Tag: chamber music

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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‘Cellissimo’: Upper Hutt recital by NZSM cello and piano lecturers

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Classical Expressions at Upper Hutt

‘Cellissimo’ – Inbal Megiddo (cello) and Jian Liu (piano)

Boccherini: Sonata in A major; Beethoven: Handel Variations (‘See the conquering hero comes’); Cello Sonata No 4 in C, Op 102; Schubert: Introduction, Theme and Variations, Op 82 No 2, arranged by Piatigorsky; Rossini: Concert Rhapsody on The Barber of Seville, arranged by Mario Castelnuovo Tedesco.

Genesis Energy Theatre, Expressions Arts Centre, Upper Hutt

Monday 3 September, 7.30pm

This was the fourth in the fine series of recitals that are jointly promoted by the arts centre and the Upper Hutt Music Society. I always enjoy a trip to Upper Hutt, though I have yet to get myself there by train, which is so convenient at the Upper Hutt end, with an arrival at 7.20pm and departure at 10pm.  The arts centre itself is an attractive space, usually with an art exhibition to visit before or during the interval and a coffee bar open at those times too.

It was an interesting programme, though by the end, I felt that Ms Megiddo had chosen a bit too much showy music at the expense of a couple of more lyrical works for the cello. (By the way, her name is pronounced with a hard ‘g’ and stress on the second syllable: clues to pronunciation should be routinely clarified in every reference to names whenever there is the slightest chance of uncertainty, as there is, even, in many ordinary English names).

It began with one of the large number of cello pieces composed by the 18th century’s most famous cellist, Luigi Boccherini; I count about 23 cello sonatas in the Gérard catalogue (and he wrote over a hundred string quintets that call for two cellos). It opened with an Adagio, gentle in tone with a long ornate melody that nevertheless offered plenty of scope for display of his own virtuosity, typical of writing by a composer for himself; though it was not without minor bowing flaws. It continued in the Allegro movement with much decorated material, in a vigorous rhythmic style.

Turning attention to the piano, Jian Liu’s playing was in immaculate accord with Megiddo’s playing, supporting it admirably.

Beethoven’s Cello Sonata No 4 followed. If I found the performance a little lacking in tonal richness, I’m inclined to put it down to her instrument, which has plenty of projection but which makes it hard to obtain a warm, lyrical line. As a result the work sounded a bit severe, its most notable quality being to bring out musical structure, rather than the flesh that gives music its essential life.

Beethoven’s variations on the aria from Handel’s Judas Maccabeus, ‘See the conquering hero comes’ responded better to Megiddo’s playing; here there seemed better scope for a dramatic approach which had the side effect of injecting more colour and spirit. The sharp differences between each of the variations lend the piece a good deal of its interest, with excellent opportunities to mark the cellist’s technical skills, and the piano’s contribution, with its own striking ornaments, was again, most rewarding.

The second half gained through its singular variety of styles. Megiddo captured the bare beauty of Pärt’s Spiegel im Spiegel in a very arresting, keenly focused performance, with remarkable pianissimos and long-held, deeply intoned notes as the piano handled the more detailed elements.

Megiddo’s note for a piece written for the cellist, marking the 50th anniversary of Israel’s emergence, succinctly described the character of contemporary Israeli concert music, and it was an excellent introduction to her playing of Eretz by Hanna Levy. There were indeed echoes of the various cultural strands that contribute to the complex fabric of Jewish peoples in Israel, and they made for an interesting, often attractive, symphony of disparate sound. This too found Megiddo in a very comfortable space.

The next two pieces struck a curious note for someone always intrigued by unexpected juxtapositions. Schubert and Rossini were very close contemporaries; the prodigal flowering of Rossini’s music, aged about 18, that almost at once gained world-wide popularity occasionally stood in the way of the 5-years-younger Viennese composer’s hopes of success, especially in opera. Another odd circumstance is the fact that Schubert ended his composing life through dying, poor and not widely celebrated, just a few months before Rossini ended his opera career by retiring in Paris in great fame and wealth.

But here was a set of variations composed for piano four-hands by Schubert, not, I should have thought, primarily a show-piece for the players. (It’s in the Deutsch catalogue as: Variations on an Original Theme in B-flat major, Op. posth. 82, No. 2, D 968 A). It sounded fairly unexceptional as a conventional set of variations. However, I am not in a position to know what Schubert’s original was like, nor what changes cellist Piatigorsky made in the course of his arrangement, but what we heard had plenty of material for a skilled cellist to make excellent use of.

The Rossini variations were also an arrangement by another hand, this time by Italian composer, best known for his guitar compositions, Mario Castelnuovo Tedesco (translating as ‘Newcastle-German’, if you’re interested). It didn’t start terribly well on the cello, though I didn’t think it mattered as it did not impress me as an especially worthy piece of music.

Rather better was their brief encore, one piece from the Suite popular española by Manuel de Falla which seems to be an arrangement, probably for violin, of six of his Siete canciones populares españolas (properly translated as Seven Spanish popular songs, and not ‘Popular Spanish Songs’).

A somewhat uneven programme, somewhat unevenly played on the cello though very fine at its best, and with sufficient musicality and musical substance to make the journey worthwhile.

 

Brahms the Second? – perhaps Herzogenberg the First?

Posted on by Peter Mechen

St Mark’s Lower Hutt Concert Series

BEETHOVEN and HERZOGENBERG

Jane Young (‘cello) / Hugh McMillan (piano)

BEETHOVEN- ‘Cello Sonata No.4 in C Op.102 No.1

HERZOGENBERG – ‘Cello Sonata No.3 in E-flat Op.94

St.Mark’s Church, Woburn, Lower Hutt

Wednesday, 29th August 20

What a lovely concert! – a wonderful idea by Jane Young and Hugh McMillan to present something of a “standard classic” in tandem with something else rather less known, to the advantage of both!

In a sense, each of the pieces represented an adventure, albeit of a different kind. Beethoven’s Op.102 ‘Cello Sonatas completed the process already begun by the composer with his Op.69 Sonata, of inventing something new – an “equal partnership” between ‘cello and piano for such an instrumental combination.

By comparison, Herzonberg’s work seemed to bravely and steadfastly explore paths already trodden by giants such as Brahms, managing, in places, to convey his own late-Romantic slant to the familiar terrain, with attractive and absorbing results.

The Beethoven Sonata opened beautifully and tremulously, as if the composer was depicting the unfurling of a flower in the sunlight – the phrasing between both players properly resonated, their full accord expressed through a sense of hand-in-glove phrasing and beautifully-modulated tones. Beethoven seemed here to be anticipating Schumann’s poetical musings, his themes at once spontaneously expressive and contained, hinting at darker feelings.

The Allegro vivace alternated freely between playfulness and purpose, only the ‘cello’s highest notes giving any suggestion of strain for the player. It all made a telling contrast with the Adagio’s relative darkness and gradual lightening of mood.

Both players timed their respective “not ready yet” figurations at the finale’s beginning to perfection, the ‘cello’s wonderful drone-notes creating whole worlds of mystery, which the piano then gently mocked with “Well,are you coming along?” phrases.

I thought Jane Young’s and Hugh McMillan’s playing gave the episode a wonderful “boys’ and girls’ own” freshness of utterance and movement. But their playing of the whole sonata was as good, at practically every point presenting their listeners with opportunities in the music for engagement and participation. I felt the musicians made practically every note of the work eloquent and distinctive.

Hugh McMillan talked briefly about our “mystery” composer, Heinrich von Herzogenberg, one whose name I knew in connection with Brahms, via correspondence between the latter and Elisabet von Herzogenberg. Brahms was on good terms with both husband and wife, though he may have harboured a secret passion for Elisabet, whom he wrote to frequently. Towards the end of his life he paid a kind of belated homage to Herzogenberg’s music, acknowledging its quality.

Herzogenberg’s ‘Cello Sonata No.3 does show the influence of his great contemporary in places, especially in the piano writing throughout the opening movement, while in other places I detected vestiges of the Mendelssohn of the Octet. The last few pages of the movement achieved a swing and flow amid a grandeur of utterance that seemed the composer’s own, as did much of the slow movement, though again the piano writing had a big-boned Brahmsian feel to it. The players readily enjoyed the contrast between the lyrical opening and the running middle section of the music, with gaily tripping piano and cello pizzicati.

The work has a kind of ‘grand finale’, a theme and variations movement which, in some circumstances might be thought a trifle long, though Jane Young and Hugh McMillan kept our interest simmering with both their interchanges and occasional “solo” sequences. An occasional moment of strain regarding the cello’s intonation mattered far less than the player’s feeling for phrases and their integration into the flow of things, which satisfied greatly. My feeling at the work’s conclusion was less of a “Brahms the Second” response to the music , and more along the lines of “Herzogenberg the First” – thanks in part to these two musicians’ whole-hearted advocacy.

Young Leonari Trio produces elegiac joie de vivre at Lower hutt

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

The Leonari Trio (Hilary Hayes – violin, Edward King – cello, Maria Mo – piano)

Beethoven: Piano Trio in D, Op 70 no 1 (‘Ghost’); Rachmaninov: Trio élégiaque No 1 in G minor; Arensky: Piano Trio No 1  in D minor, Op 32

Lower Hutt Little Theatre

Tuesday 28 August, 7.30pm

This young trio which came together at the University of Waikato in 2009 has had a charmed life, after winning the Pettman Royal Overseas League scholarship and touring Britain with singular success, visiting some fairly notable concert venues. Individually, they have gained some prestigious awards: both string players were in the NZSO National Youth Orchestra while pianist Maria Mo has played concertos with the Opus Chamber Orchestra and the Waikato Symphony Orchestra.

This concert fell in the middle of a nationwide tour for Chamber Music New Zealand; a second, very attractive programme called Viennese Tales, has been played in other centres, sadly not in the Greater Wellington region (you could catch it in Cromwell on 2 September).

Though it was unfortunate that I arrived a little late, the boisterous sounds of their playing met me as I opened the outside doors of the theatre and I could well have stayed there with no loss of clarity or excitement from their playing.

I could at once understand how their gusto and an almost reckless abandon that exposed an occasional fluff, would have won audiences over in their UK tour, and since.  Perfect accuracy becomes irrelevant when music is attacked with such open enthusiasm and delight in a rapport that was so attractive and immediately obvious.

Fortunately my colleague Rosemary Collier was there too and she left me with a few remarks about the first two movements of the Beethoven, generally admiring their individual accomplishment, that combined so strikingly in ensemble. Their slow movement was most expressive, and technically interesting, another friend remarked about the impression that certain of Hilary Hayes’ violin sounds had, resonating with those in the piano, evidencing excellent intonation.

The choice of pieces brought to mind the music that was played by the wonderful Turnovsky Trio more than a decade ago. Both Rachmaninov’s first Trio élégiaque and the Arensky Trio were in their repertoire, as I recall.  It’s worth noting the fact that Rachmaninov also wrote a second Trio élégiaque, this one in D minor, and given Opus No 9: a full-scale, three movement work modelled on Tchaikovsky’s and written in his memory; he had died shortly before, in 1893.

These players tackled the music with an approach that was similar in spirit, virtuosity and youthful joie de vivre to the Turnovsky Trio.  The Leonari Trio began the Rachmaninov with a hushed, magical, cross-string motif that becomes the accompaniment to the piano’s first romantic theme; the playing was full of drama and refinement, even though it rose to quite an extrovert and energetic character before long.

The provenance of the violin and cello which I heard about at the interval, helped explain the special beauty of tone they produced, with timbres that were so closely related that they almost sounded as if emanating from one instrument. The violin was formerly that of the late NZSO violinist Stephen Managh, and the cello was a loan from Allan Chisholm who is retiring as assistant principal cello of the NZSO later this year.

Never needing to play loudly to compete with the piano, their sound projected vividly in the theatre, which is often claimed to present a dry, difficult acoustic. Perhaps, but it just demands players capable of listening to the effect they are having, and adapting to the situation. Cellist Edward King created warm and opulent passages in its later phases.

For its part, the piano, also criticised by some (and now sought to be replaced by a shiny new Steinway), usually surprises me by its range of colour and sonority. Maria Mo seemed to have its measure, as well as the measure of the theatre, also found difficult by some. Though her playing was full-blooded, she had the lid on the short stick and her sound was vigorously lyrical rather than simply loud.

Certainly, together they made a good deal of noise but it was musical noise, and it didn’t prevent their playing of the subsiding, élégique coda with a serene peacefulness.

The Arensky trio also found the players in full sympathy with the music, starting in a lovely lyrical mood, phrased beautifully, assertive in later staccato piano episodes over tremolo violin, though becoming a little blurred in fast piano passages. They particularly relished the blousy piano tune in the Scherzo, and the piano produced delightful bell-like treble notes at the top of little flourishes in the Trio.

Flawless tone in the slow Elegia movement, all three players in remarkable accord, which was still more striking in the finale, particularly in the soft passages nearing the end.

Audiences, including several young people, have been looking better this year than in the past few years, and their warm applause won them an encore, of the third of John Psathas’s Three Island Songs, also played brilliantly.

 

Enterprising flute repertoire – Ingrid Culliford, with Kris Zuelicke

Posted on by Peter Mechen

Old St.Paul’s Lunchtime Concert Series

Ingrid Culliford (flute) / Kris Zuelicke (piano)

J.S.BACH – Sonata for Flute and Keyboard BWV 1020

MIRIAM HYDE – 3 Solos for Flute and Piano

ERNST BLOCH – Suite Modale

ROBERT MUCZYNSKI – Sonata for Flute and Piano Op.14

Old St.Paul’s Church, Thorndon

Tuesday August 28th, 2012

It was a pleasure to encounter Ingrid Culliford’s flute-playing in repertoire different to that which I’ve heard her perform in the past, nearly always with the Auckland contemporary music ensemble 175 East. And double the pleasure was had from hearing the instrument played with such a variety of tones and timbres, the four very different pieces on the program requiring and getting properly individualized responses from both musicians.

Old Johann Sebastian’s lovely G Minor Flute Sonata (licence-plate number BWV 1020), has apparently been appropriated by certain scholars on behalf of the great man’s son, Carl Philipp Emmanuel, appearing in its Doppelgänger guise as H.542.5 – does the decimal point indicate a somewhat equivocal scholarly stance? Whoever was responsible, the work itself was a delight as presented here, the performers giving us a winning mixture of momentum and suspended beauty. This was characterized in part by the instrumental combination – the piano tripping gaily along, and the flute a more liberated spirit, choosing occasionally to mirror the piano’s busy figurations, but in other places soar untrammelled above them.

Throughout the sonata, I couldn’t help admiring Ingrid Culliford’s refusal to be victimized by the composer’s almost total disregard for his soloist’s lungs. This wasn’t such an issue in the slow movement, both players having sufficient “lebensraum” to negotiate both long-breathed lyrical lines and other-worldly, ambient accompanying modulations. There was also a hint here and there of the “echo” element between the instruments, most beautifully realized. Perhaps the finale, more than the other movements, leaned towards the rather more volatile spirit of the son as opposed to the father – occasional spurts of energy either (depending upon one’s point of view) invigorated or destabilized the music’s flow, with the performance certainly bringing out the essential character of those impulses.

Next was a work by Australian composer Miriam Hyde (1913-2005), someone whose work sounds as if it’s worth getting to know more of – Hyde was primarily a pianist, and one who had something of a performing career upon that instrument, both in Australia and overseas. She composed in all genres, except for opera, her style finding certain affinities with that of English composers of the time, subject to the same kinds of influences and inclinations. She had little in common with avant-garde trends, writing about her music at one point, “I feel my music can be a refuge for what beauty and peace can still be omnipresent…the triumph of good over evil. I make no apologies for writing from the heart”.

We heard three pieces from her work 5 Solos for Flute and Piano, a collection which the composer put together from pieces composed over a number of years, from 1949 to 1968. The earliest, Marsh Birds, was included here, as were The Little Juggler (1956) and Wedding Morn (1957). First was Wedding Morn, the opening piano chords beautifully played by Kris Zuelicke, the stuff of dreams, the flute introducing a rather more earthy aspect, as if rousing the spirit from the dreams and insisting upon some engagement. The piano evoked church bells, their figurations becoming somewhat Lisztian in places, to which the flute responded with lyrical wonderment.

Playful and gigue-like, The Little Juggler readily evoked the mesmeric nature of the activity, as well as plenty of tumbling warmth and an abrupt (perhaps unscheduled!) ending. Finally, the warmly-nostalgic Marsh Birds seemed to take one’s sensibilities back to simpler times at the outset, the middle section suggesting the extent of distances travelled in both time and space, and the birds’ dialogues striking a piquant, “song for the ages” note, the music ending wistfully. Enchanting.

To different worlds, next, with Ernest Bloch’s Suite Modale – with this, as with the Miriam Hyde work, Ingrid Culliford told us a little about the composer and the music’s circumstances. If one was expecting intensities of the order of the same composer’s Schelomo for ‘Cello and Orchestra, one would perhaps be disappointed; but what one got instead was an attractively ritualistic set of meditations, the composer refracting a lifetime’s experiences (Bloch wrote this in 1956, three years before his death) in this gently-conceived journey filled with bygone impressions. Bloch touchingly dedicated this work to the flautist Elaine Schaffer, whose playing he knew and admired from recordings, though he never actually met her.

Each of the four movements reflect a specific mood, which I thought the performers drew we listeners into. First, there was a kind of meditation expressed in polyphonic terms between flute and piano, rhapsodic in feeling, but elegant in style. Then, the players dug into the second movement, bringing out contrapuntal textures, and heightening a sense of ritual and order. The Allegro giocoso evoked youthful energies, both immediate and more nostalgically-conceived, while the finale contrasted a melancholic opening sequence with an exhilarating contrapuntal whirl of activity, one which wound down through attractively melodic piano-and-flute interactions to a strongly-poised, inwardly peaceful ending.

There remained the Flute Sonata of a composer unknown to me, Robert Muczynski, born in Chicago in 1929, who trained as a pianist, and whose works mostly involve chamber ensembles and piano. This four-movement Sonata, neoclassical in spirit, had bags of personality, which the performers obviously relished throughout – a lively, even volatile opening movement with plenty of rhythmic syncopation and dynamic contrast, followed by a Scherzo whose L’Apprenti Sorcier-like galumphings alternated with gentler, more pastoral gaieties. The musicians then gave us, by way of contrast, some rapt, almost mesmeric textures of enchantment at the Andante’s beginning, which the piano then darkened with suggestions of the abyss beneath, indicating that not all is sweetness and light in this world of ours. These were sobering thoughts which the gaiety of the finale’s Allegro con moto thankfully put aside. True, some of the music’s edges were angular and elbow-sharp, but the ride was nevertheless an exhilarating one. Both musicians brought to these things loads of spirit and sensibility, expressed by turns with unerring judgement and fine feeling. A lovely concert.

 

 

 

 

 

Enchanting double bass recital with a little cello too, at Lower Hutt

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

J S Bach’s Sonata for Viola da gamba No 2 in D, BWV 1028;
Cello Concerto No 4, third movement (Goltermann);
Fauré: Elegie;
Bottesini: Fantasia on themes from La sonnambula

Alexander Gunchenko (double bass) and Kirsten Simpson (piano), and Daniel Gunchenko (cello)

St Mark’s Church, Lower Hutt

Wednesday 22 August, 12.15pm

The double bass is among the orchestral instruments that has struggled to find a respected place in the solo sphere; a bit like the bassoon, its role is sometimes regarded as that of musical comedian.

Yet it’s had at least one famous practitioner, both a virtuoso and a composer (also a conductor who premiered Verdi’s Aida in Cairo), Giovanni Bottesini.

Alexander Gunchenko is one of the contingent of musicians from Ukraine and Russia who were recruited by the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra in the 1990s, and helped raise its standard so dramatically.

Gunchenko, who had only recently left the Tchaikovsky Conservatorium (presumably the one in Kiev) and had a short spell with the Ukraine National Chamber Orchestra, came to New Zealand in 1999. There he continued his studies at Canterbury University; and in 2007 joined the NZSO.

I gather he has been appearing for the Hutt Valley lunchtime concerts annually over the last few years, but this was my first hearing.

Music for the cello and its earlier predecessors can readily be transcribed for the double bass, and the recital began with a sonata for viola da gamba by J S Bach (No 2 in D, BWV1028). Though the bass (which is in fact a descendant of the viola da gamba family, and not a member of the violin family) is not as strongly projecting as the cello which replaced the viola da gamba during the late 17th and early 18th century, it had its own quieter and more mellow sound which has come to be appreciated again in recent times.

That made playing by the bass particularly attractive, for its quietness, once the ears were accustomed to it, gave the music a beauty and refinement that is actually Bach would have had in mind in writing these sonatas. (Accompaniment by a harpsichord would of course have been more appropriate, though Kirsten Simpson’s partnership was always sensitive to the bass’s sound).

The opening Adagio movement was a lovely, if momentarily nervous in intonation, way to engage the mind and accustom the ear. True, the piano did tend to weigh a bit heavily on the bass in the second, Allegro, movement, but the playing was so fluent and genial, enveloping us in its long, nicely expressed phrases, that any dynamic imbalance didn’t matter.

And the next slow movement, now in a slow triple time, was a further demonstration of the bass’s lyrical character, no matter that it was mostly in the low baritone range. Where the notes do go higher, however, it was even more beautifully mellow than a cello could ever be (and I learned and love the cello).

The next item was something a bit special: The young Gunchenko, the 11-year-old Daniel, a cellist who has just completed Grade 5 with, I imagine, rather high marks; his appearance was unadvertised, but a very engaging idea. I too encountered Georg Goltermann’s fourth cello concerto (his dates 1824 – 1898, almost exact contemporary with Bruckner) when I was a student but, somewhat older, I certainly wasn’t getting around the music as fluently as young Daniel did. There are probably good reasons why the name isn’t on everyone’s lips, but this taste of one of his concertos would have made the audience wonder about that. The third movement – the last I imagine – was a tarantella, fast and very rhythmic; the two musicians maintained its pace and togetherness admirably.

Alexander returned to play another cello classic, Fauré’s Élégie. Here, one could easily have been seduced into never wanting to hear it on the cello again, so discreet and, well, elegiac was this performance. The oneness of the two was clearly evident when the piano took over the melody and the bass simply kept it company in warm,  supportive accompanying figures.

The party piece was Bottesini’s Fantasia on themes from La sonnambula, a typical 19th century show-piece that gave audiences the comfort of well-known tunes clothed in unbelievably virtuosic playing. If it looks hard for a violinist to race about the fingerboard in such music, the same behaviour on a much longer fingerboard, with greater difficulty in hitting the exact note, including a lot of high harmonics, was a somewhat breathtaking exhibition.