was sizeable audience in attendance, but largely composed of family and friends, I suspect.  The only publicity I saw was on the website of the New Zealand Choral Federation.

The excerpt ‘Deliver Us’ from Stephen Schwarz’s The Prince of Egypt featured a violin solo, played with strong, euphonious tone by Vivian Stephens, accompanied by Isaac Stone on the piano.  That meant there w s no-one standing in front of the choir to bring the singers in – yet the men came in on the dot.  The women’s part was very low in the voice at the start; perhaps rather too low for young voices.  It brightened up later.

Isaac Stone said in his spoken introduction to ‘The Teddy Bears’ Picnic’ by Bratton and Kennedy, that it was a favourite of the choir – and it was soon easy to see why.  The excellent harmony arrangement by Andrew Carter was great fun, and gave plenty of scope for the singers to show their skills.

Eric Whitacre’s ‘Leonardo dreams of his flying machine’ was an extended piece, in more ways than merely length – its contemporary angular style and variety of writing would have challenged the choir.  There were awkward intervals and chords, and many difficult effects, symbolising the sounds of the dreamt-of flying machine.  It was hard to pick up most of the words, but the choir sustained the piece well.

Having a solo item gave the rest of the choir a break, but I found ‘Amour! Viens aider ma faiblesse!’ from Samson et Dalila somewhat out of place in this concert.  Natalie Williams sang, accompanied on the piano by Isaac Stone.  This was a big voice, and rich, suited to the mezzo-soprano role of Delilah.  The was sung in good French, but the movement from note to note was not always secure.  Mostly the tone was mellow and exemplary, but top notes were rather strained

Young composer David Williams, a former student of Isaac Stone’s (presumably at Tawa College, where the latter teaches) was present to hear his piece ‘As I fall’, a setting of a poem by Margery Snyder, a young American poet.  The idea of falling was realistically conveyed, and the piece was sung well, growing more and more in complexity and volume as it proceeded.  It was a skilled piece of writing.

‘Epitaph’ by Anthony Hedges was a humorous item, the words including “Where I’m going there is no eating so no washing up dishes”.  A close harmony item, it gave scope for some expressive singing from the choir.

Finally ‘High’ by the Lighthouse Family and arranged by Isaac Stone was a short item in which both men and women hummed for some passages.  It was sung with vigour, using the words well, and with great attention to rhythm

Nearly all the items were sung unaccompanied with no apparent difficulty.  This is an excellent choir.  The concert comes soon after a splendid one by the Wellington Youth Orchestra.  We have great young musicians, who deserve every encouragement.

 

The Goldbergs with strings attached…

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Hutt Valley Chamber Music presents:

THE NEW ZEALAND STRING QUARTET – Goldberg Variations

J.S.BACH (arr. W.Cowdery) – Goldberg Variations BWV 988

New Zealand String Quartet

Helene Pohl, Douglas Beilmann (violins) / Gillian Ansell (viola) / Rolf Gjelsten (‘cello)

St.Mark’s Church, Woburn Road, Lower Hutt

Wednesday 22nd May, 2013

I wouldn’t dream of going so far as to say that I NEVER, EVER want to hear the Goldberg Variations played on a keyboard instrument again – but all the while the New Zealand String Quartet was performing this work in an arrangement made by Bach scholar (and harpsichordist!) William Cowdery, I was transported, wafted into a world of enchantment from which all keys, jacks, hammers and pedals – anything remotely percussive – had been removed.

Or so it seemed, at the time, to me. The next day, I played my Glenn Gould recording of the work, performed, of course, on a piano, and was, to some extent, reconverted. But it’s a measure of the durability and flexibility of Bach’s music that, when presented on instruments of completely different sound-character, it seems to envelop timbre, texture and tone, and make the instrument (or instruments) seem utterly and indisputably appropriate to the occasion.

I had heard the NZSQ play this work before, in Upper Hutt, and remembered at that time being both intrigued and impressed – though on that occasion the impact of it all was, I think, diluted by having another work on the program, Elgar’s Piano Quintet. Here, in the softer, more homely and intimate setting of St.Mark’s Church, Woburn, the “String-Goldbergs” filled both time and space with sounds which, even more than the last time round, seemed to fuse both craft and content into a symbiosis of beauty and feeling.

What the string quartet version seemed to me to allow was a contrapuntal partnership of equals which the solo keyboard versions I’ve heard don’t emulate in the same way – having both the strength and individuality of a single player to a voice makes for a more dynamic kind of interaction of parts than a single player at a keyboard can provide. With two, sometimes three, and occasionally all four players committed wholly to the notes, to matters of technique, timbre, intellectual overview and emotional expression, the music’s amplitude is enriched to what I felt was a compelling degree.

As expected, the players of the New Zealand String Quartet were wholly taken up with and set aglow by the bringing together of these different elements, and reinterpreting the music’s world. Even an injured Helene Pohl was able to contribute a characteristically heartfelt first-violin line as required, astonishingly redistributing the fingerings of her parts to avoid using a recently-damaged little finger. The process made not one whit of difference to her usual vibrancy and focus – a mere handful of notes not quite in tune still resonated with that intensely musical quality particularly her own.

Here are a few thoughts regarding some of the individual variations and their place in the whole – from the outset, the group adopted a “whiter”, more austere tone than I’ve previously heard from them, effective as an opening statement of intent, a “surface” that suggested both order and contained expressive potential. From the dignity of this opening Sarabande, we were energized by the polonaise rhythm of the first variation, its running lines reminiscent of the Third Brandenburg Concerto’s finale – the repeat featured some delicious variations of tone, the lines having an engaging “stand-alone” quality, more so than with the keyboard version, though still as integrated.

As mentioned above, not all the variations used all four players, a textural device which, as happens with both piano and harpsichord, gives the music contrasting densities – so the Canon of the third variation, with its two-violin interaction and ‘cello bass line created spaces which, in the succeeding Passepied, the extra player joyously filled, excitingly amplifying the sound-picture.

Sometimes an individual player stole the show, as did Doug Beilmann with the “schwung” of his figuration’s rhythms in the Gigue of No.7 – at other times it was the interaction between the musicians which gave real pleasure, as when Gillian Ansell’s viola cheekily finished off Rolf Gjesten’s ‘cello phrases at the line-ends of the following Variation (No.9). Then, in the following Canon everybody had a part to play in the music’s strolling grandeur, the players (I fancied) smiling with the pleasure of it all.

The trio of variations that concluded the work’s first part were worlds in themselves, the playing bringing out by turns the music’s propensities towards delight and sorrow. No.13’s Sarabande had a kind of “heavenly length” quality, combining serenity with a mellifluous character, the occasional  “catch” in the instruments’ throats on certain strings adding to the intensities. The Toccata was a clever-witted philosopher between two poets, his élan further honing the melancholy of No.15’s Canon, its wistful, questioning phrases played with wonderful poise by the ensemble, in readiness for what was still to come.

I so relished the players’ presentation of the “Grand Overture” which began the second part of the work – all very celebratory, and “orchestral” in style, though never generalized as such, but always with “point” and plenty of variation. (Incidentally, from this point on my notes began to voluminously grow!). Again there was conveyed throughout the work’s second part a kind of “joy of interaction” among the players, the two-part  No.17 Toccata (arranged among three instruments, here) brimful of lines eagerly looking to interact with their counterparts. The following Canon represented a kind of fruition of this with Rolf Gjelsten’s ‘cello dancing in counterpoint with two singing violins – and if the succeeding No.19 charmed us with pizzicato-voiced dance-impulses, the following Toccata stimulated our impulsive leanings with the players’ exciting alternations of pizzicato and whirling bowed triplets!

So much more to describe! – but one must resist most of the remaining blandishments and concentrate instead on the great Adagio of the 25th Variation – the violin’s anguished leading line like a bird hovering above the ocean of the lower instruments’ sombre counterpoints. Here, the violin’s bird brought to us something of the feeling of the “immensity of human sorrow” while holding fast to the skein stretched across vast distances to the lower instruments’ quiet, oceanic certainty – a kind of depiction, I thought, of both the solitariness and surety of spiritual faith, on the composer’s part.

Several other rich and vibrant variations later came the celebrated Quodlibet (a Latin term for “whatever” or “what pleases”), the last . This featured Bach’s droll synthesis of two German folk-songs (how wonderful to contemplate those woods “Cabbages and turnips have driven me away” in this context!), the players enjoying the music’s mix of friendly rivalry and adroit partnership. And, quite suddenly, it seemed, at the end, there it was – with the return of the opening Aria, it felt to us as though the music was coming home once again, having undergone its own solar orbit and experienced many world-turnings, both interactive and solitary. Now, the players’ tones seemed more in accord than counterpointed, more fulfilled than striving, more fused than disparate. Here, we in the audience were being given the well-wrought strains of sounds approximating to a divine order, a ray of serenity from chaos. We held onto those strains as best we could, but in the end we had to let them go.

Much acclaim and very great honour to the New Zealand String Quartet players! – through their sensibilities and skills we were able to coexist, for a short time, with a kind of transcendental awareness of things, by way of music whose being somehow seemed to accord with our own existence.

Delights and disappointments from the Poinsett Trio

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Wellington Chamber Music Trust

Mozart: Trio in C, K.548 (allegro; andante cantabile; allegro)

Brahms: Trio in C minor, Op.101 (allegro energico; presto non assai; andante grazioso; allegro)

Fauré: Piano Trio in D minor, Op.120 (allegro ma non troppo; andantino; finale: allegro vivo)

Paul Schoenfield: Café Music (allegro; andante moderato; presto)

Poinsett Trio (David Cross, piano; Deirdre Hutton, violin; Christopher Hutton, cello)

Ilott Theatre

Sunday, 19 May 2013

(Reviewer’s note: It is now known that Deirdre Hutton’s violin had, before the concert on Sunday 19 May at the Ilott Theatre, developed quite a long seam opening.  This led to major problems with sound production.  The matter could not be fixed prior to the concert.

Apparently they tried to get hold of an Auckland violin maker prior to the concert, who was visiting Wellington, but didn’t succeed, as she had already left.  She’s now repaired the instrument. – R.C.  25th May)

It is always good to welcome back Wellington musicians studying or working overseas.  This is the case with cellist Christopher Hutton.

However, overall I found this concert disappointing, given the very high standard always demonstrated in the Wellington Chamber Music Trust series.  At the beginning of the Mozart sonata the violin was a little off pitch; this recurred at various times throughout the concert.  The beautiful piano part was for the most part beautifully played with commendable delicacy of touch, but it rather over-awed the strings.  Yes, the piano had the principal part in Mozart’s early chamber works, but this was not an early work.  Maybe it was the dry acoustic, but I found the violin tone harsh; the cello I could not hear much from through most of the work.  I liked the instrument’s sound when I could hear it.

In the Brahms trio, the balance was more equitable between the piano and the strings.  It opened with a typical Brahms melody, after a lively introduction.  Better tone and intonation emerged from the violin.

The second movement was unusual for the use of mutes throughout by the strings – even when pizzicato was being played.  The movement was fast, soft, and had a gentle, rollicking character, due to the rhythm, and the muted pizzicato.

The lovely opening string duet of the slow third movement was echoed in the piano solo that followed; this was the pattern throughout the movement. This back and forth character gave interest and clarity to the writing and the performance.  Again, there was some harshness of tone from the violin.  The most extended of the piano solos had rather the features of a salon piece for piano.

The finale was agitated, bur mellifluous melodies were passed from the strings to the piano and back again.  However, there were too many flaws in this performance to allow the music to carry me away, although the ensemble was more cohesive in this work.

The Fauré trio was heard in last year’s Sunday afternoon series, just over one year ago, with a trio of young New Zealanders studying overseas.  Its character demands subtlety, and the Poinsetts demonstrated it, and some élan showed through, despite occasional waywardness of the violin’s intonation.

The charming song-like opening melody of the andantino was most pleasing.  However, the pianist did not vary his dynamics as much as did the string players.  An impassioned duet for cello and violin was very pleasing.  Ensemble and tone were improved.

The fast finale found once again that tuning was not always on the spot.  The movement featured a lively and ingratiating piano part.  As the programme note said, ‘the music is restrained, finely crafted, and entirely charming.’

Paul Schoenfield’s Café Music was exactly that, and didn’t ‘grab’ me as a component of a chamber music concert, being full of jazz rhythmic clichés, though written as recently as 1986; for example, the second movement’s off-beat ‘swing’ (in the traditional slow middle movement of chamber trios, despite the programme notes saying ‘traditional slow-fast-slow’).  The final presto was a dizzy, discordant dance taken at a cracking pace, and was a bit more adventurous.  It was rhythmically lively, but that rhythm did not contain much variety.

The violinist played the jazz style very well, as did the pianist.  All in all, this was a skilled performance – even if somewhat lightweight, nevertheless skill was required in its playing.

As an encore, the trio played the first movement of Dvořák’s ‘Dumky’ Trio, which was a component of the other programme they were presenting in their 13 concerts around New Zealand.  The delightful work was given a crisp introduction and a good rendering of the jolly, fast main theme that alternates with elements from the introduction.  There was plenty of emphasis on important notes, and a build up to each entry of the theme, making it a truly dance-like performance to end the concert.

 

Larks and serious business, with Yevgeny Sudbin and the NZSO

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra presents:
THE LARK ASCENDING

Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending

Beethoven: Piano Concerto no.2 in B flat Op.19 (allegro con brio; adagio; rondo: allegro)

Elgar: Symphony no.1 in A flat Op.55 (andante nobilmente e semplice – allegro; allegro molto; adagio; lento – allegro)

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mark Wigglesworth, with Vesa-Matti Leppänen (violin) and Yevgeny Sudbin (piano)

Michael Fowler Centre

Friday, 17 May 2013, 6.30pm

It was gratifying to see the Michael Fowler Centre virtually full, no doubt due at least in part to the presence on the programme, The Lark Ascending, the work that tops the Radio New Zealand Concert ‘Settling the Score’ popularity programme almost every year.  Works by English composers book-ended the concert, and an Englishman was the conductor, who obviously knew the music very well, especially the Elgar.

While the concert-master played the delicious solo part in the Vaughan Williams, his colleague Yury Genzentsvey led the orchestra in both this work and in the Beethoven concerto.  A slightly smaller orchestra, particularly in the wind departments, played these two works; the full team assembled for the Elgar symphony after the interval.

Excellent, informative and quite lengthy programme notes were not credited to anyone.  The only other negative thing to say about this concert was that there was an unfortunate amount of unsuppressed coughing, especially during the Lark, that quietest of quiet orchestral pieces.  It was absent during Bryn Terfel’s recent concert – what has happened?

Leppänen bestowed a wonderful variety of tonal colours on the piece, including warm and rich, sprightly, and, well, bird-like.  The slower section was considerably drawn out compared with other performances I have heard – but none the worse for that.  All of the many solo passages were superbly executed, and at the end, his colleagues applauded as warmly as did the audience, but they themselves gave a fine account of Vaughan Williams’s music.  Notable was some gorgeous woodwind playing; for example, flute and clarinet together.

Written before the concerto known as no.1, this Beethoven concerto is very much in the Classical tradition of Haydn and Mozart, particularly in the first movement.  The violins did not sound at their best always in the opening passages.  However, the tall, handsome young pianist made an immediate impression in his lilting initial foray, varying his dynamics subtly.  Phrasing was lovingly done.  Sudbin showed great delicacy in pianissimos, and every note was in place.  Compared with most other pianists, he sat very close to the keyboard, and played from almost directly above it.

One was seldom aware of the sustaining pedal, and his sound was full, while never being ‘louder than lovely’.  There was nothing mechanical about this playing; it was always nuanced and apt, such as through the various changes of key, and the athletic runs, for example in the magical cadenza – which ended with surprising little chords.

The slow movement began with an inspiring orchestral flow into which the piano breaks, but without disturbing the tenor of it lofty expression.  There were delightful piano syncopations before a more sombre mood emerged.  The return of the main theme was decorated most deliciously by the piano.  The facility of this young pianist is remarkable.  Yet he makes every note count.  However, I was surprised to hear trills on the piano pedalled; this gave out an odd metallic shimmering sound from the instrument.  The orchestral playing in this movement was sublime.

The finale breaks in as a lively, passionate contrast.  The pianist’s dexterity continued to be varied, and carried expression with it.  The ending of the movement was enchanting; delicate yet strong.

The audience’s enthusiastic response to the pianist was rewarded with not one, but two unannounced encores.  The beauty of the first was somewhat marred by a cellphone’s intervention.  It was a delight not to have a showy piece played, but rather a poised, gently glowing piece.  However, the next one demonstrated technique to burn, including superb articulation, the pianist playing even more over the keyboard than in the concerto.  This was a much faster, noisier piece, with a bit too much pedal for my taste.  Although they were not familiar to me, I concluded that both pieces were by Scarlatti, and some learned friends I spoke with in the interval had the same thought.

The Elgar symphony came as quite an aural shock after the relatively restrained first half, with the much larger orchestra, especially in the brass and woodwind departments.  The opening march-like theme would declare the music to be by Elgar even if one didn’t know.  There were lots of typical surging crescendos; how different from Vaughan Williams’s gentle piece!  Of course the latter was also a considerable symphonist.

Excitement builds in the first movement, tuba and all.  Is it all bluster?  The first significant symphony by an Englishman was not, however, all ebullience. The opening theme returns in quieter mode, before it is shouted from the rooftops again.   It featured gorgeous string writing – and playing.

The second movement has another rather imperialistic theme for full orchestra, with much percussion and a contrabassoon lurking underneath.  Glissandi from the two harps glowed, and then it was back to the march of soldiers in combat, trumpets giving the battle calls.  The music became more than a little pompous, saved by some delicate woodwind and string passages, sometimes in unison.  I detected fine bass clarinet playing.

The adagio was a quiet, elegiac patriotic song for fallen heroes.  The cor anglais intoned mournfully before a resolution of grief arrived.  There were little solos for the string principals.  Passionate, even pleading cries led to a quiet, contented resolution, and peace.

Then straight on to the final movement, unusually set as a lento leading to allegro (not lento-adagio as printed at the head of the notes).  A quiet allusion to the main theme of the first movement, noble string playing, followed by shimmering unisons and chunky alternating staccato passages.  As the whole orchestra asserted itself in bombastic variations on the first movement theme, the music became more than a little Brahmsian Finally, it became frenzied and boisterous.

Perhaps we hear that theme a little too often.  It seems as though it was designed to rouse the masses to heights of either ecstasy or fury.  Anyway, it drew an enthusiastic response from the audience.  The pressure to write symphonies was obviously great; to me, the essence of Elgar is in his Sea Pictures, Enigma Variations, and his many attractive choral pieces.

 

 

 

 

 

Fair, fresh winds from home

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

NZ Music for Woodwind

Music by Edwin Carr, Dylan Lardelli, Alex Taylor, Gareth Farr, Ken Wilson, Anthony Young.

Ben Hoadley (bassoon), Madeline Sakofsky (oboe and cor anglais), Emma Sayers (piano), Duo Solaris: Debbie Rawson and Donald Nicholls (clarinets)
New Zealand Clarinet Quartet: David McGregor (E flat clarinet), Hayden Sinclair (B flat clarinet), Nick Walshe (A clarinet), Debbie Rawson (bass clarinet)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 15 May 2013

A concert featuring two world premières is not a common event in New Zealand.  However, this was the case on Wednesday.

The concert began, though, with a work from 1977, of Edwin Carr.  It was titled Two Mansfield Poems, and the two beautiful poems by Katherine Mansfield were included with the printed programme: ‘Sanary’ (1916) and ‘Sleeping Together’ (1908).  The first piece echoed the sunny day of the first poem.  The latter was a recollection of children sleeping in the same bed, whispering to each other.

Carr’s settings for cor anglais and piano were quite lovely.  How seldom one hears the cor anglais apart from in an orchestra! The cor anglais proved to be an apt instrument to reflect the sultry sun described in the second poem; the music was wonderfully pensive, while the playing had a gorgeous timbre.  Some of the music was dance-like, and the whole represented a great gift of delightful writing for cor anglais players.

A world première of One Body, a shortish piece by Dylan Lardelli failed to move me.  It was written for clarinet quartet.  It seemed to me suitable for accompanying a video or film about music of the spheres, or something spooky on the galaxies; or for a modern dance performance, my companion suggested.  It was all sound effects, including puffing notelessly through the instruments.  I could not find any music in it.  Given the title, I wondered if it was meant to portray the workings of the human body.

The second world premiere was of loose knots for bassoon, by Alex Taylor, a young Auckland composer.  It was certainly extending for Ben Hoadley; it was good to hear this instrument, too, in a solo capacity.  Some lovely tones emerged in a piece that incorporated microtones, and flutter tongue technique.  The piece was in three movements, and was rhythmically lively.  Hoadley commissioned it (with funding from Creative New Zealand, who also funded the  Lardelli and the Farr works) to play at a world double-reed convention he is to attend in California next month.

Gareth Farr’s Five Little Monologues was written in 2006 for the players we heard here.  The first opened with quiet ripples that moved from fast to very shrill.  Number two was an angular piece with shrieking all over the place, mainly staccato.  It was an effective little piece, and incorporated fleet-footed melodies, and became jokey at the end.

The third piece was legato with trills, while the fourth featured staccato playing again, like little sprites running all over the place, with another humorous ending.  The final piece had the instruments running quickly everywhere, high-pitched phrases alternating with low ones.  This was very accomplished writing with plenty of interest.  The work employed very musical language and phrasing.  Another quirky ending completed the set.

Ken Wilson’s Duo for two clarinets from 2002 was jolly and laughing.  The playing was preceded by some words from Debbie Rawson about Ken and his music, in which she said he was known as ‘Fingers’ Wilson.  Certainly this piece required dexterity.  It was vigorous, sprightly and jaunty; thoroughly enjoyable.  I hope Debbie Rawson will fulfil her promise to play more of Ken Wilson’s music.

Trio for oboe, bassoon and piano of Anthony Young, was written in 2011, and like the Ken Wilson piece, was a Wellington première.  The piece was inspired by baroque sonata form – four movements: slow, fast, slow, fast.  After a pensive opening, the intertwining of the parts was grateful on the ear.  The second movement had lots going on for all three instruments, Emma Sayers at times conducting with her head for entries.

The third movement featured ponderous piano and bassoon, the oboe’s melody thoughtful, even questing, with the bassoon following in like vein.  The final movement began fast, especially for the piano.  There were contemplative moments for all instruments; in fact the work explored the instruments’ capabilities, and provided plenty of variety.  A hearty ending section with a sudden full-stop completed this well-crafted work.

The whole concert was notable for extremely fine playing throughout; although the concert was overly long for a lunchtime one, it was very rewarding to hear such a range of accomplished wind music from our own country’s composers.

Worlds of difference from the NZ Trio

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music New Zealand presents:

NZ TRIO – Old World : New World

ERICH KORNGOLD – Piano Trio Op.1 /  CLAIRE COWAN – Subtle Dances

BRIGHT SHENG – 4 Movements for Piano Trio

DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH – PIano Trio No.2 in E Minor Op.67

NZ Trio – Justine Cormack (violin) / Ashley Brown (‘cello) / Sarah Watkins (piano)

Town Hall, Wellington

Wednesday 15th May, 2013

It took me a while to “settle in” to the Town Hall’s more-than-ample sound-spaces for this concert – the NZ Trio had daringly opted to begin with Korngold’s Op.1 Piano Trio, music that called for plenty of rich, vibrant and well-uphostered sounds from the ensemble. Despite the vigour with which the players began the piece, I thought that the amplitude of the acoustic seemed at first to dwarf the players’ tones. As well, certain musical detailings sounded as though closer proximities were needed in order to make their effect (Justine Cormack’s thrummings just before the opening’s repeat here became little more than a physical gesture), so that I felt something of the music’s flavour and variety wasn’t getting through. In fact, the dialogues involving violin and ‘cello at first resembled the exchanges between a couple of faded beauties reminiscing about old times – a feeling which I thought simply wouldn’t have been in accord with a youthful composer’s freshly-wrought impulses.

However, once my ears had become used to this particular sound-world (“gotten on the wavelength”, would have been my generation’s chic expression for the phenomenon) I was better able to appreciate what the NZ Trio was doing, and enjoy the explorations of contrasts which throughout the first movement swing wholeheartedly between impassioned exchange and wistful stillness. By the end, I thought the players had caught the essence of things, summed up by what came to us as almost an ecstasy of sustained arco and pizzicato sounds over the final measures .

A lively, mischievous and angular Scherzo with its sultry Trio followed, compounding my amazement at its thirteen year-old composer’s prodigious creativities. It made me think of conductor Water Damrosch’s celebrated response regarding a youthful work of Aaron Copland’s, a remark (made straight after a performance of the work to its audience) that stated its composer would eventually be “capable of committing murder”. Naturally, Copland didn’t follow up the suggestion, and (as far as I’m aware) neither did Korngold undertake any such venture.

The slow movement’s opening ‘cello solo, lovingly played by Ashley Brown, brought out the music’s reiterating “dying fall”, with exciting, surging “road-music” contrasts in places. The same idea was present in the finale as well, ballade-like in its opening presentation, though under siege from certain angularities. The Trio’s big-boned forward drive swept the music’s changes along, the players alive to all of the music’s possibilities, engaging our sensibilities and giving us no doubt as to why its composer would have been regarded as such a “wunderkind” at the time.

In the light of Korngold’s youthful efforts, it was interesting to read New Zealand composer Claire Cowan’s thoughts regarding the composition of her work for Piano Trio, Subtle Dances. I liked her connection between her “intuitive” approach to composition and the relationship between composer, performers and audiences, and their respective places in the music’s “space”. I wondered, after reading these words, to what extent the work of a gifted thirteen year-old Viennese composer might have, however subconsciously, been similarly guided by intuition.

Claire Cowan characterized the first part of her work as “a rhythmical and passionate interlocking of playful lines”, but included a warning of the danger or risk element in such undertakings as well. The music awakened like a simple organism’s first, exploratory pulsings, with firstly the ‘cello and then violin exchanging pizzicato notes, and the piano adding a voice. The string-players tapped their soundboxes, gradually evolving an off-beat rhythm, decorated by piano figurations. When the violin joined the piano one got a sense of the composer’s “passionate interlocking” – as angst-filled as something bluesy, without being the blues…something ethnic, with a pronounced and engaging rhythmic trajectory.

It all stopped abruptly and gave way to the second movement’s be slow and lie low. A deep and wide world of inner feeling gradually settled on everything as the slow-motion dance spread its soft, shimmering silences around and about, the stillness tingling with magical harmonies. The change to the following movement was as marked as the previous transition, Sarah Watkins’ piano resounding splendidly like gamelan, and her companions supporting the piano with richly-wrought string lines, tremolandi and ostinati creating both vast open spaces and insistently claustrophobic textures at one and the same time, fitting Claire Cowan’s title for the movement, nerve lines. What a gift for sonorities this composer has!

Wisely, the Trio gave us some breathing-space in the form of an interval before serving us up with some more strongly-flavoured though differently-inspired evocations – these were the four movements of Chinese composer Bright Sheng’s Piano Trio. The composer wanted to re-explore a work for piano solo that he wrote in 1988, called My Song, reworking the musical material, and developing further his idea of bringing aspects of eastern and western art-music together. The first movement gave us birdsong, the strings’ notes gliding across spacious, airy textures. The instruments played “concurrently” rather than together, with winsome glissandi, capturing an early-morning ambience – a truly other-worldly effect, supported by the pianist reaching into the piano and softly plucking strings.

Then came a vigorous dance-like song, Sarah Watkins’ piano excitably fetching up tones from out of the instruments’ depths, and the strings with glissandi and portamenti again having an airborne quality, over surges of rhythmic energy. A beautiful shimmer of resonance sounded like an echo at the piece’s end. In contrast, the biting, driving rhythms of the “savage dance” dug into the earth, recalling similar tones of Bartok’s from his strings, percussion and celesta music. The final Nostalgia created sounds which unlocked memories of things long ago or far away, and encouraged a longing for those things to come again. The piano and strings played delicately-counterpointed lines whose resonances were allowed to drift evocatively into the imagination’s distances – beautiful!

And finally, to Shostakovich, and to a work written by the composer in memory of a close friend, who had died during 1944. Shostakovich’s particular creative intensities seemed to find the fullest expression in chamber music, and this Trio was no exception. It seemed to me that, in the first movement, there was a kind of bringing-together, the ‘cello representing something exotic, more other-worldly, and violin and piano bringing aspects of a contrapuntal framework to the exercise. Ashley Brown’s ‘cello-playing again demonstrated remarkable sensitivity, with stratospheric figurations involving haunting harmonics – it seemed as though the sounds were being “offered up” by the composer, as some kind of pre-arranged sacrificial ritual, enacted through that most severe of all forms, a fugue.

The Scherzo was a characteristically vigorous piece, both exuberant and frenzied, with rushing, upwardly-rollling figures and heavy-footed, angular stampings, the whole suggesting that there’s sometimes a fine line between enjoyment and obsessiveness. Justine Cormack’s violin lead the way with gutsy, unflinching gestures that kept energies and intensities on the boil. Afterwards, the largo’s monumental opening piano chords took us to the composer’s wellside of grief, the strings at one in their concerted lament – the dance-like opening of the finale, and its progression into and through harrowing realms merely underlined the desperation of things for Shostakovich, and the extent of his own grim resignation in the face of it all. The NZ Trio gave its all, or so it seemed – after such ordeals, the final quiet string and piano arpeggios and chords in an exhausted E major came less as relief and more as affirmation of something indestructible to be grasped against all odds.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wellington Youth Orchestra trumps with Shostakovich

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

WELLINGTON YOUTH ORCHESTRA PRESENTS:

John Psathas: Tarantismo (Wellington Première)

Rachmaninov: Excerpts from Aleko

Shostakovich: Symphony no.5 (moderato, allegretto, largo, allegro non troppo)

Wellington Youth Orchestra, conducted by Hamish McKeich, with Paul Whelan (bass-baritone)

Wellington Town Hall

Saturday 11 May 2013

A recent work by John Psathas, Tarantismo demonstrated again his considerable skill in orchestral writing, and his inventiveness.  The programme notes explained that the title refers to tarantism, the extreme desire to dance, that used to be attributed to the bite of the tarantula, but is named after the sea port in southern Italy.  From this tradition comes the dance, tarantella, a rapid, whirling dance.

The piece opened with tubular bells; soon there were brass melodies, particularly on the trombones.  The writing became briefly somewhat Mendelssohnian.  A large orchestra was required; numbers of ‘friends and guest players’, whose names were not listed, joined to support some sections.  I noticed three additional horns, the principal double bass and the principal violist from the NZSO.  There may have been others, notably in the percussion.  I noted, too, two players from the Quandrivium quartet that I heard perform two nights before. There was gorgeous harp playing from Michelle Velvin – and indeed throughout the concert.

Undulating phrases helped the work to build and build in both volume and tempo to complete was a very successful work, with something worthwhile for each player to do.

The surprise guest was brought to the platform for the second work, and turned out to be bass-baritone Paul Whelan, who had been performing the previous night with the NZSO and the Orpheus Choir in Psathas’s Orpheus in Rarohenga.

The music from Rachmaninov’s opera Aleko was completely unfamiliar to me, but most enjoyable.  The Introduction started with woodwind and then there was a big symphonic sound.  Throughout, there were delightful little solos for woodwind, and the harp again made a most distinguished contribution.

The second excerpt was a Cavatina for the bass-baritone.  Paul Whelan almost shocked us with his big sepulchral Russian voice.  Parts of his excerpt were ominous and menacing, the voice used superbly to obtain these effects.  There were some Tchaikovskian turns of musical phrase near the end – perhaps reminiscent of Onegin, since the character in Aleko was described in the programme notes as ‘a world-weary young man from a wealthy background…’  The instant applause at the end was well-deserved.  This was great singing.

The Men’s Dance was rumbunctious, the double basses getting a good workout at the beginning.  Their playing was very fine, as was the brass playing, with some lovely long-held pianissimos, and much for the percussion to do.  McKeich’s conducting gestures looked clear and always meaningful.  The orchestra made a great sound, and always played as a cohesive unit.  The music was very involving.

The best was yet to come.  The playing of the Shostakovich symphony was simply splendid. This, perhaps his best-known symphony, is full of power.  I would be glad to hear a professional orchestra play this work as well as the Wellington Youth Orchestra did, despite a few intonation flaws in the strings soon after the opening phrases.  The strings nevertheless played superbly, rendering the bleak atmosphere through beautifully controlled dynamics and phrasing.  Refined oboe playing was just part of the magical woodwind to be heard throughout.  An unnamed pianist made a robust contribution.

Some Mahlerian phrases could be heard, but much of the music is more abrasive than Mahler, and much more percussion is employed, including impressive timpani playing from, I believe, another guest player.

The rather disturbing opening theme is repeated in many different guises in this first movement.  A violin solo, full of pathos was beautifully played by leader Arna Morton.

Again in the second movement, the double basses got the initial passages.  The jolly (or mocking?) section that followed was full of joie de vivre – apparently.  Solo violin was again an outstanding feature, then flute had its time in the sun, and many others, including the contra-bassoon.  The pizzicato string passages accompanying some of these were absolutely spot on.  The conductor had the measure of the work, and the orchestra conveyed that.

Notable in the third movement were the horns in top form (acknowledging that not all were regular WYO players).  The music moved from the jolly to the sombre here.  After a marvellous harp and flute duet, there followed ominous passages, in which the strings really dug into their instruments, to produce full, rich tone, exquisitely nuanced.  The dramatic contrasts and extremes were most exciting.

The finale started with bang, bang brass, especially the tuba, and timpani, as they played an exciting dance.  The movement ran a whole gamut of senses and emotions.  The period of quietude seemed almost shocking after what had gone before.  The tension mounted as the military, in the shape of brass and side-drum, called; the strings endlessly repeated one note in unison until the climax, and the end.

All the music was chosen well, to give a range of solo passages for many of the players, and passages allowing other sections of the orchestra to shine.  It is hard to think of a symphony that provides more opportunities for woodwind solos than this one does.

The audience, if not large, was very attentive, and a partial standing ovation greeted the concert’s conclusion.  I left the hall on a ‘high’.  All credit to Hamish McKeich and the players.  The future of symphonic music in this country seems secure in these hands.

NZSO performs Hear and Far, but all contemporary, to warm reception

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and the Orpheus Choir conducted by Tecwyn Evans.
Soloists: Jenny Wollerman, Richard Greager, Paul Whelan

John Adams: Harmonielehre;
John Psathas: Orpheus in Rarohenga

Wellington Town Hall

Friday 10 May, 6.30pm

[A review by a colleague did not materialize and this is based on my review that appeared in the Listener of 16 May. It could not be courteously published until that issue of the Listener had gone off sale. It is here somewhat changed and expanded]

Not long ago a concert of music written in recent decades, especially by a New Zealand composer, would probably have attracted a smallish audience. But things are changing.

The comfortably filled Town Hall at this concert of two pieces of music of the past 30 years was a moderate surprise.
Perhaps it’s a pointer to two linked phenomena: as in most other artistic spheres, more composers today realize that an attractive, accessible and well-made product is the only likely path to success; and it is to be observed that audiences respond accordingly.

(In this context I am bemused at the habit of publicizing a new piece of music by describing it as the ‘world premiere’, suggesting that concert promoters from Helsinki to Buenos Aires will be clamouring for performance rights. A more persuasive statement would be ‘second (or tenth) performance’).

Those elementary facts needed to be explained to neither of this evening’s composers.

John Adams’s Harmonielehre is written in open rejection of Schoenberg’s 12-tone system, yet he pays his respects to the great if misguided composer by using the title of his famous treatise urging that ages-old tonality, which evolved organically from ancient times, be replaced by an invented system.

Adam’s piece is a brilliant example of often maligned American style, of ‘minimalism’. It is music of energy, pulsing momentum, colour, yet with a dramatic shape that galvanised the audience for 40 minutes.   It starts with a throbbing outburst from brass and timpani; then marimba, xylophone, and the rest of the orchestra that includes two harps, two tubas, piano; electrical and mesmerizing, it accelerates, mutates rhythmically and generally maintains its hold on the audience.

Under Tecwyn Evans there was far more excitement than in the recorded versions I’ve heard (maybe that’s just the difference between live and recorded music). The middle of the first movement calms to a beautiful, if filmic lyricism, but recovers its opening motoric obsessiveness to the end. The middle movement, The Amfortas Wound, recalling Parsifal, relates to the creative block that Adams had experienced before writing this; more strings-led, a sort of neutral, trapped emotional state dominates. Part III resumes the throbbing rhythms but with light and calm, in tones that hint of Martinu or Nielsen; pulsating excitement returned, bringing boisterous applause.

I was intrigued to find recordings of the work on You-Tube were illustrated by abstract expressionist paintings by the likes of Rothko and Barnett Newman which, though minimal enough, hardly suggest the strong pulse that drives the music.

John Psathas’s oratorio Orpheus in Rarohenga seemed to yearn to be opera: I looked for visuals.

Accordingly, I also looked for surtitles for not all singers managed to produce the words with clarity. The programme booklet for the 2002 premiere performance, which had celebrated the Orpheus Choir’s 50th anniversary, printed the full libretto; but the notes here gave only a very generalized account of the story. Apart from the wonderful contributions of Richard Greager (Cook) and Paul Whelan (Orpheus), the words were largely inaccessible.  However, Mark Dorrell had trained the choir to sing with ardour and energy as well as clarity and precision, with very few flaws. Jenny Wollerman, singing the cross-cultural role of Venus (Cook’s observation of the Transit at Tahiti was another bit of the jig-saw; but we missed Mercury, whose transit Cook observed at The Coromandel Peninsula), was beautifully musical.

The text was by Auckland poet Robert Sullivan. It was often poetic and vivid, though it handled the widely spaced episodes without really creating a sense of time passing, from the first sighting New Zealand in 1769 to Cook’s death in Hawaii ten years later.

In a review for The Dominion Post in 2002 I wrote that I was not sure about the success of this combining Greek legend in a rather far-fetched association with Cook’s contact with Maori and the Hawaiians. For I could not avoid the feeling that Orpheus (whether god and choir) had been strong-armed into some sort of accord with Maori deities and an exploratory expedition some thousand years later.

I remain uncertain

The music however is powerful, exhibiting all Psathas’s orchestral virtuosity, melodic and rhythmic inventiveness; Evans led the large orchestra, organ, choir and soloists through this tough work with impressive finesse, accuracy and huge energy. There was spirited ovation.

 

Tribulation and triumph for young pianist at Lower Hutt

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music Hutt Valley presents

JASON BAE – Piano Recital

BEETHOVEN – Piano Sonata No.6 in F Major Op.10 No.2

RAVEL – Gaspard de la Nuit

CHOPIN – Mazurkas Op.59

RACHMANINOV – Piano Sonata No.2 in B-flat Minor Op.36

Lower Hutt Little Theatre,

Thursday 9th May 2013

Chamber Music Hutt Valley organizers must have wondered about what else was going to go wrong, regarding the chain of events associated with the Society’s much-awaited piano recital by Serbian Sonja Radojkovich. Firstly, Radojkovich had to withdraw due to ill health, and then replacement pianist Jason Bae, of Auckland, had his bag containing practically all of his personal effects stolen from the Lower Hutt Theatre while he was rehearsing for the concert.

The wonder of all this was that, despite the setbacks, the concert still went ahead and the music triumphed, thanks to the outstanding abilities of and remarkable professionalism displayed by the young Korean-born pianist, playing without his normal contact lenses, and having to rely entirely on memory throughout much of his final day’s preparations for the recital.

Jason Bae had, a week before, graduated with performance honours from the University of Auckland’s School of Music while under the tutelage of Rae de Lisle. After concluding this present tour, and fulfilling a couple of concerto engagements in Auckland with the Philharmonic, he will be heading for London, where he has been accepted into the Royal Academy of Music for a Masters of Arts in piano performance, studying with Christopher Elton and Joanna MacGregor. High-flying stuff!

On the strength of his performances in this present recital, I would say that he has all the requisite talent and all the “young-pianist” characteristics to be able to develop into a truly remarkable musician. In terms of technique alone, he was able to square up to all the contact-points of the most demanding items, while his musical sensibilities enabled him to sensitively and tellingly shape and control the ebb and flow of many different aspects of the music’s expression.

Probably the most successful performance overall during the evening was that of the Rachmaninov Sonata, a work that requires a kind of “grand virtuoso manner” with a fastidious ear for voicing individual parts and a feeling for facilitating a kind of play between impulse and poise. To my ears, Jason Bae showed that he possessed all of those qualities, giving us a proper “epic” quality in the playing, right from the opening of the work. Here were grand orchestral sonorities set against gentler melancholic strains that followed (shades of the composer’s famous Op.32 B Minor Prelude at one point), and an impressive array of keyboard textures, the music cascading from bright, Rimsky-Korsakov-like glisterings on the heights to deep-throated bells down in the valleys. Perhaps the melancholy lyricism was a bit dry-eyed in places, but so much else was achieved in impressive style, one couldn’t really complain.

The second movement’s lyrical opening seemed to form of itself out of the very air in the pianist’s hands, the composer then seeming to play with salon-like melodic sequences, but then subject them to all kinds of adventures, ritualistic, agitated and breath-catchingly melodic – the playing here amply demonstrated why it was that pianists love to tackle Rachmaninov’s music! After a brief introductory moment of reflection the finale irrupted with energy and forward drive, a kind of “boyars’ march”, delivered by the young pianist with brilliance and swagger, and maintaining a sense of excitement right through to the concluding flourishes, doing rich justice to a self-assured display of confidence by no means characteristic of a sometimes cripplingly self-critical composer.

Ravel’s formidable Gaspard de la Nuit was also impressively recreated, especially throughout the two outer movements, each of which brought out Jason Bae’s wonderful variety of touch and surety of emphasis at any given point in the music. Thus the opening Ondine shimmered and swirled most delicately, while conjuring up a growing sense of volatility born of the water-sprite’s hopeless love for a mortal man, culminating in a frisson of movement and bitter laughter which at once mocked and stung as well as filled the heart of the enraptured listener with both pity and relief.

Its shadow-side here was Scarbo , the work’s third movement, reckoned by many commentators as an exemplar of musical malevolence. The pianist’s prominent repeated notes shortly after the music’s creepily disturbing beginning did seem to me to lack true visceral bite, but Bae made amends by later conjuring up some truly awe-inspiring, necromantic figurations and textures, orchestrating the tensions and suggestively psychotic confrontation-points with dark brilliance.

Interestingly, I thought his Le Gibet  (a musical depiction of a corpse left on the gallows in the setting sun) not yet on the level of the two other realizations, macabre stillness and pity perhaps more elusive states to realize and maintain in music over long periods. Bae’s playing seemed to my ears concerned more with beauty than with desolation, his tone-gradations and texturings missing something of a “stricken” quality, a kind of underlying ghastliness that informs every chord progression, every melodic impulse, every single bell-tolling note. No tone-poem to nature’s beauties, this, but a study in gloom and hopelessness. Perhaps one ought to be heartened at the thought of a musician young in years whose mind is yet unclouded by such morbidities and their musical realization.

On a similar level of accomplishment was Jason Bae’s rendition of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No.6 in F Major, the work which opened the recital. The music’s opening measures were given plenty of poise and spring by the pianist, the juxtapositioning between legato and staccato passages helping to bring out the fun of the work, evident from the very first two chords. Though an early sonata, there’s already a distinctive creative spirit at work in its alternations of virtuoso display, poised, elegantly-worked figuration, and touches of humour. Jason Bae’s playing underlined the first two of these qualities with plenty of stylish gestures and technical aplomb, though the music’s humour was somewhat left to its own devices.

I thought the slow movement nicely done, if rather sectional, with the pauses between sequences of the movement feeling a bit dead instead of “thought-through”. But the pianist achieved a lovely contrast between the contrapuntal opening and the more chordal trio section, with an ear for gradations of tone in evidence. And the tongue-in-cheek nonchalance with which the finale’s presto was launched buoyed us along splendidly, even if the bumptiously ornamented key-change could have raised our eyebrows a bit more mischievously. But Bae missed, in my opinion, the biggest joke of them all (perhaps this WAS the joke!), the unexpected plunge back into the second-half repeat, as if Beethoven was saying, “AND another thing….!” It was, come to think of it, a twist of a different kind, a “That’s enough of that!” gesture, instead.

I’ve left the Chopin Mazurka group to the end, because I found it a bit of a puzzle – the individual pieces were played cleanly and smoothly, with all the pianistic dots and crosses filled in – but I didn’t feel the music’s character was sufficiently projected, via a dance-element that’s earthy and in places even spiky.  I certainly don’t think pianists should play the Mazurkas as though they’re another set of Waltzes – Schumann’s Countesses have no place in these largely rustic, strongly-accented pieces, whose rhythmic quirkiness and obsessive leading beats confounded some of Chopin’s contemporaries (there are accounts of Chopin “falling out” with people over reactions to his playing of these very individual works.

The composer’s enjoining other interpreters to “listen to Bellini” in order to play his music properly would have most likely been a directive to take notice as much of the singers’ rubato as part of the beauty of the vocal line. As with Mozart, who wanted his music to “flow like oil” Chopin’s advice to other pianists has been taken up by many as meaning to create a kind of unending prettiness, bringing to heel any more vigorous or darker aspects to the music. I’m certain Jason Bae will, as he continues to explore those Mazurkas, come to dig his fingers into them more deeply and uncover more of their “cultured earthiness”. Liszt has been practically castigated by more recent scholarship for comparing these pieces to Polish folk-music all those years ago,  but one can HEAR in the music’s characterful impulses what he meant.

All credit to Jason Bae on a number of counts, regarding an exciting and stimulating recital. We wish him all the very best for his oncoming period of study in England, and look forward to encountering his playing again, at some undisclosed but eagerly awaited time.