Tag: guitar

Interesting exploration of varied guitar music in NZSM’s students’ showcase

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music: St Andrew’s Showcase week

Guitar students: Jake Church, George Wills, Dylan Solomon

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Thursday, 8 October 2015, 12.15pm

The last of the four showcase concerts from the New Zealand School of Music offered guitarists a platform. One of the four programmed players could not appear, meaning that a piece by New Zealand composer Mike Hogan, Hammerowen, was omitted.

Thus, in contrast to the hour-long viola concert on Wednesday, this one was about ten minutes shorter than the normal 45 minutes.

Two guitarists calling themselves Duo Kita, Jake Church and George Wills, began with two pieces from Brazilian composer Sergio Assad’s Summer Gardens Suite. It rather established the character of the whole concert: undemonstrative, gentle, subtle, discrete, for it supplied an appropriate though back-to-front opening piece, Farewell, a restrained and regretful lament.

Twentieth century guitar music sometimes seems to have little connection with the popular image of guitar music, probably coloured in the imagination by that of the great Spanish composers. In these two pieces the resources of the two instruments are carefully and imaginatively exploited and the expressive potential of a full range of dynamics (other than fortissimo, though careful amplification can achieve striking effects), and articulations deriving from the variety of plucking techniques. The second piece, Butterflies had little connection with either Schumann’s inventions or of Offenbach’s boisterous ballet score; dominated by a rather a hypnotic, self-reflective spirit that was driven by a repeated, rising four-note motif.

Jake Church remained in his place and then introduced the concert; unfortunately I did not catch certain key details (the microphone was iffy) and had to check things later. He explained that he was about to play a Bach suite that was different from that in the programme: the Suite in E flat, BWV 998 which, according to the usual reference source, was written for keyboard but later arranged for guitar. “Arranged for guitar, it is usually played in D major with a ‘Drop D’ tuning [that means the low E string is tuned down a tone to D]. Julian Bream played it in a BBC2 broadcast on television in early 1978 at the All Saints chapel of New Wardour Castle, when he announced it as ‘of vital importance’.” (Wikipedia). Church played the Prelude and the third movement, Allegro.

The Prelude was quietly cheerful with rolling triplets while the Allegro was a dance-like piece with quicker triplets, quite charming. I could well understand how guitarists were happy to purloin it, under what-ever pretext, from the plentifully-endowed keyboard players.

And Jake Church followed that with a Levantine Suite by Dusan Bogdanovich, born in Yugoslavia (presumably Serbia) just 50 years ago. One of the most distinguished contemporary guitar composers, his three movement work was an impressive exercise in quite complex counterpoint and rhythms, interesting textures, often delicately decorated, and Church’s playing was up to its demands. I confess to losing track of the shifts between the three sections, but there was an episode involving fractured scale passages, and it came to an end as the composer would have wished, without rhetoric or attention seeking.

Dylan Solomon’s offering was one of Scarlatti’s 500 or so keyboard sonatas , K 213 in D minor, a steady-paced, deliberate piece in which the original conception for harpsichord could be readily heard, without creating any sense that the guitar was inappropriate; a short pause in the middle led to a repeat that seemed somewhat of a variation on the first section, at least in tone and articulation. It was admirable.

Tarrega’s Adelita and Preludio No 2 was played by the other half of the Duo Kita, George Wills. It was a charming revelation of the gifts of a composer whom most of us would know only from the unforgettable Recuerdos de la Alhambra. Here was the same melodic gift, gently paced; the first piece sounded to me more improvisatory, ‘preludish’ than the more song-like second piece and I wondered whether Wills had played Adelita second for it sounded more song-like, restrained and perhaps infused by a feeling for whoever Adelita was.

George Wills brought the recital to an end with Danza Negra by Columbian composer Lucas Saboya. The title rang bells but I found it was a recollection of a Dansa Negra by Brazilian composer Guanieri – a piano piece played by Katherine Stott at the Nelson Chamber Music Festival earlier this year (useless trivia).

The real enigma rested with the programme note that referred to Saboya’s piece as part of Suite Ernestina, the last part of which contains an ‘allusion’ to a Danza negra by one Antonio Lauro’s Suite Venezolana. In a samba rhythm with a generalised South American character (meaning I’m not really able to pin-point the melodic and rhythmic styles), it involved virtuosic scales and other fast finger-work that Wills handled with impressive, idiomatic skill.

Though the recital was rather abbreviated, it gave the happy few who were there the chance to expand their musical horizons with both original guitar music and excellent adaptations from the classical masters from three most adept instrumentalists.

Rather short and variable concert from university voices and instruments

Posted on by Rosemary Collier

New Zealand School of Music

Victoria Voices: Songs from South Africa, Broadway and Renaissance Europe, conducted by Robert Legg, Andrew Atkins and Thomas Nikora, with Andrew Atkins and Thomas Nikora (piano)

Psathas: Island Songs; Ragnarök Trio (Claudia Tarrant-Matthews, violin; Caitlin Morris, cello; Sophie Tarrant-Matthews, piano)

Pujol: Grises y Soles; Paulo Beillinati: A Furiosa; Guitar Quartet (Royden Smith, Dylan Solomon, George Wills, Jamie Garrick)

Adam Concert Room

Wednesday 30 September, 7.30pm

A small but enthusiastic audience heard a rather short concert (50 minutes, with several longish breaks for changing the position of the piano and other adjustments), the chamber music sections of which were being assessed towards the players’ end-of-year academic results.

The choir was presenting its second concert for the year, under the direction of Dr Robert Legg. It was a much smaller choir than that which sang in May; doubtless it currently being exam. time was the difference between nearly forty and 22. The choir includes students, staff and others associated with the university.

Three African songs began the programme, the first two sung from the gallery above the first-floor Adam Concert Room in the School of Music. It was slightly disconcerting that 7 faces were hidden from most of the audience by a large rolled up projecting screen. These first songs were sung unaccompanied, from memory, and featured splendid tone and projection, although I found the altos rather weak, apart from a fine alto solo, and a tenor one too, in the second song.

For the third song, ‘Hamba Lulu’, the choir descended to the audience’s level, and sang with piano accompaniment from Andrew Atkins. Overall, there was a pleasing sound. This was not difficult music, and the Adam Concert Room acoustic allowed everything to be heard.

John Psathas’s work was a challenge for young players, but one they fully met. This was a later setting of the work; the original was for clarinet, violin and piano. The cellist and violinist (playing an unusually large violin) knew the work so well that they scarcely looked at their scores. It demanded high energy playing, but in this lively acoustic the fortissimos were a bit hard on my ears. There was some difficult double-stopping for the cellist towards the end of the first movement, and again later – but it was performed in most accomplished fashion.

The second movement featured extensive pizzicato for the cellist. The violinist doubled some of the passages with the bow, but this was difficult to hear. The pianist, whose face we could not see through a wall of hair, was thoroughly competent at her demanding part throughout the work.

Voices returned, to be conducted by Andrew Atkins and accompanied in the second item by Thomas Nikora. First was an anonymous medieval drinking song, ‘Vitrum Nostrum’, sung unaccompanied. A very fine solo tenor introduced the piece, and was followed by the choir making a robust sound, and with excellent rhythm and ensemble. There followed Thomas Morley’s well-known ‘Now is the Month of Maying’, which was given a sprightly accompaniment by Nikora. Atkins did a good job in conducting the choir, though some of his body movement was excessive. Generally well-sung, the item suffered from a rather untidy rallentando at the end.

Next up was a splendid guitar quartet, playing two South American works. The first was by Argentinian Máximo Diego Pujol: ‘Grises y Soles’; the second, ‘A Furiosa’, by Brazilian Paulo Bellinati. Of interest to me was the fact that the players did not use the traditional little one-foot stools to help them support their instruments, but instead had support brackets clamped onto the sides of the instruments. Like the earlier trio, the players knew their music so well that not a lot of use was made of their scores.

Both pieces employed a large variety of guitar tones, techniques and timbres. There was a variety of percussive effects, strumming (very little) as well as plucking with fingernails or with fingertips. These techniques and effects conveyed a huge variety of moods, rhythms and tempi in the pieces. The second piece was rather more melodic than was the Pujol. Both were exciting, and demonstrated the skill, precision and preparatory work of the players.

The choir returned to sing two songs from the shows, conducted from the keyboard by Thomas Nikora: ‘Edelweiss’, from The Sound of Music by Rodgers and Hammerstein, and ‘Sunday’ from Sunday in the Park with George, by Stephen Sondheim. The first was pleasant, but rather passionless (not that it is a highly passionate song!). There was more variety of expression in the heartier second piece.

While the chamber and guitar musicians performed to a very high standard, the choir, and its repertoire, were disappointing, despite a pleasing sound and a good level of accuracy. This concert hardly seemed to be the culmination of four months of consistent choral rehearsal since the last concert, in May. Comparisons may be odious, but… it was a far cry from the university choirs of my time, and the levels they reached performing, for example, as the second choir in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, and the splendid à cappella choir’s Mass for Five Voices by William Byrd.

Guitarist Jamie Garrick in charming, idiomatic lunchtime recital

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Jamie Garrick (guitar)

(Prelude from Lute Suite in C minor by Bach)
Le départ – Le retour by Napoléon Coste
Études esquises (excerpts) by Gerald Garcia
Julia Florida by Agustin Barrios
Suite del Recuerdo by José Luis Merlin

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 23 September, 12:15 pm

Very unusually for these more punctual days, my train from Wellington’s northern reaches was late and I missed the first piece and some introductory words from the guitarist. I missed the Prelude from one of Bach’s lute suites, in C minor, BWV 997.

Coste’s Le départ – le retour was under way and I found myself in the world of his early 19th century contemporaries, Fernando Sor, Giuliani, or perhaps Berlioz (who also played the guitar and was two years older than Coste), composers with whom I am much more familiar.

Clearly Jamie Garrick is at home with this very singable music, for he can make the guitar sing, weaving through the rhythms, beautifully breathed, like the bel canto opera of the time (Bellini was also a near contemporary). This was an age when the guitar had become very popular, with several composers writing very popular concertos such as Giuliani and Carulli.

The other three pieces were by 20th century composers. The pieces from Gerald Garcia’s 25 Études esquises were quite short. They were divertingly varied in tone and style, from the first fluent piece, the third dominated by repeated notes high on the E string, then a piece with a melody that rose and fell, built on series of discrete and agreeable phrases. Not a monumental, Beethovenish creation but an attractive sampling of only 20 percent of the whole collection.

The recital’s best-known guitar composer followed: the Paraguayan Agustin Barrios. Julia Florida is a barcarolle, written in 1938, late in his life; Garrick played it unaffectedly, capturing the gentle sadness and charm of its melody.

José Luis Merlin, born in 1952, is also a South American, born in Argentina. His Suite del recuerdo, a collection of six short, characteristic pieces of great variety. It opened with an Evocacion , described as sad and nostalgic, which was repeated as the fifth movement, providing a rather gladdening memory (recuerdo) of its earlier exposition, the heart of the suite perhaps, and making the warmest emotional impression. Most of the other pieces were lighter and happier in tone and for the most part the music avoided commonplace guitar devices. Though No 4, Carnavalito, which seemed to depict a fairly sedate carnival, indulged in some characteristic strumming.

Garrick is a talented young player with an unerring instinct for an attractive and imaginative approach to the guitar, and the ability to make music that moves beyond conventional notions of the character of guitar music.

 

Technically brilliant, varied and versatile recital by New Zealand Guitar Quartet

Posted on by Frances Robinson

New Zealand Guitar Quartet
(Christopher Hill, Jane Curry, John Couch, Owen Moriarty)

Djembe by Andrew York
Capriol Suite by Peter Warlock (arr. Owen Moriarty)
Three Short Pieces by Mike Hogan
Percussion Guitar Music: Kalimba, Kangogi, Berimbao by Jurg Kindle
Ratschenita by Jack Body (arr. Owen Moriarty)
Music in Four Sharps  by Ian Krouse
Onslow College Suite by Craig Utting (arr. Owen Moriarty)
Bluezilian by Clarice Assad

NZSM Concert Hall, Massey University, Wellington.

Wednesday 16 September 2016, 7:30 pm

Djembe is based on its namesake, a traditional African stretched-skin drum played with the hands. To reflect these origins, York makes full play of the various drumming abilities of the guitar with wonderfully lively writing, as well as other clever effects like harmonics. York’s passion for this ensemble combination (he is a former member of the renowned Los Angeles Guitar Quartet) shone through every bar. The group effectively exploited its wide dynamic contrasts from the most delicate pianissimo to full throated vigorous ensemble volumes, and it was a great choice to open the programme.

Warlock’s  familiar  Capriol Suite was very successfully arranged by Owen  Moriarty, and sounded most convincing for guitar quartet. The various voices were clearly expressed, and we heard a wide dynamic range that did full justice to the characteristic surges of the work. The playing enhanced the contrasts between the energetic, almost breathless numbers, and the sedate, courtly measures of such movements as the Pavane, and finished with a gutsy flourish in the final Sword Dance (Mattachins).

Wellington-based Mike Hogan’s Three Short Pieces opened with a brief snippet called A Bad Ant, described by the composer as “essentially a rhythmic exercise which focuses on the spaces between the notes, alternating fast flourishes with broad rests”. I found that the stumbling rhythms held very little appeal as a concert offering, sounding frankly like no more than the earlier piano study on which they were based. Song for Mum is another snippet lasting a couple of minutes, but it was crafted in a simple, transparent style, and its gentle delivery from the quartet seemed fresh and attractive. The Ed is a pentatonic number, apparently named for the $5 denomination of the banknote showing Sir Edmund Hillary. Any connection seemed extremely remote and unlikely to me except as a convenient numeric “handle”. The music had no hint of the measured, rock-solid  approach that I associate with Ed Hillary, but was full of lively extrovert energy that was attractive and invigorating in its own right.

Percussion Guitar Music is based on African and Afro-Cuban rhythms and by imitating archaic percussion instruments. Kalimba is the name of an African “thumb piano” (Jurg Kindle). To achieve the Kalimba sound on the guitar the quartet dampened the strings with a bubble wrap insert underneath. Kindle had suggested a handkerchief, but the substitute was very effective, giving a muted, semi-staccato delivery to the sound that in no way diminished the lively and energetic delivery from the group. Kangogi are bells used in the traditional music of Ghana, and the piece used gentle harmonics very effectively to evoke the sound effects, dying away to nothing at the close as though a traveller hearing the chimes were moving gradually out of earshot. Berimbao is scored using a pencil to strike the strings in order to resemble the sound of this instrument, which was first brought to Brazil by slaves from Angola. The three pieces of this suite gave great play to the versatility of sound effects that can be produced by the classical guitar, and was an excellent and interesting choice to include in the programme.

Ratschenita is Jack Body’s transcription of music from a Bulgarian village band. The quartet’s enthusiastic delivery of its lively idioms and energetic 7/8 time evoked milling crowds and busyness in a highly colourful performance that built to an exhilarating climax.

Ian Krouse based his Music in Four Sharps on Dowland’s Frog Galliard. The beautiful renaissance original makes only intermittent appearances that I personally find barely sufficient to provide adequate cohesion throughout the piece. Nevertheless, the quartet did full justice to the wide range of styles it encompasses, from drifting “hymn-like musing” (Krouse) to the build-up of a passionate climax.

Craig Utting’s Onslow College Suite (originally written for six hands on two pianos) has been very convincingly arranged by Owen Moriarty for guitars. The quartet projected the colour  and liveliness of the opening and closing movements most effectively, and provided an evocative contrast in the central Romanza where a wistful melody hovers over the passacaglia theme from the bass of the lower seven string guitar.

Bluezilian comes from the pen of multi-talented Brazilian musician Clarice Assad, “accomplished as a classical and jazz composer, arranger, pianist and vocalist” (Programme notes). Jane Curry said that Assad was the only woman composer of guitar music that she had been able to find, so this is a unique piece in the quartet’s repertoire. It is full of quirky rhythms and pauses, with occasional forays into melodic idioms and episodes of traditional strumming. The tonalities are also highly mobile, contributing to a piece that seems to reflect the many and varied interests of the writer.

The audience was treated to an encore realisation of the traditional Tarantella dance, by a Chilean folk group who were political exiles in Europe. The frenetic music graphically depicted the frenzied dancing of a victim of a tarantula bite, building into a hectic race to the finish, which was carried off by the quartet with a most enthusiastic flourish.

Although there was the occasional uncharacteristic departure from the group’s normal impeccable precision of entries, this was a concert that amply demonstrated the technical and musical skills of the New Zealand Guitar Quartet.  The programme, however, included very little repertoire that showcased the wonderful melodic and romantic qualities of the guitar, which are for me paramount elements of its remarkable versatility. The almost unrelieved scurrying of successive numbers would have been enhanced by the contrast of repose and reflection.

 

 

Duo Tapas: violin and guitar play winning St Andrew’s lunchtime concert

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Duo Tapas (Rupa Maitra – violin, Owen Moriarty – guitar)

Vivaldi: Sonata in A minor, Op 2 No 12, RV 32
Mark O’Connor: pieces from Strings and Threads Suite
Arvo Pärt: Spiegel im Spiegel, arr, Moriarty
William Squire: Tarantella in D minor, Op 23, arr Moriarty

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 5 August, 12:15 pm

Duo Tapas is a fairly visible little ensemble on the Wellington music scene; but it pays not to take them for granted, as playing much the same repertoire, with minor variations in their frequent concerts. It could be because I haven’t heard a couple of their recent concerts that this programme was entirely new to me.

They began with Rudolph Buttman’s arrangement of one of Vivaldi’s violin sonatas, the last of the set published as Opus 2. The programme listed the movements as Preludio, Allemande, Grave and Capriccio. Other sources offer different movement titles: Preludio, Capriccio, Grave, Corrente; or Preludio – Largo, Capriccio – Presto, Grave, Allemanda – Allegro. Of course I did not discover these variations till I explored the internet later; no doubt they reflected the liberties publishers felt able to take in the 18th century.

I wondered during the performance about the appropriateness of the titles, and had jotted a puzzled note that the last movement hardly sounded ‘capricious’ – rather, just brisk.

Never mind.
The duo were absolutely justified in taking up this successful arrangement of one of Vivaldi’s many lovely pieces, more than usually melodious, sounding as if he had the guitar very much in mind when he cast the continuo lines (for cello and harpsichord).

Mark O’Connor is an American composer, now in his early 60s, who has devoted himself to listenable, rather infectious music. The title refers, obviously, to the stringed instrument and the threads connecting the thirteen little movements in the suite, a sort of history of United States popular music, offering examples of many styles of music from Irish reels and sailors’ songs of the 16th century to recent times. They played ten of them. I had counted only eight when they ended, which was probably the result of failing to notice a pause and change of style. There was a convincing sense of anticipation with Off to Sea, as the sails picked up the wind; the last piece, Sweet Suzanne was the longest, most bravura and arresting: a colourful and entertaining collection.

Arvo Part’s Spiegel im Spiegel is nearly as popular as his Fratres: hypnotic, a masterpiece of simplicity. The translation for violin and guitar involved retuning the bottom E string of the guitar to a low F, to deal with the repeated anchor. Rupa Maitra played it with just discreet vibrato and a riveting stillness. Again, a very convincing transformation.

Finally, there was a piece by William Squire, a name that was once, perhaps still, very familiar to cello students. He edited a series of albums of varying difficulty: I still have two of them, as well, to my surprise, as the Tarantella in D minor, played here. It didn’t make a deep impression on me sixty-odd years ago, but this version worked very well, though I could not argue that the duo had unearthed a masterpiece. Nevertheless, the character of the two instruments, the players’ rapport and the way in which their musical instincts combined might have brought the most unpromising composition to life.

Don’t hesitate to get along to their next concert, wherever it might be.

 

Guitar students deliver impressive performances in spite of relative inexperience in tough field

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

New Zealand School of Music Showcase Week at St Andrew’s

NZSM Classical Guitar Ensemble (Joel Baldwin, Toby Chadwick, Jake Church, Amber Madriaga, Lucinda Ng, Emma Sandford, Royden Smith, Dylan Solomon, George Wills)
and the NZSM Classical Guitar Quartet (Church, Smith, Solomon, Wills)

Music by Tylman Susato, Andrew York, Piazzolla and Jürg Kindle (the Ensemble); and Bizet and Boccherini (the Quartet)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Monday 25 May, 12:15 pm

The first of the four programmes arranged by the enterprising manager of the St Andrew’s lunchtime concerts, Marjan van Waardenberg, with the New Zealand School of Music in an effort to draw more particular attention to the school’s contribution to Wellington, downtown.

As was to be expected, the audience was somewhat smaller than that for the usual Wednesday concerts, but it was by no means an embarrassment. Guitars, though still not quite classical mainstream, have a strong appeal, especially when they play music that has survived in the repertoire for a century or so, including much music of the Hispanic world that seems to invite transcription ‘back’ for the instrument that probably inspired its creation: Albeniz, Falla, Barrios, Villa-Lobos, Tarrega, Brouwer…

This programme really offered none of that, apart from a transcription of Piazzolla’s Primavera Porteña. It opened with a set of three Renaissance dances by Tylman (Tielman) Susato who lived from around 1515 to 1570. (So this might be around his 500th birthday). He was a calligrapher and printer in Antwerp, the first in the Netherlands to use moveable type for printing music. Antwerp was a leading centre of printing in the first century after its invention by Gutenberg. (Last year I spent a fascinating three or four hours in the Plantin-Moretus Museum of printing in Antwerp).

Susato was also a composer of motets and masses as well as chansons and dances, either arranged or original tunes. Here we had dances: a Pavane, Gaillard and Ronde. Their arrangement left the Pavane in what I felt was a somewhat ponderous state, though dynamics were carefully and enjoyably studied; the triple time Gaillard and the more lively Ronde, felt better adapted for dancing.

Andrew York’s two pieces were quietly interesting, the first, Pop, starting with chords that hinted at Theodorakis’s sirtaki, or hasapiko, from Zorba the Greek, but soon went its own way. Brajamazil had a comparably quiet pulse, that used the eight-part ensemble in two parts, one providing a repeated riff, under a tune that varied somewhat; all played with the same care for ensemble as the set of Susato dances. It may have been the acoustic, but I missed something of a resonant bass that might have underlain the rather uniform quality of the whole ensemble.

Piazzolla’s Primavera Porteña (originally for bandoneon, violin and guitar I suppose) is an attractive and fairly well-known piece, partly in triple time, but often rhythmically obscure (to me), which the ensemble played skilfully. Finally, a couple of pieces by a composer I had not heard of, Jürg Kindle, entitled Funky and Techno, which Jane Curry suggested (if I heard correctly) represented a style of music that had only brief vogue. Funky needed precision, solid rhythm as well as a certain freedom; it was rather a work in progress.

Techno perhaps suffered from the limitations of what it was imitating, but the attempt to invest it with a little sophistication left it somewhat morbid.

The large ensemble was then replaced by a quartet of the four more advanced players. They played arrangements of three of the dances from Carmen, which had the advantage of deriving, at least, from the home of the guitar. Rhythms were reasonably lively though again they suffered through the care and restraint with which they were played. The first, Aragonese, essentially a rather elegant, restrained dance, was the least handicapped by that sobriety; so it expressed that dignity quite well. But the Seguidilla which Carmen dances in high frustration as she faces Jose’s timidity, his overwhelming fear of letting go, his sense of duty to the army, was a tough one. At this stage, these players were not really up to capturing the sexuality that the dance expresses.

They ended with an Introduction and Fandango by Boccherini which lay quite well for the guitars. Though the Introduction passed without much impact, the Fandango came off well since it was drawn from the famous guitar quintet La retirata di Madrid. Throughout, their obvious pains over notation precision and dynamics were always conspicuous, and the performances showed proper attention to the basic challenges that face players of this instrument, in these not always very rewarding pieces, from which there is nowhere to hide.

 

An unusual trio throws fresh, sometimes questionable light on a variety of chamber pieces

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Trio Amistad (Rebecca Steel – flute, Simon Brew – saxophones, Jane Curry – guitar)
(Wellington Chamber Music)

François de Fossa: Trio No 1 in A, Op 18
Piazzolla: Histoire du Tango – Café and Bordello
Sergio Assad: Winter impressions for Trio
Bach: Trio Sonata VI, BWV 530 (arranged Eric Dussault)
Debussy: Petite Suite (arr. Timothy Kain)
Falla: La vida breve – Danse espagnole (arr. Owen Moriarty)

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Sunday 3 May, 2:30 pm

This, just incidentally, was the third recital involving a flute within a month – see Middle C of 1 and 29 April.

The Trio by the amateur and rather obscure 19th century French composer, François de Fossa, was written originally for violin, guitar and cello (reflecting the widespread interest in the guitar in the first half of the 19th century).

I had not heard of De Fossa and have been interested to find him, of course, through Google, significant in the guitar world, responsible for bringing Boccherini’s guitar quartets to notice, arranging Haydn quartets for guitar duo, translating a guitar method from Spanish.

Since Fossa himself had arranged for the guitar, music written for other instruments, I guess there can be little objection to musicians today arranging his. The thing that struck one at once however was the dramatically different sound produced by the tenor sax, and by the end of the concert the question remained; it was the most problematic of the six pieces they played.

The original would certainly have held together sonically and the flute substitutes easily enough for the violin, but the timbre of the saxophone seemed to contribute a quality that was rather too prominent. One can understand the hesitancy of classical composers, since the invention of the saxophones, to embrace them as fully legitimate members of the family. Even without knowing its history, one can sense that the saxophone is of another time; though I wonder whether, if it had not been taken up so completely by the world of big band jazz, it would sound more comfortable in classical music.
In its style the trio shows echoes of Haydn (the occasional amusing, deliberate miss-step) or Boccherini, or perhaps George Onslow; it was very agreeable, and it was played with charm.

In the two pieces they played from Piazzolla’s Histoire du tango, Simon Brew picked up his alto sax, again, not an instrument Piazzolla had envisaged, but here it fitted the sound world with a perfect authenticity (and it made me wonder whether the alto might have made all the difference to the Fossa piece). They began with the second piece, Café 1930, which is charming and gay; there was more evidence of the true roots of the tango in the first part of the suite, Bordello 1900, as you’d expect, and the players rejoiced in the syncopated rhythms and captivating melodic shapes.

Brazilian composer Sergio Assad (using the tenor sax again, in place of the as-scored, viola) wrote his Winter Impressions in 1996. I would have doubted the existence of much of a winter in the area around São Paulo, and Jane Curry’s guitar was the only one of the trio whose music hinted at The Frozen Garden – the first movement. The flute in the second movement contributed a dreamy tune, and the distinct lines for all three instruments created a most delightful musical pattern. The last movement, Fire Place, created an air of charming sociability, with animated talk punctuated by meditative pauses. Assad struck me as a natural, gifted composer with his own voice in music that had arisen because it had to be composed and not to fulfill academic assignments or important commissions.

The 6th of Bach’s Trio Sonatas, written for his oldest son Wilhelm Friedmann, was reportedly pieced together from parts of his other works, which is the reason for their sounding familiar, though I could not name or place them. Music long familiar has a habit of sounding more substantial and, of course, memorable, and so did this. The first movement was a successful wedding of flute and alto sax, each echoing the other. As I had with the Piazzolla, I found the alto a more comfortable companion with its colleagues here, and its soft, rather beautiful tones in the Lento, middle movement, held the music together in an organic manner. It was a most successful adaptation, colourfully played.

Debussy’s Petite Suite for piano duet has been much arranged, for orchestra and a variety of chamber ensembles, which would seem to give permission for virtually anything. Here Rebecca Steel’s flute seemed utterly natural, taking, as was explained, the piano primo part while the saxophone took the secondo (bass) part, much duetting in 6ths. The effect here was for the guitar to be placed rather inconspicuously, simply accompaniment; though there was a charming duet between flute and guitar in the Menuet. Nevertheless, though I am unhappy about most amplification, it’s often necessary for the guitar and might have been useful here.

The Spanish Dance from Manuel de Falla’s La vida breve ended the programme, and here again I felt the alto sax might have been a better choice than the tenor in the mix with two lighter instruments; in its top register however, it was fine; the guitar had more prominence which was most welcome; and the piece brought this charming concert a delightful finish.

 

Brilliant guitar recital from Owen Moriarty at St Andrew’s

Posted on by Lindis Taylor

Owen Moriarty – guitar

Music by Marek Pasieczny Joaquin Rodrigo, Manuel Ponce, Mauro Giuliani

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday 8 April, 12:15 pm

At some stage at most guitar recitals, the famous words of Chopin come to mind. “Nothing is more beautiful than a guitar, except, possibly, two.” We had only one, though Jane Curry, head of guitar at the university School of Music, was there too, evidently without her guitar.

Owen Moriarty began with the youngest piece, a Little Sonata by Polish-born Marek Pasieczny (it was wrongly spelled in the programme). It was in four movements, inspired by Schubert’s set of four piano pieces, the Impromptus, Op. 90; and the title was suggested by Hindemith’s ‘Kleine Sonate’.  In truth, it was quite some distance from Schubert, but I knew what he meant: each movement was in a spirit that, give or take a couple of centuries, owed something to the outward shape or spirit of Schubert’s. Schubert’s first piece is marked Allegro molto moderato; Pasieczny’s is Moderato galante; the second, the favourite Schubert Impromptu, in quaver triplets in E flat, is simply Allegro while Pasieczny’s is marked Lento religioso, rather different.

Never mind. The first was ‘galant’ – mid 18th century – sure enough, in character, though somewhat advanced in melodic shape and harmony. Like most of the programme, it afforded Moriarty excellent scope for his superb dynamic subtleties; and the gentle second piece was an even better example of the way the player shifted the sound not merely through the vigour of the plucking but by the position of his right hand working the strings. The third piece, Arpeggiato largamente opened with spacious broken chords that led to charmingly worked out themes; while the fourth, the equivalent of Schubert’s fast A flat Impromptu, exploited the guitar’s essential strumming technique, vigorous and somewhat grand as it reached the end.

Rodrigo’s Bajando de la Meseta is one of five pieces in a suite characterising regions of Spain, this one literally, ‘Lowering the plateau’; Meseta refers here, specifically to the plateau of New Castile (Castilla Nueva), the most central region of Spain in which Madrid is situated. It opened in a deliberate manner, lento strumming, in fast common time, which shifted to triplets, increasingly virtuosic with fast scales and fancy decorative passages.

Ponce’s Balletto and Preludio comes from a generation before Rodrigo. He had an association with Andres Segovia and the two were complicit in publishing this pair of pieces as a newly discovered work of the great lutenist Silvius Leopold Weiss, a contemporary of J S Bach; this was the era when Kreisler was turning out pieces that he attributed to various baroque composers.

It certainly worked as a piece of that age, the Balletto, charming, slow and danceable; while the Preludio was subject to several rhythm changes with motifs weaving through various lines adroitly delineated by the player.

The real spectacle came with Rossiniana No 1 (of six) by the Italian guitarist Giuliani whose guitar concertos (more than one I think) were familiar a few years ago, but not heard (by me) recently. This was one of six pot-pourris on tunes from Rossini’s operas arranged freely and with huge flair and an eye to impressive virtuosity. The tunes were somewhat familiar, at least one from L’italiana in Algeri?, with the last leading to the typical Rossini crescendo of increasing excitement and spectacular agility by both the guitarist’s hands

Another piece by Rodrigo was the last item in the programme: Pequena Sevilliana – The Girl from Seville. Coming from Andalusia, flamenco music was to be expected, but quirky, with little twists that involved the fingers darting all over the finger-board. It was a delightful finish to a highly entertaining and revelatory recital of, quite simply, international calibre guitar playing.

 

Acclaimed Guitarist Recital highlights venue shortcomings

Posted on by Frances Robinson

New Zealand School of Music presents:

Matt Withers – Australian guitarist

Programme:
F.Tarrega – Recuedos de la Alhambra
I.Albeniz – Asturias
Blue Moon & Somewhere over the Rainbow
La Catedral – A.Barrios
Black Wattle Caprices – R.Edwards
Usher Waltz – N.Koshkin
Libre Tango, Verano Porteno, La Muerte Del Angel – A.Piazzolla
Three Irish Folk-Songs
Cuban Dance – J.Pernambuco

Adam Concert Room, NZSM Victoria University

Friday 20th March, 2015

Matt Withers is head of Guitar at the University of Canberra and a widely acclaimed performer who has picked up many awards in his relatively short career. He is currently touring New Zealand for the first time doing recitals and master classes, and this was a welcome opportunity to hear someone of this calibre whose reputation has gone before them.

He described his varied programme as “a round-the-world tour”, and it opened appropriately with two well loved Spanish classics from Tarrega and Albeniz. He immediately put his own stamp on these familiar works by an amazingly delicate touch and sensitivity of interpretation, calling frequently on rubato and the power of the pregnant pause before resolving a phrase or section. He marked Tarrega’s move from minor to major mode with a very creative brightening that highlighted the shift most effectively. These were both very romantic readings, quite devoid of any Iberian brashness.

So too were Almeida’s two settings of Blue Moon and Rainbow – delicate, laid back, almost hinting at the louche, caressing every single note. My heart leapt with joy to see Barrios’ La Catedral on the programme – one of my favourite pieces –     and it too was presented with great tenderness and lightness of touch.

The Black Wattle Caprices by Australian composer Edwards (who apparently lives in Black Wattle Bay in Sydney) were indeed capricious, leaping from one idea to another with, to my ear, no clear idea of a destination or overarching concept. But Withers is a strong supporter of Australian composers, and he clearly engaged with these works, playing them with very obvious enthusiasm.

Throughout the first half, however, I had been disappointed, and frankly baffled, by the apparent shortcomings of Matt Withers’ technique. In many pianissimo passages there had been missing notes, or even clusters of notes entirely missing, and phrases that he was not able to project even to where I was sitting only 3-4 metres distant. This despite his modern lattice-built instrument which provides greater projection than traditional designs.

It was very odd, and could hardly be attributed to nerves in so experienced a recitalist. Something was clearly not right, but it was not until a brief conversation I had in the interval that the pieces of the jigsaw fell into place. I had been listening to an artist who was, literally, not warmed up. While I sat comfortably in the room in a winter jersey, scarf and jacket on this southerly Wellington night, the conditions played havoc with the performance. There are two basic requirements for a successful technical performance: a relatively high radiant temperature for the hands (essential for high speed dexterity), and a lowish air temperature (for keeping a clear head and sharp concentration). If the air temperature is raised to a level sufficient for high speed dexterity, concentration is seriously impaired. Likewise a low air temperature makes that same dexterity physiologically impossible.

At the time the Victoria School of Music was designed in the 1980s, these parameters were clearly presented to the authorities. They were at that time the Ministry of Works, who oversaw all design, construction, and funding approvals for universities. The architects proposed wall mounted radiators, which had a long history of meeting the required parameters for optimum musical performance. This proposal was completely at odds with current government policy which was to use gas (usually air) heating, but the evidence was sufficiently compelling to convince the ministry, and an exception was allowed.

This system has since been removed from the Adam Concert Room, depriving players of the most basic environmental conditions for a competent performance. I now realised that what I had observed in the first half of the programme was the classic situation of a player who was too cold. By the last pair of items things were improving, and they continued to come right throughout the second half. This is such a familiar situation (ask anyone who has played, shivering, in provincial wooden churches for the local music society!) that the penny should have dropped sooner. The other serious difficulty with cold venues is that they do not address the fundamental physics of musical instruments, which must be sufficiently warm to speak properly and in tune.

The second half of the programme opened with Koshkin’s Waltz, which expresses the chaotic torrent of fearful and anxious thoughts besieging the unfortunate Usher of Edgar Alan Poe’s story. The interlude of lightning and thunder came across with power and urgency, before the beautifully crafted and poignant collapse into final silence as Usher’s house disappeared into the enveloping marsh.

The Piazzolla bracket comprised a very attractive group of pieces where Withers captured the contrasting moods with delightful whimsy, be they lively, or gently evocative and reminiscent. Likewise the Irish songs, very simply and effectively set by British guitarist Steve Marsh, were beautifully rendered, full of longing, and played with great affection.

With Pernambuco’s energetic Cuban Dance, Matt Withers offered a vigorous and enthusiastic finale to a very interesting and varied programme. The audience were most appreciative, and they were rewarded by a lovely rendering of Stanley Meyers’ wistful Cavatina as an encore.

NZSM Classical Guitar students square up to a challenging recital

Posted on by Frances Robinson

New Zealand School of Music presents:
NZSM Classical Guitar Students

Lunchtime Concert Series
Old St.Paul’s, Wellington.

 Tuesday September 23rd, 2014

This brief concert was a welcome opportunity to hear again the talents of the NZSM Classical Guitar students under the tutelage of director Dr. Jane Curry. The full ensemble consisted of fifteen players, of whom four were guest members from the School’s pre-tertiary programme. The recital comprised a wide variety of works that spanned the “Golden Age” of Elizabethan lute music, the Baroque, and the 19th and 20th centuries.

The initial work, for full ensemble, was Three Distractions by Richard Charlton (b.1955). The first two short numbers involved lots of complex, irregular and syncopated rhythms, while the third was  marked by angular atonal writing with many percussive effects. It was a challenging piece, where the complexities were well handled and the integration of the large ensemble was excellent.

Then followed two duo numbers, firstly The Flatt Pavan and Galliard by John Johnson (1550-1594) who was one of the fathers of the “Golden Age” of English lute music. The characteristic graceful Elizabethan writing was well balanced by George Wills and Jake Church, with musical phrasing and good dynamic variation. The following Jongo for Two Guitars (1989) by Brazilian composer Paulo Bellinati was a total contrast where rhythmic complexities and clever percussive effects were also very effectively realized.

The bracket was completed by a duo version of Manuel da Falla’s unmistakable Spanish Dance which was given a very competent reading, though the quietest dynamics tended to disappear in the church’s acoustic, and some slightly untidy passagework popped up occasionally between the two players.

The next bracket comprised works for guitar quartet, with players Royden Smith, Dylan Solomon, Amber Madriaga and Christopher Beernink. The first work was Toccata by Leo Brouwer (b.1939), a Cuban player-composer who often combines “traditional forms with energetic, rhythmic flare resembling Cuban folk and street music. Brower’s compositional style is unique, consisting of a multitude of different sounds, techniques and cultures.” (programme notes). The Toccata was certainly busy with all of these, yet it somehow failed to grasp me in an integrated experience  that engaged the ear and led one on a musical journey. Its technical challenges were certainly met head on by the quartet, but some essential dimension seemed to have eluded the composer’s pen.

The next work was a transcription for guitar quartet of the opening sinfonia from Bach’s Cantata BWV 29 Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir. Bach himself wrote three versions of this movement – the first for solo violin (in BVW 1006), then the cantata sinfonia scored for orchestra, and finally a transcription for solo lute (BVW 1006a). I have not heard this last, but I felt that this guitar version was simply not able to do justice to the wonderful contrapuntal writing. Its very life blood derives from the gutsy, incisive attack and timbre offered by bow, reed or trumpet, and the guitar can simply not produce this.

There may well be merit in pedagogic versions that test the technical capacities of players (which were very adequately demonstrated here), but it does not sit comfortably in a concert programme. However, this particular recital was serving as an assessed element of the university course, so the parameters are somewhat different.

Spin by Andrew York (b.1958) was next on the programme. It was a work that challenged the players with tricky rhythms shifting between 7/8, 3/4 and 4/4, and with complex busy writing, all of which they handled with technical aplomb. I felt however that the intricacies of Spin would have been given greater shape and meaning by a wider dynamic range and more thoughtful phrasing.

The final work in the programme was Folguedo by Afro-Brazilian guitarist/composer Celso Machado (b.1953). Scored for guitar orchestra, it was billed as “a gem of a piece [in] the canon of large guitar ensemble repertoire”. It proved to be just that: the first of the two movements was immediately attractive, featuring a guitar solo introduction which then blossomed into ensemble writing that was presented with pleasing balance and dynamics. The second movement involved a considerable complexity of rhythms, textures, interweaving lines and harmonies, which were all handled pretty competently. Once again I felt that the challenge of the technical demands tended to be uppermost in the performers’ minds, whereas a greater exploration of the dynamic possibilities would have considerably enriched the music.

But having said that, the work was presented with a verve and enthusiasm that was shared by all the ensembles heard in this recital, a feature which has marked all the concerts I have heard from this tertiary programme. The Old St. Paul’s venue offered a very suitable acoustic and ambience which further enhanced the privilege Wellington audiences enjoy from hearing the fruits of this excellent NZSM endeavour.