Tag: chamber music

Quintessential chamber music – the Aroha Quartet and Andrew Joyce

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music Hutt Valley presents:

AROHA STRING QUARTET

and ANDREW JOYCE (‘cello)

Aroha Quartet:

Haihong Liu / Blythe Press (violins)

Zhongxian Jin (viola) / Robert Ibell (‘cello)

with Andrew Joyce (‘cello)

HAYDN – String Quartet in B-flat Op.76 No.4 (“Sunrise”)

TORNYAI – Streichquintett (2010)

SCHUBERT – String Quintet in C, D.956

St.Mark’s Church, Woburn, Lower Hutt

Sunday 30th September 2012

I like to think I’ve long gone past the days when I would regard work x, y or z as my “favorite” symphony, concerto, sonata or whatever. Now,  whenever I’m asked about my “favorite” whatever-it-is, I go into a “gripped by bewilderment” state, born largely of the sheer range and scope of the repertoire. I admit I take refuge sometimes behind the rather glib reply that it’s either the last work I heard performed, or else the next one I’m GOING to hear.

But if I was honest I would confess that, secretly, there’s a list of “desert island” works stashed away in my recesses, which I’d have recourse to at crisis-points. And, ever since I first encountered the music on a recording (made half-a-century ago by the Amadeus Quartet and ‘cellist William Pleeth) I’ve not been able to imagine life without being able to hear at regular intervals Schubert’s astounding String Quintet, written in the last year of his life (1828), and expressing worlds of deep emotion in the face of death.

To be present at a live performance – any decently-played live performance – of such a work as the Schubert could be counted as a privilege of human existence. But to have the music recreated and projected into our listening-spaces with such an irresistible amalgam of verve and deep feeling as the Aroha Quartet and Andrew Joyce so brilliantly did at St.Mark’s in Woburn recently was to be given a treasurable gift which won’t easily be forgotten.

It wasn’t merely the Quintet which gave pleasure in these players’ capable hands – earlier in the concert we had the Aroha Quartet alone playing a work by the acknowledged “father” of the string quartet, Josef Haydn, followed by an intriguing and ear-catching item written for the Quartet in 2010 by a Hungarian composer Péter Tornyai, actually a Quintet written with reference to Schubert’s work for the same instrumental combination (featuring two ‘cellos).

So with a programme that promised a good deal of interest and enjoyment, the players took their places and set off with the Haydn “Sunrise” Quartet (Op.76 No.4), a work named for its very opening, featuring a long-breathed melody from the first violin ascending over a gently-sustained chord played by the other instruments. The opening’s richly mellow tones underlined the poetry of the “sunrise” evocation (evidently a publisher’s, rather than the composer’s, nickname for the work), pointing the contrast with the more earthy energies of the allegro con spirito that followed (and the presence of the repeat was a further joy!).

The performance brought out the development’s minor-key “spookiness” beautifully – some of the agitated figures resulted in an edgy phrase or two from the first violin, struggling to maintain intonation, not altogether inappropriate in such a context. But what a homecoming the players made of the recapitulation, each contributing vibrant solo lines to the argument and relishing the composer’s sometimes playful, sometimes wistful variations of his material.

The group’s wonderfully rapt playing of the Adagio I found uplifting, in contrast to the programme-note’s association of the movement with lack of solace and corresponding despair – the few minor-key phrases at the movements end were for me but momentary shadows cast over a largely peaceful soundscape, in this performance. The sprightly, if somewhat droll-faced Menuetto featured a lovely “drone” from the ‘cello carried over from the dance and into the Trio, the players  beautifully nudging those gently-syncopated rhythms taking time-out from the movement’s more vigorous opening.

The finale features one of those tunes that sounds, throughout the first couple of measures, as though it could equally be by Mozart, though Haydn, as ever, brings his own distinctive quirkiness to the proceedings with lurching grace-notes in places, a more “Hungarian-sounding” minor-key variation, and some wonderfully outlandish acccelerandi towards the end of the movement – the Arohas made the most of it all, to our great delight and tantalizing, edge-of-seat excitement.

Péter Tornyai’s Quintet, brief in duration but concentrated and profound in effect, required players to retune their instruments (a technique called “scordatura”, literally “mis-tuning”, but used by composers to make some fingerings of notation possible or create unconventional timbres). Here the strings were re-tuned harmonically and the players required to use open strings to realize the work. ‘Cellist Robert Ibell spoke beforehand about the work’s affinities with the Schubert Quintet, and the group played a number of exerpts which both introduced us to the composer’s particular sound-world and made motivic connections with the Schubert.

The result in performance was decidedly eerie – I could imagine ambient sounds coming from giant machinery slowly turning, or an “Aeolian” process of wind activating different kinds of structures. The emotional effect for me was one of solitude and near-muted attempts at “connection”, via either speech or musical figuration – both sounds and gestures seemed to inhabit a profoundly refracted, if fascinating world, whose language implied rather than specified things – I was reminded of Thomas Hardy’s poem “The Darkling Thrush” whose final words always impart some comfort when understanding is hindered  – ” That I could think there trembled through / his happy goodnight air / Some Blessed Hope whereof he knew / and I was unaware….”

After the interval, Andrew Joyce introduced the Schubert, drawing our attention to the unconventional instrumentation – unlike most string quintets which add a second viola to a normal quartet, Schubert instead uses a second ‘cello, darkening and deepening the textures and resonances. Whether it was that Tornyai’s work had sharpened our listening sensibilities, or that these players would have captured our attentions in any context, or both, the sounds had a sharply-honed, arresting quality from the very first note, the harmonic “lurch” near the top of the crescendo almost orchestral in effect. Thereafter, the players kept their accents and phrasings focused and buoyant throughout the exposition (and the repeat!), relying on clean attack and intensity of tone, bringing out the music’s lyricism rather than its disquiet, at this stage.

More trenchant playing came with the development, the violins digging into their dotted figures, while being stalked by the lower strings, the sequence followed by beautiful duetting in thirds from viola and ‘cello, and an equally captivating singing line from the violin. A later reprise of the “stalking” passage for the lower strings here had a “creepiness” about it, perhaps heightened by the violin triplets above, “in flight” as it were, the playing immediate and visceral in effect. Then came the downward plunge at the end of the sequence, relieving us of some anxiety for the moment by returning us, with bated breath, to the exposition, and to “known’ territories.

As with places in the first movement, the great Adagio wasn’t over-milked for emotion at the outset – the players kept things moving, the tones intense but not over-laden or bowed down with grief, giving us the softest pizzicati exchanges imaginable at first, and gradually focusing their “sting” before allowing the hurt to retreat once again. The sudden, shockingly nightmarish irruption mid-movement of agonized agitation had a ragged initial moment which mattered not a whit in context, the raw intensities taking over and raging throughout the middle section. Amid some ebb-and-flow towards the end an uneasy peace was restored, the music looking for solace and comfort, the pizzicati once again making every note, be it gentle or rapier-like, really tell, sweetness mixed with sorrow and resignation – a great achievement by the players.

With the scherzo came terrific attack, the ensemble not always perfect, but,more importantly, the energy and desperation of the opening simply staggering! Those off-beat szforzandi bit hard, and the chromatic slurrings at the end of the sequence made a properly vertiginous effect, as did the sudden lurch into the repeat. All of which the players held fast with the onset of the trio, a veritable “well of the world’s deep sorrow”, its realization here so heartfelt and concentrated as to draw the listener into its essential stillness. No let-up with the reprise of the opening – if anything, the notes flew off the ends of the bows with even more desperation than before.

I loved the great stride of the finale’s opening, here, emphatic gesturing finely judged, and moments of relative repose given their due. There was lovely, skillful work from the first violin, here, plenty of skitterish figuration to integrate into the texture, cheel-by-jowl with the tenderest expression. The ‘cellos duetted songfully, counterpointed by haunting wind-blown figurations from both violins, while the mid-movement canonic passages were delivered with great gusto, by contrast. Only in the brief hiatus before the final gathering of energies did there seem a moment’s uncertainty among the ensemble, an equivocal impulse whose danger was grasped as one by the players and tossed into the desperate exhilaration of the final stampede towards impending destiny, the composer shaking his fist at fate right to the last bar.

A landmark performance? – I think so. I couldn’t really hope to hear a more engaging, more deeply touching, and more understanding reading of this incredible music. Very great honour to the Aroha Quartet and to Andrew Joyce for giving us such a memorable experience.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Viva Viola at Lower Hutt campaigns for full recognition with both hits and misses

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Viola Viva: The Next Generation (John Roxburgh, Alexa Thomson, Megan Ward and Vincent Hardaker)

Music by Bach, Handel, Bizet and Saint-Saëns

St Mark’s Church, Lower Hutt

Wednesday 26 September, 12.15pm

I find that I heard other embodiments of this ensemble last year, and a solo performance by Megan Ward in June. Previous experiences entertained me more than this one did, though there were things, such as the arrangement of Handel’s Fireworks Music, that I thought came off splendidly.

Almost all music for a group like this must be arrangements, and so there is the risk of running foul of the strong feeling in the more severe quarters of the classical music world that such things are bastards, disreputable, to be deplored. Most generalisations are dishonest and foolish and so is that. All arrangements must be taken on their merits and listened to objectively, and with one’s emotional antennae switched on.

I entered just after the Overture to the Royal Fireworks Music had begun and loved the depth of sonority achieved by these instruments; while their sound was quite different from that of woodwinds and brass, it produced a similar effect, of celebration and energy, adorned with plenty of variety, notably when the pensive middle section came. In La Paix (the peace the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle at the end of the War of the Austrian Succession – succession of deceased despotic European monarchs was a bountiful source of conflict and profligate slaughter in the 18th century) I found myself wanting a little more sustained tone, but the entire three movements generally made a persuasive case for the enterprise.

The disposition of players changed democratically with each new piece, allowing each to be heard in the more prominent parts. I’ve always been fond of the Minuetto from Bizet’s incidental music for Daudet’s play, L’arlésienne; it seemed to have been much more played in the 1950s when my musical affections were at their most susceptible. But I couldn’t find it in my heart to fall for this arrangement the colours of which seem to matter more than they did in the Handel; the middle section – say, the Trio – sounded rather cloddish.

The Bach Fugue in C major – oddly truncated from its Prelude – seemed to do them no favours for it was so brief that I found it hard to become involved with, and the playing, capable as it was, simply did not persuade me. Perhaps its performance needs careful rethinking and really thoughtful repetition.

The next piece was an arrangement of ‘Lascia ch’io panga’ from Handel’s Rinaldo. Again I had misgivings about is success as a translation, and didn’t feel that it has bedded into its new habitation.

The last offering was Saint-Saëns’s tone poem Danse Macabre. John Roxburgh took his turn leading this, playing a good deal of the devilish bravura which was fit for a Paganini, or at least a Wieniawski as it might have been when it was written in 1873. It actually began life as a song setting of an eponymous poem by Henry Cazalis, and the composer did separate arrangements for piano solo and small orchestra before coming to its orchestral full dress.

So there is plenty of authority for adaptations here, and this one worked well, though one must be forgiven for missing the special effects such as xylophone. Its great popularity has, naturally, caused it to be dismissed by the more severe of music critics, but it is nevertheless a major work of its kind, one of the first after Liszt’s invention of the symphonic poem with its literary, artistic or philosophical references.

The players did well with the sul ponticello effects, and other departures from routine techniques. If intonation and ensemble were occasionally a fraction under perfect, its atmosphere was splendidly conjured right through to the beautifully protracted dying phrases, and the tonal quality both individually and in choruses, was often excellent, beguiling the ear.

This ensemble, and the personal variations on it that seem to occur, strike me as having a good future both in the specialised viola world and in the sphere of general classical music.

 

Amici Ensemble in fine performances at Waikanae

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

The Amici Ensemble (Donald Armstrong and Cristina Vaszilcsin, violins; Julia Joyce, viola; Rowan Prior, cello; Diedre Irons, piano)
(Waikanae Music Society)

Enescu: Sérénade Lointaine (trio for piano, violin and cello)
Mahler: Piano quartet in A minor
Mozart: Piano quartet in G minor, K.478 (allegro; andante; rondo)
Brahms: Piano quintet in F minor, Op.34 (allegro non troppo; andante, un poco adagio; scherzo: allegro; finale: poco sostenuto, allegro non troppo)

Waikanae Memorial Hall

23 September 2012, 2.30pm

An interesting programme performed by fine musicians is always an attraction – even on a gorgeously sunny, warm day in spring.

The Amici Ensemble is a variable feast, under the leadership of Donald Armstrong.  This time it comprised a piano quintet, but the music played varied from three-strong, through four-strong to five-strong (no pun intended, Donald!)

George Enescu’s brief Serenade was a tuneful work, well worth an airing, while the other shorter work, Mahler’s quartet, was a surprise in that it was little like Mahler’s later music.  Nonetheless, it was a very attractive work, Schubertian in parts.  It was written when Mahler was 16 to 18 years of age, and is incomplete.

The Mozart piano quartet chosen, one of only two the composer wrote, was a familiar work.  As the programme note stated, ‘here the piano takes an equal role rather being simply a continuo instrument discreetly backing the strings.’  This gave full rein to Diedre Irons’s pianistic abilities; her performance was bright and lively.  However, some inaccuracies in the lower register, and a general lack of sparkle in the strings meant the quartet had less impact than it should have.

After the interval, Brahms’s monumental quintet.  It features an exciting opening, followed by lovely contrasts, with plenty of power.  All the instruments displayed marvellous sonorities.  Again, there were a few inaccuracies – not severe, but too many.  Phrasing was beautifully done.  A slow passage in the first movement produced attractive timbres.  As usual, in this quintet Brahms extracts the maximum from his material.

The second movement is serene, but with plenty of melodic and harmonic interest, and dense textures at times.  The scherzo has a spooky start, before the grand march commences.  The movement becomes tempestuous with the fugato; the tone of the instruments was not always coherent.

The finale features another quiet opening leading up to a dramatic sequence of syncopated entries for the strings.  A gypsy melody begins on cello, then is taken up the other players.  Many contrasted passages in a powerful development are solemn and tension-filled.  There is passion towards the end, then a tragically gentle mood before a robust finish.

A well-filled hall appreciated the playing of an interesting and satisfying chamber music programme from the players, who are all, apart from Diedre Irons, members of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra.

 

Zephyr – breaths of fresh air

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Chamber Music New Zealand

Zephyr Wind Quintet

Music by Elliott Carter, Gareth Farr, Carl Nielsen, Darius Milhaud, Ross Edwards, Gyorgy Ligeti

Wellington Town Hall

Sunday 23rd September

What a joy when one literally stumbles across a piece of music that then becomes a favorite! I didn’t even know wind quintets existed when, way back during my formative music explorations in the Palmerston North Public Library (what an Aladdin’s Cave of a place!) I chanced across an LP recording by the Philadelphia Wind Quintet. “Nielsen”, it said on the cover – and “Barber” as well, if I remember rightly. The Nielsen was, of course, that composer’s Wind Quintet, the very first music of his I ever heard – and I loved it right from that first bassoon phrase, with those chirpy, out-of-doors responses tumbling over one another, as if for the sheer joy of being breathed into life and set in motion.

Since then, I’ve acquired several wonderful recordings of the Nielsen, my favorite being the Melos Ensemble’s characterful 1960s performance for EMI – but live performances have, until this concert , eluded me. I can imagine being more than content had the Zephyr Wind Quintet played only the Nielsen work at their recent concert, as it was such a benediction to hear it “live”, let alone played so magnificently by the ensemble.

However, it was my good fortune to have the work “framed” in concert by a number of attractive and contrasting pieces by other composers , who also seemed to know a thing or two about writing for winds. Beginning the program was a work by Elliott Carter, the music having a similar kind of instant appeal to that of Nielsen’s – perhaps busier and more densely-textured, but  just as inclined towards lyricism. As with Nielsen, a droll sense of humour was never far away, with strongly-characterised episodes in the music used as “foils” for one another, deep tolling bells at one point enlivened by birdsong, with subsequent wind-flurries setting the cat among the pigeons.

A second part, allegro giocoso, clicked some even higher voltage-switches on, setting in motion rapid-fire momentums which delighted the ear, whether settling upon an individual instrumentals line or registering the contrapuntal dovetailing. The music argument seemed to intensify, as if a lot of people at a dinner-party were shouting at one another, trying to make individual points at all costs, before the host, with a shrug of the shoulders and a disarming word or two, defused the argument and bade everybody goodnight.

Gareth Farr’s Mad Little Machine which followed was a Zephyr commission for the group’s current tour – aptly titled, the piece brought out bags of “attitude” from each of the instruments, expressed both in individual and concerted ways. Right from the opening cavortings of the bass clarinet, which both astonished and alarmed everybody else, there was energy and bite as flourishes of impulse from all the different voices were tossed between the group.

The near-constant motoric, syncopated rhythms generated crackling energy, unexpectedly allowing a”luftpause” mid-work before setting off again even more mad-headedly, the figurations wild and angular, and the combinations amusingly bizarre  (piccolo and bass clarinet amusingly “spooking” one another, at one point). It all came to an abrupt end, not with a bang, but with a squeak, to everybody’s great delight. Wonderful, too, that the composer was present, applauding the performance as enthusiastically as HE himself was being applauded!

After these exertions, the Nielsen work seemed to come from another world, lyrical, spacious and bracingly “outdoor” in feeling. The composer wrote the quintet for the Copenhagen Quintet, with the individual characteristics of each player very much in mind. In fact, had he lived longer, Nielsen might have completed his promise of writing individual concerti for each of the Quintet members – as it was he finished only two of the larger works, for flute and then for clarinet. We have left only the Quintet to give us the barest of glimpses of the remaining three players’ personalities.

Apart from one or two vagrant notes and a slight ensemble hesitation when beginning the final grand statement of the first movement’s ascending opening melody, the playing was spick-and-span, flexible and alert, throughout the work. The performance, I felt, concentrated more on the music’s fluency than its occasional quirkiness and pungency – those evidently characterful and volatile personalities who helped inspire the work were mostly on their best behaviour this time round.

I wondered whether the Town Hall acoustic told against some of the work’s immediacy, the sounds integrated almost to a fault, so that we were denied some of the spikiness of Nielsen’s writing. Beautiful details, such as Ed Allen’s first solo in the opening movement, were wonderful, but the strands of colour and texture in ensemble seemed “tamed” in those voluminous spaces. In a smaller hall we would undoubtedly have enjoyed a more flavoursome sound-picture.

The finale, with its frequent solo and duo passages, here most tellingly enabled the players to be themselves, the “wandering in the wilderness opening” featuring plenty of wind-blown freedom and acerbic calling-to-order, while each of the variations following the beautiful hymn-tune (Nielsen’s own setting of a chorale “My Jesus, let my heart receive thee”) created its own intense colour-and-texture experience to wonderfully expressive effect. This tune first appeared in a sing-song 3/4 rhythm, but its reprise at the very end was as a grandly processional 4/4, at once celebratory and humbly moving. (The interval, immediately afterwards, allowed me and others plenty of space to savour it all further!).

Back afterwards for Darius Milhaud’s entertaining suite La Cheminée du roi René, a seven-movement work originally written for a film about an historical ruler from Milhaud’s own Aix-en-Provence, one which brought out the composer’s own piquant response to evocations of earlier times. The movements were all very short, but each made a distinct impression of specific things, processionals, morning songs, entertainers and entertainments. The musicians successfully captured and brought to life these charming vignettes, concluding with a Madrigal-nocturne, whose dream-like rituals gradually faded with the sounds of ancient fanfares at the end.

Strange to hear echoes of Mahler’s Seventh Symphony in Ross Edwards’ work Incantations, with calls sounding across a crepuscular landscape at the outset. Wild horn-whoops and all, the atmosphere captured by the players set the scene for the second movement’s insect-like molto animato, one whose repetitive figurations tightened into a kind of naturalistic ritual chant, to almost claustrophobic effect – whew! As for the finale, the sounds seemed almost filmic to me, primordial at the start, then developing mesmeric rhythms that gathered up hymn-like strands whose oscillations continued in my brain long after the actual music had stopped.

Rounding off this concert’s wonderfully discursive explorings were Gyorgy Ligeti’s Six Bagatelles, pieces which belie their “trifles” classification. The pieces are arrangements by the composer of movements from a series of piano pieces called Musica ricercata, which he wrote in the 1950s. Listening to Zephyr’s brilliantly vivid realizations of this music I found it hard to imagine the pieces in any other guise than for wind ensemble. From the “Keystone Cops-like” opening movement, through the ebb and flow of lament, folksong and energetic dance, Ligeti’s pieces whirled us through whole worlds in microcosm, leaving us almost as breathless as the players by the time the final Vivace capriccioso had “done its dash”.

We were a none-too-sizeable audience when put in the relative vastness of the Town Hall, but we roared and clapped our appreciation as whole-heartedly as we could at the end – a great concert experience!

 

 

 

 

Early and late Debussy celebrated by School of Music trio of principal lecturers

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Claude Debussy
Violin Sonata (allegro vivo; Intermède: fantasque et léger; Finale: très animé)
Cello Sonata (Prologue: lent, sostenuto e molto risoluto; Sérénade: modérément animé;
Final: animé, léger et nerveux)
Piano Trio in G major (andantino con moto allegro; scherzo-intermezzo: moderato con allegro; andante espressivo; Finale: appassionato)

Te Kōkī Trio (Martin Riseley, violin; Inbal Megiddo, cello; Jian Liu, piano)

Ilott Theatre

Friday, 14 September 2012 at 5.15pm

A delectation of Debussy from dedicated academic musicians pleased an almost-full Ilott on Friday.  The two sonatas were from late in Debussy’s life; the trio from his student days.  The last was unpublished in his lifetime.

The wonderful watery sounds at the opening of the violin sonata were rendered with great delicacy and sympathy by the performers.  Debussy’s unusual use of sonata form makes the work interesting and memorable.  The end of the movement was lively and varied, yet quiet and thoughtful.

The second movement employed harmonics, the sound making me think of sprightly dancers all over the place, in both violin and cello parts.  A more lyrical theme intervened, then it was back to staccato leaps and harmonics.  The Finale was driving, yet piquant.  The sure-fingered playing of Martin Riseley had the music speaking clearly with its many different voices.  A surprise ending completed a fine performance.

It is intriguing that Debussy reverted from Italian musical terms to French for the descriptions of these two movements, and indeed for the second and third movements of the cello sonata, apparently not finding Italian words to meet his needs.

The cello sonata was written only two years before the violin one, the latter being written and performed just a year before Debussy’s death in 1918.

A strong opening from the piano was soon followed by the cello, both full-toned.

Both players were attentive to every detail, bringing out a multiplicity of gorgeous nuances, and exploiting the varied timbres of their instruments to the fullest extent.

In the Serenade second movement this included ‘the cello… takes the role of a guitar, and of Pierrot, a manic harlequin, with harsh pizzicato, flautando [bowing at the base of the fingerboard of the cello, to sound flute-like], tremolo and ponticello bowings among the effects’, to quote the excellent programme notes.  The cello began the movement with pizzicato, followed by the piano making the nearest possible thing to pizzicato.  A rapid passage takes over, but the manic harlequin returns, before he is shut away, and a serene melody emerges.  Then it is straight on to the final movement, where rhythm is once more to the fore.  A great range of dynamics was engaged.  The increasing pace built up to a repeat of an earlier theme and then the conclusion.

The trio concluded the hour-long programme in great style.  Some introductory remarks from Martin Riseley could not be heard from where I was sitting.  The work had a delicious opening on piano, followed by violin.  The piece had a cheery mood, befitting a 17 or 18-year-old, as compared with the later works played in the first part of the programme.  The movement became impassioned in a late Romantic manner, not in the unpredictable way of his later works.  This was certainly very accomplished writing for a youthful composer.

The second movement featured pizzicato at the start, and incisive piano writing.  This was followed by a lilting, light-hearted dance.  As the programme note said, this was salon music.  The music alternated between scherzo and moderato passages.

The Finale commenced with a flowing cello melody accompanied by piano, before the violin joined in, in like vein.  The music became robust and calm by turns.

The movement got well away from the delicacy with which we associate Debussy.  It was strong, yet romantic at times – it could have been Brahms – and became passionate in the build-up to the end.

The playing throughout the concert was always expressive with beautiful tone, and utterly accurate and in perfect ensemble.  Jian Liu summons magic with his fingers.

While one can recognise that the New Zealand School of Music may want photographs of performances by its staff and students, I have now almost lost count of the number of times that a clicking camera near to me has disturbed my enjoyment of the concerts.  Cannot the photos be taken during pre-concert rehearsal?  These 5.15 concerts are free, thanks to provision of the venue free-of-charge by the Wellington City Council, but does the audience need to put up with this?

 

Music played as the composers would have wished, at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

Minor Pleasures: Baroque music for two violins and continuo

Music by Telemann, Purcell, J.S. Bach, Corelli

Claire Macfarlane (violin), Jessica Lightfoot (violin), Emma Goodbehere (cello), Ariana Odermatt (harpsichord)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 12 September 2012, 12.15pm

It was striking to see a red harpsichord that exactly matched the carpet in St. Andrew’s!  That was not the only euphony on Wednesday.

Listening to lilting music on baroque instruments (and bows), in baroque style, was a pleasant way to spend a lunch-hour in the warm ambience of St. Andrew’s Church..

The first item was a surprise – ‘Gulliver Suite’ by Georg Philipp Telemann.  The excellent programme notes informed us that it was one of a set of twenty-five lessons written “for the enjoyment of music makers at home”, in 1728, only two years after Jonathan Swift’s novel was published.  It is amazing how quickly the book travelled abroad, presumably to Telemann in a German translation.  The work was for two violins only, in five movements: Intrada: Spirituoso; Lilliputsche Chaconne; Brogdingnagische Gigue; Reverie der Laputier, nebst ihren Aufweckern (Reverie of the Laputans and their Attendant Flappers), Andante; Loure der gesitteten Hoyhnhnms (Loure [presumably from the French Loureur meaning ponderousness, dullness] of the Well-mannered Flappers) / Fure der unartigen Yahoos (Wild dance of the Untamed Yahoos).

The titles bring a smile to one’s face.  Whoever coined the phrase ‘serious music’ had not heard of this suite!  The dance movements represented the scenes and characters in Dickens’s work.  A couple of lines of the autograph score were reproduced in the printed programme, depicting (as they almost literally do) the Lilliputians with their hemi-demi-semi-x2-quavers, and the Brobdingnags with their semi-breves, in 24 over 1 time-signature!

The giants who notionally performed the Gigue were noted as ‘clumsy’ – but it is hard to sound clumsy on two well-played violins!  Likewise, the naughty Yahoos were not outlandishly badly behaved in this combination of instruments, being neither particularly furious or wild.  Nevertheless, the inferences were there in the music.

A very good spoken commentary on the works to be played followed, from Claire Macfarlane.

Not for the first time in this venue, I found the violin tone too astringent at times.  The varnished wooden floor and the clear acoustics seem to create this effect.

It was an interesting contrast to have Purcell’s Sonata no.4 in D minor, Z.805 (from 10 Sonatas in 4 parts) follow the Telemann.  The five movement work is scored for two violins with cello and harpsichord continuo.  The cello part counterpointed the harmony of the violins beautifully, and the work was played with nicely nuanced baroque style.  Personally, I preferred the addition of the lower tones in this work compared with the purely violin tones of the Telemann.  While the cello sound carried well, the harpsichord did not come through to the same extent against the incisive violin sound, the violinists being placed directly in front of the keyboard instrument.  The playing, however, was well-nigh impeccable.

The more catholic style of Purcell’s writing was full of interest, with much interplay of parts and use of dissonance.

Bach was so taken with Alessandro Marcello’s Concerto no.3 in D minor for oboe, that he arranged it into a solo harpsichord concerto (BWV 974).  The whole work has plenty of character – no wonder Bach was attracted to it, as was the audience, hearing it superbly played by Ariana Odermatt.  The articulation was splendid, allowing all parts to come through clearly.

The last composer featured was Corelli, firstly in his Sonata no.4 in E minor (from Twelve Sonatas, Op.2).  The five-movement work was delightfully played by the four musicians.  The Preludio – adagio was graceful, featuring many suspensions.  An Allemanda – presto followed, then a Grave movement, in complete contrast.  Again, I found the harpsichord very reticent compared with the cello.  The Adagio and final Giga – allegro were notable for beautifully unified playing, plenty of lift, and absolutely spot-on rhythm.

The Sonata no.12 in G major (Chaconne) that followed was also a most attractive work for all four players.  The working out of variations on a four-note figure was inspired, and a satisfying end to a concert of seldom-heard works (with the exception perhaps of the Bach) that gave variety and contrast.  The playing was of such a standard that we probably heard the music very much as the composers would have intended.

 

 

Baroque ‘musick for several friends’ at the Adam Concert Room:

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Musick for several friends: No 3: Baroque wind

Music by J J Quantz, Leclair, Philidor, Duphly, Telemann, J S Bach

Kamala Bain (recorder and voice flute), Penelope Evison (baroque flute), Douglas Mews (harpsichord)

Adam Concert Room

Sunday 9 September, 4pm

This was the third of three concerts that offered various perspectives on the music of the Baroque period; the first for viols, the second for two harpsichords and this one for wind instruments. And their musical delights were enhanced by offerings of snakc and drinks afterwards.

J J Quantz was a flutist, one of the principal musicians at the brilliant counrt of Frederick the Great who was himself a flute player and also a composer. Quantz’s Sonata for recorder, flute and continuo was a substantial, four-movement work that offered both tunefulness and opportunity for display which these players were very well-equipped to deal with. It is not common (for me anyway) to hear recorder and flute playing together, and it was a real pleasure to hear how well they sounded together, the recorder with a resonant sound, though not so capable of producing vibrato and varied articulations.

A Leclair sonata was introduced by Douglas Mews, recalling the composer’s sticky end on the violent streets of mid 18th century Paris, and the mixed influences of Italian and French music to be heard in his music. Here, the flute lay in a slightly lower register than was called for in the Quantz, and it also presented technical difficulties which caused minor slips later. But in general the music and its playing was charming.

The next piece was also French, from Pierre Philidor, a composer from a large musical family; his cousin, François André, thirty years younger, was one of the most famous French opera composers between Rameau and the Revolution (a major early exponent of opéra-comique).

For this piece, in addition to Penelope Evison’s baroque flute, Kamala Bain produced her voice flute which, she said, could be called a tenor flute. Its sound is something that might cause the flute sceptic to revise his views. The second movement, marked Chaconne, was not the sort of chaconne we are familiar with listening to the typical, slow, triple time German piece. It was bright and quite lively.  Here was a thoughtful piece, emotionally quite expressive in which the two instruments blended beautifully.

Douglas Mews then played, alone, two pieces from a set simply called Third Book of Pieces, by Jacques Duphly. Unlike music French music of the time – a generation after Philidor – dotted rhythms were did not predominate and it did rather suggest a German character. The first movement, La Forqueray (honouring the composer so-named), was in slow common time, written to exploit the harpsichord’s lower range, so producing an agreeable resonance, giving it a feeling of substance and depth. The second piece was La De Belombre (the name unknown to me, to the New Grove Dictionary and to Wikipedia), and its brighter character suggested a spirited fellow, who liked dancing, but who also saw the trade of composing music as being quite important.

Then the musicians took us back east, to north and central Germany. Telemann’s Sonata for recorder and continuo displayed his rhythmic inventiveness and facility in all the compositional devices that marked one for success in the early 18th century, and alternating darting forays by recorder and harpsichord, . The Larghetto had a singing line that emerged without the assistance of vibrato; the Vivace last movement was quite a aural spectacle, demanding virtuosity from both instruments.  And the trio played another Telemann piece, from a concerto for flute and recorder, as an encore.

Finally I heard, for the second time in a week, Bach’s Sonata for two flutes and continuo, BWV 1039; the Nikau Trio played it as a ‘Trio Sonata’ at Lower Hutt. As so often with concerts of baroque music, after a variety of less-known  music by lesser composers, the Bach sounded like a masterpiece, more profoundly lyrical where that was the intent, ornaments than were integral to the shape of the music, use of the two flutes with real flair and imagination. I particularly enjoyed the two instruments in the Adagio third movement, handling the slow, rising four-note triad, creating a pensive tone.  The Presto was a charming, lively piece that sounded most accomplished in these hands.

The entire concert was interestingly constructed, supplying the curious with music that carried various styles and influences as well as a lot of pure pleasure.

 

 

Fancy having such a quartet in our midst! The last of the glorious Beethoven series

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Beethoven: the late string quartets from the New Zealand String Quartet

String Quartets: No 13 in B flat, Op 130 (with the Grosse Fuge as its finale); and No 14 in C Sharp minor, Op 131

Church of St Mary of the Angels

Saturday 8 September, 6.30pm

This concert brought to an end what might well be considered a pinnacle in the career of the New Zealand String Quartet. The quartet’s earlier achievements have been distinguished enough, with their complete cycle of Bartók’s quartets and the Naxos recordings of the complete quartets of Mendelssohn. And it has had an important role in enhancing New Zealand’s reputation as a country that places high value on the arts and music through tours every year in North America and very widely in Europe, not to mention the important contribution to music in New Zealand, for example through the biennial Adam Chamber Music Festival in Nelson, guided by quartet members.

Beethoven’s late quartets fall into two groups. Prince Galitzin had first asked for ‘at least’ three quartets and Beethoven delivered the first three (Opp 127, 130 and 132; Op 132 came before Op 130 in its completion) in 1825 and early 1826. He then continued to complete the two further quartets: Opp 131 and 135, and then in response to his publisher’s urging, he wrote the alternative finale for Op 130, and left the replaced Great Fugue as Op 133.

The New Zealand String Quartet decided here to follow a growing trend worldwide, to put the Great Fugue back in its place as the last movement of the wonderful B flat quartet, Op 130.

I should first remark on the visual beauties of the church, many candelabra and the massive columns supporting the arches around the sanctuary lit from below; the players in spotlights with just enough light for the audience to look at the names of movements. The two men wore standard black while the two women wore most elegant floor-length skirts of shimmery black and grey.

Now the music.

This quartet does not produce a sound that became familiar in the earlier part of last century; dark and burnished, evoking a religious feeling that might have been appropriate in this setting. Their sound is warm enough, particularly Douglas Beilman’s violin and Gillian Ansell’s viola, but what this quartet’s instincts veer towards are the sounds that have given them such authenticity in Bartók and Ravel and, I think, Mendelssohn.

The last quartets, at least the three that depart markedly from the conventional four-movement shape, continue to be quoted by today’s avant-garde composers to support a defence of very general non-acceptance by claiming that Beethoven in these works had far outrun his audiences and that they were not understood for many decades. That is not true: apart from some formal misgivings and the sort of discussion that still takes place about the way the bits relate to each other, they were played at once and widely appreciated. The famous French commentator, Joseph de Marliave, for example, writes: “Certainly there was recognised here extraordinary beauty but marred by blemishes and passages of inexplicable obscurity. One gains the impression of admiration mixed with an uneasy, even awestruck astonishment.”

Accessibility certainly poses no problem in this, Op 130 (nor of course in any of them), and its six distinct movements make the relationships between and within movements easy enough to follow; the mood generally is sanguine and even touched with gaiety, though infusing its melodiousness with a sort of luminous spirituality. I smiled at the remark about the banality of the Presto, second movement, in Rolf Gjelsten’s programme note (I wonder how he feels about the Presto in Op 131); I can see how this might arise, but it’s a mistake to hear a moment – and it’s very short – of esprit, a flash of self-mockery, as a flawed passage. Happily, its role was perfectly captured by the quartet’s performance, as it follows the multitudinous emotional experience of the first movement, offering us a uncomplicated pause to prepare for the beauty of the not-so-slow, Andante movement which seems to hesitate occasionally between contentment and grief.

There was a charming curve to the rhythmic shape of the beguiling, barcarolle-like melody of the Alla danza tedesca that lent special appeal.

Listening to the Cavatina never fails to touch the emotions strangely, more with its sheer beauty than through the expression of the composer’s pain, and this performance conveyed it in the form of acceptance and peace.

I have become more used to this movement being followed by the Great Fugue in certain recordings, and its size, weight and determination now seem indispensable in providing emotional balance to a work that might otherwise be heard as being somewhat dominated by a lightness of spirit. And this was a superb, unrelenting, though wonderfully varied, performance, making the quartet’s entire three-quarter hour length not a minute too long.

The C sharp minor quartet is considered by many the greatest of them all; Beethoven himself apparently did. It presents a more obscure form to a new listener because its seven movements are played without a break, so it is useful to follow it with a score on first hearing.

If profundity is rather the same as an expression of deep feeling, rapture, grief, playfulness, here is the quartet that qualifies. The fugue that opens the first movement has a very different character from that which ended Op 130. Its tonality never seems to settle and fresh, evolving ideas arise. The programme note here, and most that one reads are of little real help in the absence of the score. Failing that, only careful repeated listenings will lead to enlightenment, of committing its main features to memory.

The impression of the quartet is rather that of a fantasia whose shape is determined by impulse, but which has no less or weaker artistic integrity for that.

The heart of the quartet is movement 4, Andante, an extended set of variations, based on a melody of melting beauty, and containing passages that often drew attention to individual episodes such as the rapturous dialogue between Helene Pohl’s violin and Rolf Gjelsten’s cello in the Piu mosso  variation. Its very length, about 15 minutes, is itself a marvel in terms of its overwhelming hypnotic force.

The task of investing the movement with musical coherence, as well as creating an emotional landscape that will take hold of the emotions, even of the spirit, is the greatest challenge of a performance. Did the New Zealand String Quartet quite succeed in sustaining me, you, through this journey? I’m not sure; even with the help of the atmosphere of the church, the lighting, the sense of occasion, my attention drifted occasionally, yet their playing was of a very high order in expressiveness, richness of tone, of subtle dynamic and rhythmic variety.

But responses to music are very personal, and it is usually much more useful to admire the outward characteristics of a performance which here comprised unity and balance, the beautiful individual performances that often reveal striking personal insights, and the sustained feeling for the architecture of each quartet.

Much of the series, under three different promoters has been heard in the main centres as well as certain provincial cities; the Beethoven cycle was the most fitting way for the quartet to celebrate its 25th anniversary, and will have been one of the year’s absolute highlights wherever it was heard.

 

Beethoven and the New Zealand String Quartet – shifting the paradigm

Posted on by Peter Mechen

New Zealand String Quartet: 25th Anniversary Concerts

Beethoven Quartets Op.127, Op.135 and Op.132

Helene Pohl / Douglas Beilman (violins)

Gillian Ansell (viola) / Rolf Gjelsten (‘cello)

St Mary of the Angels, Wellington

Friday 7 September, 2012

Guest reviewer: Antony Brewer

I have been attending New Zealand String Quartet concerts since the early days and while I am suspicious of saying such things, just now it feels as if this may have been the most wonderful of all. I have heard these superb musicians playing the most technically demanding works with style, fire and finesse. This evening, however, was as befits the music, on another plane altogether.

As Beethoven’s deafness isolated him, it seems he listened more and more to his inner voices and paid correspondingly less attention to the expectations of the outside world. One will never know whether his internal processes were uniquely original in terms of form, harmony and texture and he beat them into some acceptable form, or if the deafness simply accelerated an already maturing originality.

Beethoven was known to have said to the violinist Shuppanzigh, “What do I care about your violin?” when the hapless musician begged the composer to simplify some of the parts for his instrument. Certainly, the technical demands upon the players are enormous. One has only to observe the sheer effort of concentration, the split-second timing required and the sheer mechanical skill required playing this music. And this is before the interpretive issues are addressed and they must surely be among the thorniest in the repertoire. This is a mysterious factor in play: how do four musicians assimilate the vast spiritual and emotional forces at work here?

The great pianist Artur Schnabel is known to have said that “I am only attracted to music which is greater than it can be played”. One thinks of these quartets instantly as fulfilling this requirement. No matter how wonderfully traversed, the map, as Alfred Korzybski once observed, is not the territory.

A short note about introductions. I thoroughly enjoy them. They bring me into the music and the musicians’ passion and respect for it. I find the informality adding greatly to my pleasure and hope the quartet will continue this approach in the future.

And the maturity of the quartet is quite startling. Do they feel any real nervousness? As it seems, they come onto the platform as if striding into an adventure, a profound journey which they are about to take with us, the audience.

A further mystery is for this group to have such familiarity which each other, to sense the others’ direction and subtle inflections of tempo and phrasing while seeming to lose no aspect of their individual musicianship. I find their standing to play brings forward the full expressiveness of body language and while Rolf Gjelsten sits, he is almost dancing forward on his tiptoes to join the others, shaping the music with every part of his body. I particularly enjoyed watching his smiling joy in the music.

Gillian Ansell, that nonpareil among violists, always brought out the singing and speaking voices in Beethoven’s writing, relishing every one of the numerous gifts traced into these scores

Doug Beilman is also a highly expressive artist and a perfect complement to Helene Pohl, the first violin. He addressed his violin as though it were a sentient being somehow organically connected to him and  is a powerhouse of technique and passion for the music with the ability of the truly gifted to anchor and participate at the same time, allowing his violin partner to soar into the ether as her spirit takes her.

Helene Pohl’s sense of “innigkeit” and subtle beauty of phrasing was deeply moving for me. She is an intensely musical artist able to provide the most delicate shadings of tone and shaping to the music. Dynamics and transitions between sections within movements were managed as if the works were growing before our very ears.

As a programme this worked extremely well: Op.127 is a massive work as is the Op.132. Placing the somewhat lighter, almost divertimento-like Op.135 in between acted as a slightly astringent sorbet, exciting as well as cleansing the palate. The “Heilger Dankgesang”of Op.132 was among the profound musical experiences of my life. The final five minutes of this had me feeling as if I were on another planet. Exquisite.

After many years of knowing this music I found that my understanding of it underwent a paradigm-shift under the influence of these musicians’ profound insights. One can remain sure that these interpretations will not be cast in stone and will continue to develop, fine as they are already.

 

 

 

 

Nikau Trio creates charming new repertoire for their ensemble: at Lower Hutt

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Nikau Trio: Karen Batten (flute), Madeleine Sakovsky (oboe), Margaret Guldborg (cello)

Haydn: Trio No 3 in G, Hob. IV:3 (originally for two flutes and cello continuo)
J S Bach: Trio Sonata in G, BWV 1039
Beethoven: Variations on ‘La ci darem la mano’ from Don Giovanni, WoO 28
Vivaldi: Chamber concerto in G minor RV 103

St Mark’s Church, Lower Hutt

Wednesday 5 September, 12.15pm

The lunchtime concerts at St Mark’s church on Woburn Road have been growing in popularity, and there seems to be a trend towards presenting music of greater substance over the past year or so. But that’s not the only pleasure in making the journey. The church has a light and open lobby where free tea and coffee are available before the concerts; and the church itself, with its high vaulted wooden ceiling, allows the music to bloom in the most engaging way.

The little trio in G by Haydn, written while he was in London for the Salomon concerts that featured his twelve last great symphonies, might be slight in terms of musical profundity, but perfectly matched the sunny day and the temperament of the three polished musicians. All free-lance, professional musicians, they created a beautiful ensemble, perhaps even more attractive than the original for two flutes would have been. Attention moves from one to another as they play, to admire the polish and individuality of each in turn, but then the sound of the trio as a unit overtakes you.

Given the work’s origin, it was to be expected that both flute and oboe would lie in a similar range, mostly quite high. To my ears, the oboe’s contribution lent a welcome textured colour to the sound, and the fine cello playing of Margaret Guldborg kept it well grounded.

Bach’s sonata was one of his few ‘Trio Sonatas’ (this one for two flutes and continuo); it was a very common genre in the early 18th century, and Bach wrote it during the years at the small court of Anhalt-Cöthen during 1717 – 1723, his instrumental music years (because the Prince was a Calvinist and was not interested in choral music). Cöthen is a bit north of Leipzig, in the present province of Sachsen-Anhalt.

It is in the traditional slow-fast-slow-fast pattern, and though hardly one of his major works, it offered enough musical substance in the form of counterpoint to hold the attention. And the opening Adagio was of a sanguine character, spiced by the Bach gift for the slightly unorthodox, to end the movement on an unresolved cadence. Though I can’t recall hearing the piece before, the second movement, Allegro ma non presto, and the last movement, were familiar. A trio sonata might stand somewhere between a solo or duet sonata and a concerto, and there were hints of the texture of one of his concertos in the third movement.

The Beethoven variations too were originally composed for a slightly different combination: two oboes and cor anglais, in 1796. It is quite an extended work with considerable variety between the eight variations though its pattern is little different from the very common variation form that prevailed across the centuries. The three players here exhibited considerable delight in this variety, whether tossing motifs back and forth or enjoying a brief duet in charming harmony. The eighth variation became more elaborate in its concertante character, both flute and oboe extremely busy while the cello looked after the melody. The rhythm in the coda turned into a gigue, with the cello again important; but the piece subsides to a quite poignant conclusion.

The Vivaldi concerto is one of his less common excursions for particular instruments: here he wrote for recorder, oboe, bassoon and strings. In G minor, it opens brightly, with Guldborg’s cello fluent and lively, then taking on a serious quality in the Largo led by the flute and oboe and the trio’s always splendid sharing of the motifs as well as the warmth and accuracy of the ensemble made this a thoroughly delightful recital.

 

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