Category: Reviews – Concerts

Innovative, impressive concert by Brentano Quartet

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Chamber Music New Zealand

Renaissance pieces by Byrd and Gibbons (arranged for string quartet by Mark Steinberg): Haydn: String Quartet in D minor Op.103; Haydn: Chorale, Der Greis, Hob. XXVc:5 (arranged for string quartet by Mark Steinberg); Hartke: Night Songs for a Desert Flower; Beethoven: String Quartet no.15 in A minor Op. 132

Brentano String Quartet (Mark Steinberg and Serena Canin, violins, Misha Amory, viola, Nina Lee, cello)

Wellington Town Hall

Sunday, 12 June 2011, 5.00pm

The first surprise in this concert was that the quartet was to play arrangements of works for voices by Byrd and Gibbons. Never fear, this was no romantic send-up; the musicians played their instruments as if they were viols. The lack of vibrato and the method of bowing made them sound like authentic instruments of the composers’ time. As Mark Steinberg’s programme note pointed out, playing from a chest of viols was a pastime indulged in by Elizabethan friends, and vocal music must have often been played in this way in private homes.

The simpler, more austere plainchant-based Byrd works contrasted with the freer, inventive Fantasias of Gibbons. Their more active, dance-like quality was most enjoyable. It was delightful to hear these works in a ‘regular’ concert. They were tuneful, sprightly and thoughtful by turns.

An interesting facet was that Steinberg held his violin more like the usual way a treble viol is held, throughout the concert – but he gets a wondrous sound, in no way restricted or less than full.

The quartet as a whole makes a splendid sound. A quote form a review in 2010: “Their tones match perfectly, and they play seamlessly – handing off melodies to one another so that you can’t tell where one instrument stops and the next starts. They play as if listening to one heartbeat.” The most distinctive sound in the group was the viola, played by Misha Amory. His rich, bewitching sound had character and depth.

‘Der Greis’ (the old man), is a song that Haydn wrote late in his life. At the informative pre-concert talk by Kate Mead of Radio New Zealand Concert, we were told (also in the programme notes) that Haydn had recently had a line of the song printed on his visiting cards, saying that he was old and weak. The lines of the text were also printed at the end of the second movement of the Op. 103 quartet, hence their inclusion in tonight’s printed programme. Another symptom of his age was that he could not manage to write the more demanding first and last movements of the quartet, but we can feel very glad that he sent the two completed movements to his publisher, for they are inventive, and full of interesting and enjoyable music.

The slow movement of this quartet could be a Renaissance mass, played on the viola, while the menuetto featured agreeable contrasts, and both were played with gorgeous tone. The slow chorale that followed was magically still and quiet, with little decoration; instead it was spare and peaceful.

However, this is not the sombre music of an old man; it is mainly fresh and cheerful, like so much of Haydn’s music. These players found the essence of Haydn – robust and delicate by turns, with no nuance missed. Vibrato was used subtly. This was the complete ensemble, in every sense. It was a wonderfully satisfying performance of a thoroughly satisfying work of musical genius.

Hartke’s music is somewhat Messiaen-like. It is harmonically interesting and adventurous throughout, but always musical. While undoubtedly contemporary music, the piece was very accessible. It began with a very attractive high-pitched opening with flowing, intertwining lines. Indeed, much of the work was in the higher register for all the instruments.

The first movement, Madrigal (allegretto grazioso ed amoroso) used harmonics, first on the second violin contrasting with the low tones of the viola and cello. Later, there were harmonics on the viola, which had a wonderfully sweet tone, and on the other instruments. Here, as elsewhere, there was much sensitive playing.

The second movement was titled ‘Lament (mesto)’. The latter word means sad, sorrowful, dejected. It was a lament all right, beautifully played.

Next was ‘Intermezzo (lontano, dolcissimo)’ Lontano means distant, remote, as indeed desert flowers are for most of us. It began with a sublime cello solo. Nina Lee produced a lovely sound from her cello, not a deep and throaty sound, but one which blended beautifully with the other instruments.

Finally, there was ‘Réjouissance (allegro vivace)’, French for rejoicing. This was a technically demanding movement, with much use of ponticello (playing near the bridge) and col legno (playing with the wood of the bow – for which the musicians provided themselves with their second-best bows). These were not techniques for their own sake, but were part of the joyous dance that comprised most of the movement.

Despite the titles, the work was not excessively emotional in character, but delightfully attractive.

Beethoven’s late quartets are probably the mightiest in the whole chamber music repertoire. One of the first things I noticed was that the Brentano String Quartet are not afraid of pianissimo. The solemn opening of the first movement demonstrated their sensitive playing and their perfect ensemble. The viola particularly had a beautifully rich, intense sound in solo passages. But obviously all four are in great accord.

The second movement was played with clarity and distinction.

In the third movement, molto adagio, the music had reverential intensity – a quiet, still and slow chorale, austere yet rich, spare and ascetic yet monumental. There was little vibrato to relieve the direct message of this music in the Lydian mode, which made its long-drawn-out music harmonically interesting. Some phrases were almost sweet agony. It was sparingly impassioned; the players let the music speak for itself.

Despite the comparative brevity of the fourth movement march, there was a lot of contrast packed into it. A solo passage for violin was very impressive, revealing a very warm tone from Mark Steinberg.

The allegro appassionato finale was played with-energy plus, to make an exhilarating end to this marvellous work.

One does not always want an encore after something as magnificent as the Beethoven quartet, but on the other hand, the audience was eager not to let the musicians go. They gave us a Dvořák waltz, Op. 54, which was charming and lively.

We revelled in an impressive and satisfying concert.

Triumphant Mahler Six from Inkinen and NZSO

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra conducted by Pietari Inkinen

Symphony No 6 in A minor by Gustav Mahler

Michael Fowler Centre

Friday 10 June, 6 .30pm

The absence of a notable soloist usually leads to a less well populated auditorium, but clearly the name Mahler works like a famous composer and a star soloist rolled into one. There were a few gaps, to be sure, and I speculate that they would have been filled if the orchestra had not abandoned its ‘senior rush’, discounted late ticket selling policy.

Audience expectations were high, and they were not disappointed.

In brief, this was a magnificent, world-class performance that would have inspired a standing ovation in most of the great musical centres of the world. Wellington audiences are shy: fear of standing up, alone: but here a brave first one would have had the whole house up in a flash.

The orchestra had been augmented by additional players, some, I gathered, from Christchurch. About 116 in all; it is the biggest of all Mahler’s symphonies in terms of instrumental demands, not only in the range of instruments but also in player numbers: nine horns, six various trumpets, five flutes and piccolo, double timpani and harps; and I counted more in some strings sections than were listed in the programme. There were several less familiar items: celeste and tubular bells, a brace of cowbells that were carried through the aisles in stalls and gallery; Mahler’s use of percussion, though impressive in 1906, is hardly radical in comparison with their exploitation in recent times . The pièce de résistance was a specially acquired mighty hammer and solid wood drum that delivered the famous three strokes of fate in the last movement.

Such was the scene that greeted the audience – the entire stage and the raised levels behind the strings packed with players and equipment.

Apart from the scale of the piece, both in numbers of players and duration – almost and hour and a half – there are musicological matters. Mahler’s works were not subject to the numbers of published versions of his symphonies such as occupy the attention of Bruckner scholars studying the various published versions of many of his 11 symphonies, but Mahler’s Sixth had its birth difficulties.

In the course of rehearsals before the premiere at Essen in 1906, Mahler changed the order of the second and third movements, so the Andante came before the Scherzo. According to Wikipedia, he took that change so seriously that he had erratum slips inserted in the existing published score and ordered his Leipzig publisher to produce a revised edition to take account of the changed Andante – Scherzo order.

But the editor of the International Mahler Society’s edition of 1963 claimed that Mahler had again changed his mind, settling for the Scherzo – Andante sequence; and so there are two justifiable versions in use now. Michael Kennedy, in the booklet essay accompanying Simon Rattle’s 1990 account with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, says: “But no evidence to support this assertion has ever been presented”.

And it is interesting that the latest edition of New Grove Dictionary of Music simply states that the Andante was “originally presented as the third movement but subsequently relocated as the second”.

I have that Rattle recording in which the Andante is first, and have to confess that I find it more emotionally and structurally persuasive to hear the Andante straight after the first movement.

Wikipedia lists the performances by leading conductors using each edition. More have used the Scherzo-Andante version but many, including Abbado, Jansons, Ivan Fischer, Barenboim, Gergiev, Maazel and Slatkin have performed the Andante-Scherzo version. Inkinen is listed in the former camp (Wikipedia presumably listed him on the strength of the cancelled performance with the Japan Philharmonic earlier this year; this was Inkinen’s first performance of it). 

Kennedy also records the fact that Mahler had deleted the third of the three hammer-blows, at the end of the Finale: superstition that it might be prophetic – of his own death. But there is no musical reason for conductors to do likewise, and presumably few have.

Reviewers often allege that the Town Hall provides a more balanced and responsive acoustic for music of most kinds, and it’s possible that we might have had a more uniform sound picture there, but the general impact of this performance in the Michael Fowler Centre, no holds barred, left nothing to complain about. I can imagine no more arresting and full-throated opening: a complete vindication of the size and weight of the strings – well over the normal 60 – in which timpani, cellos and basses lent their vital power along with the lower brass and woodwinds. The onset of the throbbing rhythms of the opening march clearly presaged the irresistible energy that characterised the whole performance; nor were the beautiful lyrical passages less characteristic – the gentle portrait of Alma soon follows, after the strange subsidence from the sour brass chords.

There is no great contrast between the unrelenting Allegro energico, the first movement, and the opening of the second movement, Scherzo, which starts with a comparable heavy tread, now in triple time, soon plunges darkly into growling Fafner-like (Siegfried) bass sounds, but later offers brief oboe-led lyrical moments; though even these are punctuated by hard timpani. Here, with clarinets raised to cry to the farthest reaches of the hall, the orchestra caught marvelously the alternating gracefulness and ominous shadows which Alma took to represent the ‘unrhythmic games’ of their two little children (though the second, Anna, was born only in 1904). “Ominously,” she writes, “the childish voices became more and more tragic, and at the end died out in a whimper”.

In many ways, regardless of the underlying autobiographical nature of the narrative, the symphony is one of Mahler’s more formally traditional works, without voices and without an overt programme or philosophical subtext. But it is also a massive concerto for orchestra, and one could easily spend the hour and a half attending to nothing but the memorable and surprising flourishes and fanfares, defiant outbursts and agonized lyrical passages given to innumerable, arresting, individual and groups of instruments. No sooner is there a cry of alarm or some mark of the inevitability of fate than relief arrives from the flutes or celeste, or from an expression of nature in the shape of cowbells.

The scale of the music is so huge that when one first encounters it, and this was my early experience, it is easy to feel it as an incoherent series of motifs that seem to progress without much of a plan other than the composer’s momentary impulse.

Mahler wrote to a friend in 1904, as he was in the midst of composition: “My sixth will present riddles to the solution of which only a generation that has absorbed and digested my first five symphonies will dare apply itself”.

The Andante moderato needs no special insight perhaps, as it is much closer in spirit to the glorious slow movements of the fourth and fifth symphonies. Why, in spite of its pervasive melancholy, it has not been accorded the privileged position of the Adagietto of the Fifth mystifies me. The cowbells return; strings are at their most rich and opulent; Ed Allen plays rapturous horn solos, surrounded by magical flutes and oboes.

The last movement’s enigmatic opening, alternating calm beauty with flourishes by harps and the ominous murmurings by the tuba and low woodwinds set the scene. If I found the argument hard to follow at first hearing when I was young, there is now an inevitability that I find very clear, and the undulating dynamics and tempi of the shimmering orchestral colours as they were so vividly and excitingly laid out on Friday evening, had me spellbound for the full half hour.

Yet the score seems so full of graphic detail (Strauss suggested to Mahler that it might have been ‘over-scored’) that one must be forgiven for seeking the ‘meaning’ of many passages in this movement. The more clarity and energy that a conductor such as Inkinen brings to it, unusual sonorities from single harp strings, screaming trumpets, nasal oboes, the more likely are such questions to arise. This movement’s final peroration seems to start about seven or eight minutes from the actual end: it’s no mean feat for a conductor to convince his audience that every rise and fall in temperature, ever pseudo-climax, from which tactical retreat for regrouping is undertaken, all makes sense.

But it did.

And there was no avoiding the meaning of the three hammer blows, the last surrounded by the most real, despairing, defiant peroration of all.

How lucky we are to have an orchestra, built on over 60 years of commitment and experience, and well-enough endowed to permit the performance of such magnificent works that are so central to the understanding of civilization: not just of the west, but of all mankind.

NZSM string players mark 10th anniversary of Lilburn’s death: ambient problems

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Remembering Lilburn: String quartet in E minor; String Trio; Violin Sonata

New Zealand School of Music Students and Staff: Martin Riseley, Jun He (violins), Donald Maurice (viola), Inbal Megiddo (cello), Jian Liu (piano)

Ilott Theatre, Wellington Town Hall

Friday, 10 June 2011

This year marks ten years since the death of leading New Zealand composer Douglas Lilburn. As part of commemorations, the School of Music arranged this concert to remember a long-serving former staff member of the Victoria University School of Music.

The quartet in E minor, published in 1946, includes plenty of virtuosic material; the players more than rose to the challenge – they played well, with facility and commitment, including the School of Music’s new cellist, Inbal Megiddo from Israel.

The quartet contains many felicities, yet endless repeated notes and phrases, and repeated rhythmic figures. Martin Riseley’s programme note says “…the Quartet carries a new kind of optimism, one rooted firmly in the past, quasi nostalgically, but which senses hope for what is to come.” What with the sombre nature of the work, the young children in the row behind me, the coughers and someone’s cellphone ringing loud and clear in my ear towards the end, I can’t say that I found this a major musical experience. A move to another seat improved things for the rest of the concert.

The trio, published a year earlier than the quartet, begins in a dour vein, progressing to sombre and even to mournful, despite the first movement marking of allegro non troppo. The programme note by Martin Riseley says “…the Trio carries the bitter presence of the unendurable loss of life from the war,…” There is more variety in the writing here than in the quartet. To my mind it is a
much more appealing and accomplished work. It develops to a charming mood, and its allegro finale has a delightfully optimistic ending.

The violin sonata is written in one movement with five contrasting sections. It is more animated and upbeat than the other two works. It is innovative and lively. Much of the writing is extremely taxing for both players, but they brought it off, through all the changes, splendidly. The peaceful ending finished the concert on a calm note.

Lilburn’s position as a composer, teacher and promoter of New Zealand composers and  compositions is admirable and unassailable. However, the music we heard in this short concert was not, in my opinion, among his greatest.


More and more young choirs enter Wellington region Big Sing fest

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Gala Concerts, The Big Sing, Wellington Region: New Zealand Choral Federation Secondary Schools’ Choral Festivals

Wellington Town Hall

Wednesday, 8 June 7pm and Thursday, 9 June 7pm

It is great to be able to report that an increasing number of secondary school students are singing in school choirs: the numbers taking part in The Big Sing increases every year.

This year I attended the Thursday night Gala Concert, which was the culmination of a day in which 15 secondary school choirs from 9 schools sang three items each. The previous night’s concert had featured 18 choirs from 10 schools.

Each choir has to sing a New Zealand or Pasifika piece, a piece from the Western music tradition, and an ‘own choice’ item, which is often, but not always, a more popular piece. They then choose one from these to sing in the Gala Concert that night. Sponsorship is provided by a number of Trusts, Creative New Zealand, and the Wellington City Council which, I understand, provides the venue free of charge throughout the two days and evenings.

The concerts are very well run, with a knowledgeable and clear compère and efficient stage management. A number of schools have several choirs, so their items are taken in sequence, to lessen the amount of moving around required. During the day-time sessions they are mixed up, which would make for greater interest for the audience, being mainly the members of other choirs.

First up was the Tawa College Dawn Chorus, now a very-long established choir, with over 100 voices. They featured lovely unison singing, and their item (‘Where e’re you go’ by Rosemary Russell, arranged by Glenys Chiaroni, both New Zealanders) had beautiful flute and piano accompaniment. As with all the choirs, singing was from memory. The sound was unforced, with admirably shaded dynamics.

That school’s second choir, the Early Birds, was conducted by a student conductor, Fuatino Malo-Siolo. Like some of the other conductors, both student and staff, she conducted without the score. Her style was very graceful. The singing of ‘We are one’ by Greg Gilpin, was accurate and tone was good; perhaps there was not enough attention to dynamics.

Yet another choir from Tawa, Twilight Tones of about 40 singers, was directed by Isaac Stone. He would be one of a number of conductors who had himself taken part in The Big Sing when a school student. This was exemplary singing, of Hoagy Carmichael’s ‘Skylark’. The difficulties in this piece appeared non-existent to the choir.

A new participant in The Big Sing was the mixed choir from Samuel Marsden Whitby. Let’s hope its participation is continued in the future. In the meantime, they were not secure in singing ‘A Joyful Song’, and did not project enough sound, or joy.

The parent school, Samuel Marsden Collegiate, presented a huge choir, Ad Summa Chorale, who appropriately used movement in their rendering of ‘The rhythm of life’ by Cy Coleman. They truly had life. The articulation of music and words was clear despite the fast pace of the piece. A student accompanist and a harp played by Jennifer Newth added to the enjoyment of the item as did the lively conducting of student Anna McKinnon, a winner, with Fuatino Malo-Siolo of Tawa College, of a conductor’s certificate.

A second choir from the same school, the Senior Chamber Choir, numbering 24 singers, presented John Rutter’s arrangement of the traditional English carol ‘Tomorrow shall be my dancing day’. Good tone and great attention to dynamics were features, plus fine legato singing and superb projection.

The next choir, Nga manu tioriori o Kapiti, despite being from a co-ed school, comprised only female singers. With piano and two student violinists, they sang Elgar’s ‘The snow’. Although well sung, this piece was not projected enough, nor was there the range of dynamics the composer calls for.

Sacred Heart College’s Prima Voce Choir was a large choir, but did not have a particularly large sound. ‘You can’t stop the beat’ begins rather too low for a choir of teenage voices. Nevertheless, this was otherwise a good performance.

Porirua College’s mixed choir evoked considerable cheers from the mainly school-girl audience (why is it that boys’ choirs evoke such greetings, but the girl choirs less so?). Their singing of ‘Fa’amalolosi’ a traditional Samoan song, was spirited and effective. The student accompanist played without score. Rhythmic precision was matched with excellent sound. Movement was incorporated in the performance, and a male soloist (using microphone) was another element. However, the song itself was not musically interesting.

St. Mary’s College Schola proved to be a very skilled choir, in every department. ‘This Little Babe’ from Benjamin Britten’s A Ceremony of Carols is quite a taxing piece, but very effective when well sung, as it was here.

Con Anima from St. Patrick’s College, Wellington is a very well trained choir with a lovely tone. They, too, had soloist as part of their performance – of an arrangement of the traditional Scottish ‘Loch Lomond’. However, the setting of his part was a little too low to carry very well. After a quiet couple of verses in which the pianissimo singing was very fine, the performance became literally con anima.

Chilton St. James School can boast that 20% of the school is involved in choral singing. Their large I See Red choir sang the opening chorus from Smetana’s opera The Bartered Bride, no doubt an item to be presented when they visit Prague before long. Impressively, they sang in the Czech language. This was a very accomplished performance.

The next choir from this school, Contempora, is a junior choir. It sang unaccompanied under a student conductor who also arranged the traditional Maori song ‘He honore’ that they sang most successfully.

The third Chilton choir, Seraphim, did attract large cheers, despite being all-female! The singers divided into two facing choirs, to sing a choral arrangement of Papagena and Papageno’s duet from Mozart’s The Magic Flute’. Sung in German, this was a very classy performance, almost faultless.

The final choir on show was the Wellington College Chorale, which performed in Gaelic ‘Dulaman’, an Irish folk-song about seaweed gatherers, set for choir by Michael McGlynn. Here was precision-plus, and a very effective performance of a song that was very demanding linguistically, if perhaps not so musically challenging.

A pause while award certificates and cups were brought onstage was filled by young organist Thomas Gaynor (a former Big Sing participant) playing Vierne’s Toccato in B flat minor, a grand piece of organ music employing many different sounds and a great demonstration of the player’s skill.

In awarding certificates and cups, adjudicator John Rosser from Auckland, was taking into consideration the performances the choirs gave during the day, not only the single-work evening items. Without going into a lot of detail, Rosser gave some pointers of what he was looking for, e.g. in the Western music pre-1930 selection he emphasised phrasing.

For the New Zealand music segment he awarded third place to Porirua College, second to Seraphim from Chilton St. James, and the cup to Tawa’s Twilight Tones. The Western music section saw awards to St. Patrick’s College Con Anima, Wellington College, and again the Twilight Tones.

For the Own Choice section, Twilight Tones and Wellington College were again winners. Rosser made a few remarks about the appropriate use of movement in the performances, for which he had a word ‘choralography’. He encourage the participants to carry on with singing after they leave school, and urged the conductors to take up courses soon to be offered by the Choral Federation.

Wellington Cathedral of St Paul had made an award for the best performance of an item using the Wellington Town Hall organ (to encourage its use), and this was won by the Wellington College Chorale. The item employing the organ was not performed on Thursday night. The commended conductors received certificates, as mentioned above.

Finally, there was a cup for the choir who appeared to carry out the Big Sing spirit best; it was won by Samuel Marsden Collegiate School.

The evening ended with a strongly sung National Anthem in Maori and English, with Thomas Gaynor accompanying on the organ.


Olya Curtis and David Vine offer unfamiliar violin music at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Violin music by Fauré (Andante in B flat, Op 75), Schumann (Violin Sonata in A minor, Op 105) and Szymanowksi (Violin Sonata in D minor, Op 9)

Olya Curtis (violin) and David Vine (piano)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 8 June, 12.15pm

Olya Curtis and David Vine make a good contribution to the chamber music scene in Wellington. For the past couple of years they have given us good performances of a field of music that, even more than solo piano recitals, is a neglected field.

 

You may have noticed the virtual invisibility of Fauré’s unfinished violin concerto (of which I’ve traced a couple of recordings in the Gramophone archive, first movement only, from 1979 and 2001, the latter by Philippe Graffin and the Ulster Orchestra). This being so, there is little point perhaps in dwelling on the fact that this piece published 20 years later, in 1898, was based on the slow movement of that concerto; neither is familiar. This piece is melodically slender, though agreeable and by no means trite. Given that it was thus something of a promotional exercise, it was a pity that the violin part was not quite as polished in intonation, or perhaps as refined in spirit as Fauré’s music invariably is.

 

Schumann’s first violin sonata is moderately well known and this was a rather splendid performance, that drove away any feeling that one might have contemplating the works of his last few years: that the level of inspiration had declined. For this is a fine work and it was played with much more confidence and assurance; the first movement displays in clear idiomatic terms the composer’s often denigrated talent for writing for strings; there were no important lapses in accuracy.

 

The second movement, Allegretto, was perfectly paced, the speed sufficient to maintain attention while affording the appropriate calm of a second movement, with nicely judged tempo changes. The last movement, Animato, was rather more than that: it was quite energetic, and blessed with a charming melody.

 

Szymanowski wrote his violin sonata aged about 22, when he was still under the influence of late romantics like Strauss and Scriabin. It leaves no doubt that the composer would become a distinctive voice, though not necessarily of music in a Polish idiom. If some of her intonation was iffy again, it was a very reasonable trade-off for an effort to exploit the drama and the extrovert character of the music. And anyway, some of the wayward approaches to the notes could well have been a deliberate attempt to demonstrate a freedom that one senses to be an essential aspect of this composer’s music. There was occasionally room to speculate on the balance between perfection and vitality. The sustained lasts note of the first movement drew attention through the violin’s varied articulation.

 

Szymanowski was a pianist rather than a violinist, yet the music presents as much challenge to the violinist as for pianist David Vine; the music led both down paths that demonstrated Szymanowski’s early command of the idioms, especially German, of the turn of the century, moving to increasing complexity and technical difficulty. Though perfection slightly eluded the violinist in the second movement, the two established a beautiful rapport through its peaceful, lyrical episodes. And in the Finale, through the excellent partnership between the two players, the level of energy and virtuosity brought this interesting piece to a highly satisfying conclusion.

 

 

 

 

Elixir of soprano, clarinet and piano

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Music by Dankworth, Spohr, Bartók, Vaughan Williams, Britten, Schubert, Liszt, Bliss, John McCabe, and Estonian Songs

Elixir: Kate Lineham (soprano), Rachel Thomson (piano), Moira Hurst (clarinet)

Sacred Heart Cathedral, Hill Street

Sunday 29 May 2011, 3pm

Despite the beautifully calm, sunny day, and the lack of advertising on Radio New Zealand concert earlier in the day, a good-sized audience came to hear this rather unusual ensemble perform a novel and varied programme.

However, the opening item was not a good start. The song ‘Thieving Boy’ sat too low in the voice for Kate Lineham. The lower notes did not come over to the audience in this venue.

That very morning I heard William Dart on Radio New Zealand Concert in his talk on Reynaldo Hahn, quote someone saying that classical singers should go to cabaret to learn how to deliver words. Lineham’s words when heard, were very clear.

However, much of the time, as elsewhere in the programme, the clarinet was too loud, and it was a struggle to hear the voice because of it. For the second half of the programme, I removed to the cushion-less rear of the church, and found the sound and the balance much better. I have traditionally sat in this position at Sacred Heart, for enhanced seeing and hearing, but of late have been seduced by the beautiful new seat cushions. Sunday’s experience taught me that beauty is to be preferred over comfort – even if I could not now always hear the informal spoken introductions, which were sometimes far too long and discursive, and at times repeated what was in the programme notes.

Things picked up with the gorgeous Spohr songs. We do not hear enough of this composer who, although he lived longer, was a contemporary of Beethoven, and famous in his time. Presumably the clarinet of his day was a quieter instrument than today’s model; likewise the piano. Perhaps the latter’s lid could have been on the short stick rather than fully open. The acoustic of the church is very lively, but tends to amplify the instruments more than the voice. Nevertheless, the four songs from the composer’s Six German Songs were beautifully sung, but at times it seemed like an unsuccessful fight with the instruments.

The voice needs to be the pre-eminent part, because it is delivering the words and thus the meaning of the songs, and the basis for their interpretation. There were excellent programme notes, but it would have been an added bonus to have had the full texts of the poems.

The Three Hungarian Folk Songs from Csík were in fact piano pieces based on folk songs collected by the composer. These were delightful short pieces, played with taste and subtlety. In the third, Poco vivo, there was a loud section; which again, reverberated rather too much in this building.

Next up were Three Vocalises by Vaughan Williams, composed in the last year of his life. It is interesting to consider how to perform songs with no words, as Moira Hurst said in her introduction – what is being expressed? There was magnificent interweaving between voice and clarinet; the composition of these pieces was deft indeed. As with the Spohr, these were pieces I had not heard before, yet were well worth hearing. The balance seemed better in these items – and one was not having to try to hear words.

The final of the three, ‘Quasi menuetto’, contained bird-like passages; perhaps not unexpected from the composer of The Lark Ascending.

Britten’s Four Cabaret Songs to words by W.H. Auden I had heard before, a number of times. While it is only fair to point out that the other singers I have heard perform them live were older and more experienced, I did feel that though the songs are brilliant and the singing was lovely, with great facial characterisation, the je ne sais quoi of cabaret was missing. The venues of the former hearings may have been a little (but not much) more conducive to that atmosphere.

The well-known ‘Tell me the truth about love’ earned its own applause which was then provided for each song in the group), though I found it over-pedalled in the piano part; the piano should surely echo the sparkle of the voice.

I felt ‘Johnny’ needed even more vocal contrast between the excited and the doleful verses, not only a dynamic contrast. This factor improved as the song went along – perhaps that was deliberate, to gradually change and deepen the realisation that Johnny was not going to stay around. Lineham has a pretty voice, but it is not especially powerful, except at the top. Again, words were very clear – but is this voice really right for cabaret songs?

The accompaniments were beautifully handled. Since the clarinet was not involved, Moira Hurst revealed the variety of her wind instrument accomplishments by playing a whistle, acting as the station-master at the conclusion the last song, Calypso, which uses train noises. She dashed through the audience while blowing, wearing an appropriate peaked cap.

After interval, we were treated to what is probably the most famous song for this combination, Schubert’s lovely Der Hirt auf dem Felsen (The Shepherd on the Rock). The balance and ensemble seemed to be a lot better – or was it because of my new position towards the rear of the church? A few small intonation wobbles couldn’t detract from a very accomplished rendition of this extended song with its ravishing melodies for both singer and clarinet.

Liszt’s Petrarch sonnet no. 123 is a very contemplative piano piece, yet has a passionate middle section, and was played with feeling; the pianissimo ending was exquisite. Again, there was too much pedal for my taste, but otherwise the work was attractively played. The programme note told us that ‘…[the] poetry is essential to understanding the music’, so why was the sonnet not printed for the audience’s added understanding?

Sir Arthur Bliss was represented by Two Nursery Rhymes, settings of ‘The Ragwort’ and ‘The Dandelion’ by Frances Cornford. Featuring quirky clarinet and piano writing, these were fun. Apparently the clarinet was being a seagull in the first song, and, more obviously, a donkey in the second. These songs suited Lineham’s voice and style very well.

A group of Estonian songs were preceded by the story of how the trio obtained these songs; a piece of real New Zealand networking and ‘who knows whom’. They proved to be very pleasing songs, though again, the lower register of the voice employed in the first song could not be heard well. The second, The Singer’s Childhood began with a very lovely unaccompanied first verse; then the clarinet joined in. It was an attractive song, the singer expressing its nostalgia feelingly.

The final song, Shepherd’s Song, with piano and clarinet, was brief and touching.

The programme ended with Three Folk Songs by John McCabe. These were settings of traditional songs: ‘Johnny has gone for a soldier’, ‘Hush-a-ba birdie’ and ‘John Peel’. All three perfomed well in these attractive songs, that gave both clarinet and voice plenty of melody, with lively, even humorous writing.

For an encore, the trio performed very effectively Stephen Sondheim’s well-known ‘Send in the Clowns’, but again the low pitch of the opening mitigated against a thoroughly satisfying performance from the singer, though the instruments gave a fine rendition.

I was a little surprised that the singer used the sheet music for all her items (as did the pianist for her solos) even following an extensive tour for Chamber Music New Zealand, during which, presumably, much the same music was performed; communication between singer and audience was good, but would have been even better without that barrier between.

Nevertheless, this concert gave its audience an interesting programme of pleasing and mainly unfamiliar songs, and demonstrated that here we have three very competent musicians.

Pangea Piano Project – double the pleasure

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Pangea Piano Project

Ya-Ting Liou and Blas Gonzalez (pianos)

Music for Four Hands and Two Pianos by New Zealand Composers

Kenneth Young, Jack Body, Edwin Carr, John Psathas

The Hunter Concert Series (presented by the NZ School of Music)

Hunter Building, Victoria University of Wellington

Thursday 26th May, 2011

Every concert has its own intrinsic qualities and unique merits; but this one was exceptionally memorable. I found it a life-enhancing experience, and in fact couldn’t trust myself to write a review until I’d returned to earth, somewhat. Now, with feet firmly back on the ground, I’m ready to re-savour the pleasures and excitements of what I heard and saw at the Hunter Building, on a late May evening.

The Pangea Piano Project consists of two gifted young pianists, Ya-Ting Liou from Taiwan and Blas Gonzalez from Argentina, who have joined forces to, in their own words “combine standard piano music with less conventional repertoire for solo, duet and duo”.  The duo has commissioned, premiered and recorded many works by composers from all around the world, and obviously considers the New Zealand repertoire for the piano eminently worthy of attention – in fact “wide and varied”, and characterized by “imaginative innovation”, according to the duo’s programme note.

Works by four New Zealand composers, two of whom were present at the concert, made up the evening’s music, and to my ears readily endorsed the opinions of the duo. The first half featured items for four hands at one piano, by Kenneth Young and Jack Body, while two pianos were brought into play after the interval, for music by Edwin Carr and John Psathas.

Naturally. the performers took advantage of the “composer-presence”, inviting first Ken Young and then Jack Body to speak about their respective pieces. Young’s work, entitled Variations on a Prayer, written in 2010, was inspired by both Beethoven’s and Brahms’ approach to variation form, whereby themes are not just ornamented but transformed – Young likened the process of transformation to “the struggle between faith and doubt”, speaking about how the act of prayer itself is multifaceted in a way that itself suggested variation form. The music’s meditative opening evoked spaces that seemed to encourage self-examination, with mirror-like treble-and-bass interactions. Conversely, the variations make a rhapsodic, almost quixotic impression, with canonic figurations again suggesting self-awareness, the pianists all the while expressing the differing moods beautifully with their keyboard choreographies. More agitated episodes featured a toccata-like hammering above and below intertwining linear themes, and rapid unisons imploding to form a violent waltz, the irruptions gradually lessening as the opening theme returns, beautiful and prayerful, suggesting a kind of processional towards what seems like a state of reassurance – a heartfelt and moving work.

Jack Body’s Three Rhythmics (written in 1986) was commissioned originally by the New Zealand Music Federation, but was pronounced as “too difficult” by the performers who had been assigned to the piece. Body himself ascribed the piece’s difficulties to his own youthful confidence, stressing that he was “a bit younger then”, and  admitting also that “at certain times in one’s life one feels the need to do or create something flashy”. He calls the kind of virtuosity required of the performers “mechanistic rather than Lisztian” , and observed wryly that that even the performers who subsequently tackled the work more-or-less successfully complained about its difficulties. However, he emphasized that the live performances he’s heard of the work have all produced an exhilarating effect – so that demands, after all, perhaps do bring rewards.

He would have been exhilarated all over again by this performance – right from the Stravinsky-like opening of the first movement “Drumming”, with its wonderfully jagged accents and rhythmic patterning, and with the textures spiced by occasional hand-clapping, the duo kept the pulse of the work alive and buoyant. What a change with the “Interlude” movement, in which all notions of conscious time seem to have been dissolved into a Dali-esque “melting-clocks” kind of scenario at the beginning, the duo gradually goading the “parlando” declamations back into metered divisions . And I loved the pair’s choreographic interactions during the final “Ostinato”, enacting for us in sight and sound an almost ritualistic clashing of lines over a dancing bass. We heard left and right figurations occasionally spreading themselves, fragmenting the symmetries with angular accents and dealing with the remorseless bass line as best they could, the argument breaking off boldly and abruptly by way of solving the music’s impasse. Breathtaking playing!

Edwin Carr’s suite of dances from his ballet score “Elektra” represented an earlier era of New Zealand composition, but one whose boldness, vigour and austerity seemed as “contemporary” as any of the other works. This music marked the duo’s switch to the two-piano medium, giving the concert ample variety of texture and spatial ambience. Carr’s work dates from 1955, and his time studying in Italy with composer Goffredo Petrassi, who was an advocate of the neoclassicism whose influence, thanks to the likes of Stravinsky, was very much in vogue. Carr actually took the directorship for a short period of Il Nuovo Balletto d’Italia, who performed his ballet a number of times on tour. This two-piano version of a suite of dances from the score stresses what the programmme notes describe as “vigorous rhythms, percussive piano writing, concise formal design and rugged polytonal chords”. I thought Carr’s music triumphantly spanned the centuries over which the inspiration had cast its shadow, the textures at once lean, spare, and energetic in a modern manner, but also presenting a cold, marbled finish in places that suggested an antiquity of centuries. Each of the four pieces had something of this Janus-faced aspect, the performers ringing out their tones across the two-piano vistas, and evoking a dark and compelling ambience of human interaction and emotion.

John Psathas’s work, Zeal, from 1992, concluded the concert. The work has five movements, the first, Lulling Imagination to Sleep, beginning with murmuring bass figurations that readily recall his earlier (1988) Waiting for the Aeroplane – there are similarly vast spaces conjured out of the sounds, underlined by the antiphonal placement of the pianos. The music’s ambient capacities gradually build to something of an elemental roar, before retreating as enigmatically throughout a long-breathed epilogue.The following Ghost Hunting is quixotic and fragmentary, featuring tingling exchanges between the instruments with occasional biting sforzandi, the playing by turns whispering, wailing and laughing – one senses ghosts being laid to rest. The title-movement, Zeal, features monumental, pagan-like gestures, energetic and deep-throated, the sounds breaking away and reforming, reinventing themselves in the process, and contrasting markedly with the following Amalgam, a world in which sharp angularities play jabbing, poking games of hide-and-seek in the nocturnal mists. Finally Unstoppable Forces: Immovable Objects brought forth driving, syncopated energies from the tireless pair towards tremendous, Mahlerian outpourings of tone, whose climactic moments Baz Gonzales described in his program notes as “romantic grandeur”. Like all of Psathas’s music, its direct emotional impact is the most striking immediate feature, though deeper layers of impulse driving things like the larger-scale organization of the material make for interesting explorations of one of this country’s most interesting composers.

It would seem that there is a recording of these and other works planned with the duo, for release on the excellent Waiteata Music Press label – in my book, already a sure-fire winner, judging by this remarkable concert’s music-making from the Pangea Piano Project.

Four fine musicians compete for NZSM Concerto Competition

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music Concerto Competition

Competitors: Nick Price (guitar) – Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez; Reuben Chin (alto saxophone) – Pierre Dubois’s Concerto for alto saxophone and string orchestra; Kate Oswin (violin) – Mozart’s Violin Concerto No 5 in A; Sunny Cheng (piano) – Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G
Adjudicator: Vyvyan Yendoll

Adam Concert Room, Victoria University

Wednesday 25 May, 7.30pm

This was the final round of the School of Music’s annual concerto competition, reduced now to four finalists. Each is accompanied by piano – a pianist of their choice.

First, I was impressed by the musicianship and accomplishment of all four contestants, and the way in which the finalists had emerged produced a concert of good variety.

The first contestant was guitarist Nick Price who played the obvious concerto by Rodrigo. Though I found his demeanour a little less than engaging – he made no eye contact with the audience, his head turned down most of the time towards his left hand – the music was there in a most attractive way. He played from memory.

He opened with bold, clean chords, paced resolutely: it established at once an expectation of an interesting journey through the music (which ended after the second movement). The gorgeous Adagio was played beautifully, easily paced, in a relaxed manner, as if every note had to be savoured to the full: dynamics sensitively handled, with discreet rubato that let the music breathe. He was fortunate in his accompanist, Douglas Mews, who managed to re-create the score with remarkable quasi-orchestral colouring.

Saxophonist Reuben Chin’s contest piece was Pierre Dubois’s Concerto for Alto Saxophone and String Orchestra which he played with the music in front of him, not that it detracted from an air of spontaneity and total mastery of the score. Though he opened with a slightly imperfect, breathy note, articulation thereafter was pretty flawless, shown strikingly in the big cadenza where his breath control was impressive, through some very fast, virtuosic passages. A contrasting tone of melancholy coloured the slow movement, where his highest register was admirable. The last movement revealed the composition’s French descent most conspicuously and l’esprit français was accurately captured.

Chin was very capably accompanied by Claire Harris at the piano. He was the winner: one of the two contestants I had guessed as most likely.

Kate Oswin, who had her early training and competition awards in Christchurch, as well as playing in the Christchurch Symphony and now in the Wellington Orchestra, played Mozart’s Fifth Violin Concerto. She played without the score and was accompanied by Matthew Oswin. There was a slightly casual air about her playing, and at least in the first movement I thought her phrasing was not very interesting. Technically her playing was excellent however, and she certainly showed a high level of accomplishment, including effortless double stopping, in the cadenza of the second movement. She played only the first two movements.

The Ravel Piano Concerto was the choice of Sunny Cheng who came to Wellington from Beijing aged 15. Accompanied at the piano by Douglas Mews, she played from memory all three movements. This concerto suffered more than the others from the fact of being accompanied by a second piano whish detracted somewhat from the audience’s ability always to distinguish the two, especially when the keyboards were not visible – though the two pianos were distinctive enough in tone. She gave off an air of complete mastery of the work, handling rhythms and phrasing in a comfortable manner, and sounding at home with syncopations and jazz-influenced passages. Her second movement was limpidly beautiful, with just enough emotional feeling to make contact with her listeners. The two pianos created an almost competitive spirit in the last movement; equally in control, generating a sparkling, motoric excitement as it raced to its conclusion.

Reuben Chin, the winner of the competition, will play with the NZSM Orchestra in a concert at St Andrew’s on The Terrace at 7.30pm on Friday 12 August.

NZSM Saxophone orchestra, quintet and quartet beguile at lunchtime

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music
Fugue in G minor “Great”, BWV 542 for saxophone quintet (J.S. Bach, arr N. Woods)
Cantilene  for saxophone quintet (Ida Gotkovsky)
PR Girl for saxophone quintet         (Andrew Tweed)
Saxophone Quartet (Alfred Desenclos)
Toccata and Fugue in G Minor(?) (D minor, BWV 565) (J.S.Bach, arr. Guy Lacour for saxophone orchestra)
Tango for saxophone orchestra (Stravinsky, arr. J van der Linden)
Slava! for saxophone orchestra (Bernstein, arr. J van der Linden)

 

Conductor: Simon Brew, Leader: Reuben Chin, Artistic direction: Debbie Rawson. 

 

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

 

Wednesday 25 May, 12.15pm

 

At the New Zealand School of Music, Deborah Rawson attracts a lot of students to the saxophone. And her success in getting skilled performers into the community, as well as in the periodic concerts given by students and others, such as her long-standing ensemble, Saxcess, is slowly bringing a realization of the place of the instrument(s) in the classical music sphere.

 

While the jazz world was almost entirely dominated by the alto and tenor saxes, with one or two notable exceptions like baritone player like Gerry Mulligan and sopranist Sidney Bechet, the classical genre has become more accustomed to the whole consort of saxes which, on the showing of this concert, numbers at least six.

 

No details of either the pieces (only composers’ names, not in order) or the players was available at the concert, which led to a guessing game, in which I scored poorly. I got marks only for Bach and Stravinsky; I obtained details later.

 

Two of the most successful pieces in the concert were Bach’s ‘Great’ fugue in G minor played by the quintet, and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor played by the orchestra. The latter, particularly, created a rich sound that did justice very interestingly to the character of the original. The fanfare elements in the Toccata were splendidly arresting while the differing ranks of instruments allowed the various fugal passages to be heard distinctly.

 

I thought it worked a little better than the Fugue, which was arranged for quintet (Reuben Chin – soprano, Emma Hayes-Smith – alto, Annelise Kreger – alto, Katherine Maciaszec – tenor, Geraint Scott – baritone). It was played fairly quickly which seemed to make it harder to achieve variety of colour; but I enjoyed the way the soprano soared above the others, and it was the one, like a soprano voice carrying an aria, that allowed touches of a humanizing rubato to surface. 

 

Ida Gotkovsky was born in 1933 and is Professor of Composition at the Paris Conservatoire. She has composed for all main genres, including many solo and chamber pieces for saxophone.

 

Her Cantilene for quintet opened in deliberate manner, led by alto then tenor in plaintive tones. A second phase developed a lighter character, with arresting ostinati from tenor and soprano saxes. I was safe to have guessed this as post-Messiaen French: I hadn’t heard of the composer.

 

Andrew Tweed’s PR Girl was introduced by fast didgeridoo sounds (so I suspected he might have been Australian, though I find he is a British saxophonist/composer, born 1963) on baritone sax, followed by lively, entertaining jazz strains, modulating to satisfying effect towards the end.

 

The major work of the concert was the saxophone quartet by Alfred Desenclos, a major figure in the saxophone world, played by the quintet members minus Annelise Kreger. Written by the 50-year-old Desenclos in 1962, it could have come from no other national school than that of Françaix and Poulenc  A website comment reads: “it is one of the very few really substantial sonatas in the saxophone repertoire… technical and artistic challenges abound.”

 

In three movements: Allegro non troppo, Andante poco largo, Allegro energico, it immediately created an air of expectation, as the introduction ended in a string of evanescent rising scales, and the movement continued in vivacious spirit. The second movement rose slowly from a somnolent state to a mood of peaceful dreaminess. The third movement set off with little fanfare motifs which accelerated in syncopated rhythms, and the four parts entered into a somewhat fugal episode which became quite excitable. But I was somewhat disconcerted as it approached its end to become aware of a certain tonal monotony in the patterns of the four instruments; would I have had a similar reaction to the music if it had been played by four stringed instruments? I don’t know.

 

Nevertheless, the performance brought it to life with a variety of thoughful expressive colourings and dynamic contrasts.

 

Then the saxophone orchestra emerged from the vestry: eleven of them: the quintet plus six non-students (David McGregor – sopranino, Debbie Rawson – soprano, Lauren Draper – alto, Hayden Sinclair – tenor, Will Hornabrook – tenor, Graham Hanify – bass), plus conductor Simon Brew.

 

Their first piece was Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565.  As I remarked at the beginning it was a very striking arrangement, replicating organ sounds most convincingly. I was impressed too by the conductor’s decisive guidance and his ability to hold a lively pulse, dramatic energy and to command excellent ensemble. It was followed by Tango by Stravinsky, one of the first pieces he wrote after arriving in the United States in 1940. It proved a colouful, effective piece that the orchestra played carefully, with some fine comic gestures.

 

Finally came a short party piece that seemed to come out of Sousa, Ibert and Chabrier. I was surprised, on getting the complete list of music, to find it was by Bernstein, called Slava!; the name Sousa had occurred to me at the time without imagining it to be American. 

 

All the players did a splendid job in all phases of the concert, in persuading us of the saxophones’ legitimacy as solo, chamber music and orchestral instrument.

 

Tasmin Little clothed, with naked violin, in diverting recital

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Naked Violin

Playing and talking about the violin: Luslawice Variations by Paul Petterson; Bach: Solo Violin Sonata No 1, BWV 1001 and Partita No 3, BWV 1006; Eugène Isaÿe: Sonata in D minor, Op 27 No 3 ‘Ballade’

Tasmin Little (violin)

Ilott Theatre

Sunday 22 May, 3pm

Tasmin Little is in New Zealand as one of the adjudicators for the Michael Hill International Violin Competition, but she has also played the Sibelius Concerto with the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and a solo concert in Christchurch in the place of a concert with the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra since the earthquake damaged the Town Hall.

Her Naked Violin performances was arranged in Hamilton and Wellington through the chamber music societies in each city.

It is encouraging that eminent musicians such as Little are more often being invited to perform in contexts additional to the main purpose of their visit, in other places around the country. Too often in the past, players of international renown come to play a concerto with an orchestra, but no effort is made to set up solo recitals for them, even in the city in which they play.

Interviews on both National Radio and RNZ Concert during the past week revealed an engaging and sparkling personality and they may well have led to a full Ilott Theatre. Her routine involves no comedy one-liners or risqué gags – ‘Naked’ was clearly sufficient enticement.

After explaining what she aimed to do she took us step by step through the first piece, named for the place of a Polish chamber music festival, by English composer Paul Patterson. By the time the performance arrived the themes that she’d laid out sounded like old favourites (almost). It was no doubt chosen for the range of violinist playing devices that it demands, from left hand pizzicato to spiccato and false harmonics through the length of each string.

Parts of two Bach solo violin pieces followed. Two movements each from the Sonata No 1 in G minor and the Partita No 2 in E minor. Her playing is personally undemonstrative; rather, its impact on the audience came from its obvious and straightforward urge to make contact musically with the audience, just as she had through her open and self-effacing dialogue with them.

In the middle of the programme Tasmin invited questions from the floor about anything relating to the violin, the music or to her own experiences and intentions. That resulted in some interesting questions, and answers, about ‘historically-informed’ performance, how Bach would find performances of his music today, the way the performer might alter what the composer had in mind, how she managed to achieve success as a performer. Her reply to the small girl’s question, what was ‘her favourite song’ when she was young, might not have meant a lot to her (a piece by Delius).

Her last piece was the third solo violin sonata by Eugène Isaÿe; though I’ve heard it played several times and admire many aspects, it still sounds more like a very elaborate cadenza which I expect to end with the awaited ‘cadence’ that allows the orchestra to re-enter the fray. However, the performance was, like all her other playing, marked by an unostentatious mastery and a musicality that drew attention simply to the musical qualities of the piece.