Contemporary Classical

Canada, Cello, Chamber Music, Classical Music, Composers, Composers Now, Concert review, Conductors, Contemporary Classical, New York, Orchestral, Premieres, viola, Violin, Women composers

Momenta Festival IX: Ives at 150 and a Quartet at 20

On Thursday evening in New York, Momenta Quartet’s October festival – now nine years running – closed with an assorted program, enthusiastically curated by violist/composer Stephanie Griffin. Griffin is the last founding member still actively performing with the group. Noting that this festival has ever featured the opportunity for each member to have curatorial carte blanche on one night only, Griffin nodded to the overall 2024 theme – Charles Ives at 150 – while admitting that “this is not a thematic program, but rather a joyous collection of pieces that I saw fit to celebrate the genius of Charles Ives and my own twenty years as the violist of Momenta.”  As such, her own instalment was themed Momenta at 20. Griffin’s rather fine and comprehensive program notes are recommended ancillary reading, and can be found HERE.

The first musical offering was from Mexican composer Julián Carrillo: his String Quartet No. 3 “Dos Bosquejos.” Opening with muted strings and an effective microtonal chorale, this music veiled itself in mystery, dark and lush, a perfect selection with which to begin the evening. The piece continued to unfold like a set of exercises – or experiments – in string writing, with novel techniques (ca. 1927!) and textural effects. The first movement, “Meditación,” eventually burst a romantic vein, with solos and extended techniques eliciting vaguely integrated call-and-answers.

The second movement, “En Secreto,” felt eerily expressionist. (Griffin likens Carrillos’ music “to the work of surrealist artists such as Salvador Dalí and René Magritte.”) While related in mood and material to the first, the “secrets” revealed in this second and final movement were whispered between instruments in a matter-of-fact, straightforward mode, a little too efficiently.

Momenta seemed to relish these coloristic experiments in extended space. Carrillo’s numerous homophonic passages prove especially demanding in their intonation and yet most octave unisons were handled judiciously by this group. Suddenly, just as this essaying music began to fatigue under its own weight, it was over: a mere eleven minutes in duration.

After this, Stephanie Griffin spoke to the audience about the quartet’s close relationship with the music of Carrillo. They “fell in love” with the string writing of this composer and have established an important connection with his unduly neglected catalogue. Griffin has proclaimed* the forthcoming recording of Carrillo’s complete string quartets on the Naxos label to be Momenta’s “most significant legacy.”

The remainder of the first half highlighted early music from Charles Ives. Brief and inconsequential, The Innate (1908) for string quintet and piano, is based on hymnal material. It stood out as a somewhat unquantifiable preamble to the composer’s early quartet – the Quartet No. 1 (1896-1902) – which has been a favorite of Momenta’s, as Griffin explained in her spoken introduction. It was a part of their first season in 2004-2005, twenty years ago.

This first quartet from the turn of the century is a high-energy, Ivesian romp in three movements, containing a great deal of musical irony: an irony sometimes missed by Momenta on Thursday night. Striking the right side of Ives’ mercurial nature can challenging, particularly in his earlier works. There exists a quirky dimensionality here, even in seemingly upfront and “folksy” material. During Thursday’s performance, a command of tempi and rhythm in the first movement could have been better established.

The rhetorical components of the first and second movements urge a singular vision of interpretation. This brave new music, (as it was in its own time), remains theatrical today. For Momenta, the blending and balance amongst the four instruments went astray at times, requiring more central grounding in the hopes of evoking a sense of play. Where was the element of surprise?

Conversely, the third movement read as well integrated and convincing. The individualistic approach from each player here yielded dynamic displays of line and texture. One was reminded of Dvorak’s string quartets: folk-inspired and generous. Through contrapuntal awareness and a dash of extra courage, Momenta brought the recital’s first half to a delightful close, gleeful and quicksilver; Ives himself, not to mention Dvorak, would have approved.

After an intermission during which the audience was advised to stay in their seats, this lengthy program continued with a world premiere by Stephanie Griffin, herself in the solo role. The Overgrown Cathedral (2019-24) for viola and lower string ensemble was inspired by a disused, ruined cathedral in Brazil, the Igreja do Senhor da Vera Cruz.

Griffin’s idiomatic writing for solo viola flattered the piece’s narrative musical structure. Her new work unfolded as a dirge-like processional, improvisatory in its droning, rolling lyricism and unusually self-contained. The pulse altered little throughout the single-movement and skillful writing for all players alike brought to mind successful spectralist composers as well as the more contemporary Scotsman (and friend to string players), James MacMillan.

Solos in other instruments – especially the cello – peppered Griffin’s soundscape. About midway through the proceedings, “mosquito” effects emerged antiphonally, forming an integral role in the narrative and echoed by accompanying violas. As the scoring was devoid of violins (!) this resulted in an attractive sonority. The constant lulling never ceased and, relievedly, never got in the way of prominent soloistic activity. Dipping in and out of familiar string effects like sul ponticello and glissandi, The Overgrown Cathedral meandered its way to a final utterance, at the brink of being circuitous.

Photo credit: Nana Shi

As finale, and in diptych with Griffin’s Cathedral, Claude Vivier’s Zipangu was an impressive stroke. Interspersed between these two larger works for string orchestra was another short, innocuous piece from Charlies Ives: his Hymn of 1904. One craved more context for this curatorial placement, especially for its juxtaposition with Zipangu.

But Vivier’s vivid, brazen work for strings from 1980 remained an apt and powerful choice. Brimming with a depth of sound we had not yet heard on the program, Zipangu boasted its novel textures as a means of expression, easily engrossing even the most casual listener. Vivier himself claimed, “within the frame of a single melody I explore in this work different aspects of color. I tried to ‘blur’ my harmonic structure through different bowing techniques.”

Glimmers of microtonal Ligeti shone through the spectral haze of this work (*think* 2001: A Space Odyssey). After Griffin’s favoring of low registers, the arrival of Vivier’s upper strings scoring proved a dramatic and welcomed shift.

This branch of string writing is not always easy to interpret nor to refine, especially for a quasi pick-up orchestra. Nevertheless, the sheer impact and boldness of the material seemed to inspire the string players on Thursday, many of whom Griffin described as “Momenta alumni,” having played with the group over the past 20 years.

Photo credit: Nana Sh

For some time, conductor and artistic director, Sebastian Zubieta, had urged Momenta to program this music by Vivier. On Thursday night, it seemed to augment the quartet’s profile and manifest a compelling wrap-up to the 2024 Festival.

What’s more, the works of Claude Vivier are worthy of wider recognition, 41 years on from his death. Thanks to Momenta and their colleagues this relevant, near-cosmic, Canadian voice reached our sympathetic ears on Thursday night, straight on through the hurly-burly “blur” of a 21st century that Charles Ives would have almost certainly recognized.

by Adam Sherkin
Cello, Composers, Concert review, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, New York, Orchestras

Sphinx Virtuosi and New York Philharmonic Play Black American Composers

Cellist Seth Parker Woods with New York Philharmonic, Thomas Wilkins conducting. Music by Nathalie Joachim on October 17, 2024 (credit: Chris Lee)

Black American composers dominated the programming at two of New York City’s major institutions last week — a 180° turn from the typical fare of Dead White Men at most orchestral concerts.

On Wednesday, October 16, Carnegie Hall presented Sphinx Virtuosi — the flagship ensemble of the Sphinx Organization, an organization whose mission it is to encourage careers of Black and Latino classical musicians and arts administrators. Thursday at Lincoln Center’s Geffen Hall was New York Philharmonic’s program “Exploring Afromodernism” — a program which was repeated on Friday. Both concerts featured outstanding and committed performances of mainly 21st century classical works.

Sphinx Virtuosi at Carnegie Hall on October 16, 2024 (credit Brian Hatton)

Sphinx Virtuosi is a conductorless chamber orchestra of 18 Black and Latino string players. It can be hard to pull off cohesive performances without a conductor, but it was immediately apparent that this ensemble was up to the task. The concert began with a reworking of Scott Joplin’s overture to his opera Treemonisha, arranged by Jannina Norpoth. The work infused classical gestures with blues, gospel and a bit of ragtime. The most effective and exciting selection was the world premiere of Double Down, Invention No. 1 for Two Violins by Curtis Stewart, performed by Njioma Chinyere Grievous and Tai Murray. It was a brilliant display of virtuosity from both violinists, playing off one another in a keen game of counterpoint which included a fiery display of fiddling as well as percussive foot-stomping. The audience roared its approval with a lengthy standing ovation. Stewart’s other work on the program was the New York premiere of Drill (co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall, Sphinx Virtuosi and New World Symphony). Percussionist Josh Jones, a member of the ensemble, was the soloist. It was a wild piece with frenetic drumming countered by subtle moments of gentle trills on wood blocks. All in all, it was a roiling cluster of excitement.

Music by Derrick Skye, Levi Taylor and the 19th century Venezuelan-American Teresa Careña, rounded out the brief program, which included a five-minute promotional film and comments by Sphinx Organization president Afa Dworkin.

The New York Philharmonic’s program was a wonderful display of a range of talents and generations conducted by Thomas Wilkins. It began with Carlos Simon’s Four Black American Dances, which impressed right away with the composer’s great orchestration. The rich first movement showcased the brilliant playing of every section of the Philharmonic, including a rollicking solo by concertmaster Sheryl Staples, who showed off her great artistry later in the work as well. After a somewhat schmaltzy second movement (“Waltz”) and predictably percussive third (“Tap!”), the final section (“Holy Dance”) began with a mystical aura which devolved into a loud and jaunty display.

The New York premiere of Nathalie Joachim’s concerto Had To Be, written for the cellist Seth Parker Woods began with an off-stage band replicating a New Orleans-style “second line.” After a smooth transition into a slow and lush passage by the orchestra on stage, the solo cellist had a lyrical soulful melody. The second movement, “Flare” launched with boisterous brass and percussion, which tended to drown out the strings. “With Grace,” the final movement, was beautifully emotional. Though the soloist wasn’t given an especially virtuosic part, Woods’ stage presence dominated throughout the work. Wilkins graceful conducting infused an appropriate amount of emotion into the performance.

David Baker’s Kosbro was intense from its very beginning, with driving rhythms, insistent timpani whacks, double-tongued brass and winds and angular melodies. Written in the 1970s, the work was an effective combination of jazz and classical styles.

William Grant Still’s gift for melody, harmony and orchestration made me wonder why this particular work – Symphony No. 4, Autochthonous, (the subtitle refers to indigenous people) isn’t programmed more often. Still’s superb orchestra writing balanced winds and strings in a dialogue which Wilkins navigated beautifully, each exchange infused with profound meaning.

Beyond the demographics of the composers, a similarity on both of these programs was that each of the works by the living composers was an olio of styles. In each case, the creators sought to include a variety of folk, pop, jazz and other cultural idioms in a single composition. It may be unfair to generalize, because the selections were undoubtedly programmatic decisions. I promise not to make a broad generalization until I hear more music from each of these composers, which I am eager to do.

With regard to the focus of these two concerts, I am going to say something very unpopular: Nobody is proclaiming that there aren’t enough White rappers or that Anglos aren’t well enough represented in, say, Latin jazz or conjunto music. And yet in recent years there has been great emphasis on striving for diversity in classical music. I’m not saying we shouldn’t work very hard to be inclusive of all Americans — or of all peoples in general for that matter — to be a part of this art form, this culture. I’m wondering aloud why it seems especially crucial in classical music.

Let’s discuss.

Be that as it may, the Sphinx Organization has been a leader in encouraging careers and celebrating people of color in classical music for over 25 years. They have done an admirable — nay amazing — job, welcoming hundreds of young musicians into the art form, creating role models for future generations, and creating an environment in which it is not only comfortable, but encouraging for young musicians to get involved and excel in the field.

by Gail Wein
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, Electro-Acoustic, File Under?

Splinter Reeds – Dark Currents (Recording Review)

Splinter Reeds – Dark Currents (Cantaloupe)

 

Splinter Reeds, the West Coast’s first wind quintet, has distinguished themselves as advocates for living composers. Dark Currents, their latest recording for Cantaloupe, features two twenty-ish minute long pieces, Tall Grass (2022) by the totalist composer and Bang on a Can member Michael Gordon, and Antenna Studies (2018) by Paula Matthusen, a professor at Wesleyan who is one of the finest experimental electronic composers of her generation; both works were written for Splinter Reeds.

 

Gordon  has steadily developed an eclectic musical language that exhibits fluency and variety in large scale forms. The entire first section of Tall Grass is about ascent, with overlaid ostinatos in polyrhythms reaching for the skies. Alongside the melodic material are held notes that accompany and intersperse them, as well as periodic rests. The lines drop out for a long held altissimo note, then resume, the bass clarinet joining with a microtonal scale. The brakes are put on the section by a held low note, followed by an effects-filled solo from the bass clarinet. In the next section, the material slows, creating triadic arpeggiations that both ascend and descend, with octave leaps in the bass. It is like the aural equivalent of a close-up. A chorale-like passage ensues, and the section cadences in mid-register octaves and trills. The fast tempo returns with the melody ghosted in pairs and passages of hemiola that gradually unravel into their constituent elements and then knit back together, punctuated by multiphonics. The slow tempo returns in a soft, mysterious section. A galloping fortissimo passage announces the piece’s climax, rife with repeated notes. A denouement provides a slender version of the piece’s original ascent, and Tall Grass ends with an inconclusive single note. 

 

Matthusen’s Antenna Studies starts pianissimo with half tuned-in radio blasts and held sine tones, and sampled percussion, followed by non-pitched wind sounds, such as breath and pops. Sustained single tones in the winds enter on the same pitch as the electronics and accompanied by flashes of radio static. Brief canonic passages are introduced, with secundal intervals and deliberate detuning used to create beats. Sustained bass clarinet arrives two octaves lower, working its way up harmonic partials, soon followed up an octave and then haloed by electronics. The entire group soon engages in holding notes and hocketing in various registers. An interlude contains repeating patterns, warm synth chords, a held altissimo note and, once again, a plethora of non-pitched wind sounds. Overlapping mixed interval scales, the winds re-enter as the electronics recede to an upper register drone. A general crescendo is sculpted from repeated notes in the winds and another secundal tune, this time in the electronics.  Uptempo ostinatos, interspersed by a tart chord, continue alongside a wide registral swath of electronics. There is a long decrescendo in which a sampled voice joins sustained winds, closing with the electronics and acoustic instruments finally on equal footing

 

The two pieces that are on Dark Currents contrast well. Both are strong additions to their respective composers’ catalogs  that benefit from skillful playing and artful musicality by Splinter Reeds. Recommended.

 

  • Christian Carey

 

 

by Christian Carey
Chamber Music, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, File Under?

Tuesday, October 15th: Sacred and Profane, Sirota and Clement at Symphony Space

Tuesday, October 15th: Sacred and Profane, Sirota and Clement at Symphony Space

 

Tomorrow, Robert Sirota and Sheree Clement, two New York based composers,  combine forces to present Sacred and Profane, a shared portrait concert at Symphony Space (7:30 PM, tickets here). Sirota may be best known for his stints as President at Peabody and Manhattan School of Music, but he’s remained active as a composer all along. Clement has also been involved as an arts administrator, having served as President of League of Composers/ISCM, Executive Director for New York New Music Ensemble, and, currently, on the board of Association for the Promotion of New Music. Like Sirota, Clement’s primary activities are as a composer. Her works bring together political engagement, humor, and dramatic, often staged, presentations. 

 

The musicians performing are a bevy of NYC’s finest contemporary players: soprano Ariadne Greif, baritone Paul Pinto, the Momenta Quartet, cellist Benjamin Larsen, pianist Hyungjin Choi, flutist Roberta Michel, violists Jonah Sirota and Nadia Sirota, and percussionist Katherine Fortunato. And yes, the two violists are Robert Sirota’s progeny, prodigious players with a number of ensembles and in solo contexts. 

 

Each composer has contributed two pieces to the program. Sirota’s A Sinner’s Diary (2005) is for flute, two violas, cello, percussion, and piano, and Broken Places (2016) is for flute and cello. Receiving its premiere is Clement’s Mermaid Songs (2024) for soprano and string quartet. The live premiere of her vocal duet Table Manners (2020), directed by Mary Birnbaum, includes forty pounds of silverware in its staging. Who’s doing the dishes? You’ll only find out if you attend the concert!

 

 

 

by Christian Carey
Concert review, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, File Under?

Louis Karchin A Retrospective at Merkin Hall (concert review)

Louis Karchin: A Retrospective

Merkin Concert Hall

September 22, 2024

NEW YORK – Composer Louis Karchin has been prolific, even during the pandemic years. In a program at Merkin Concert Hall of chamber works and songs composed between 2018 and 2024, he was abetted by some of New York’s go-to new music performers, who acquitted themselves admirably throughout. 

All photos: Julie Karchin.

Stephen Drury is an abundantly talented pianist. But even with a repertoire list as lengthy and challenging as Drury’s, Sonata-Fantasia (2020, New York Premiere) is an imposing addition. The piece is in four large sections combined into a single movement, with elements such as chromatic and bitonal harmonies, chains of angular gestures, trills, and thrumming bass notes appearing frequently. One of the distinctive techniques employed pits a middle register chord repeated against impressionist sounding arpeggios cascaded above and below it. Apart from the meditative third section, sprightly virtuosity ruled the day. 

Two Sacred Songs (2018, World Premiere) were workshopped via Zoom during the pandemic. Soprano Marisa Karchin and pianist Steven Beck performed these settings of George Herbert, a seventeenth century poet and Anglican priest. The soprano has radiant top notes, clear diction, and a sure sense of phrasing. “Denial” requires all of these characteristics, its wide vocal range matching the various emotions on display in the poem. Beck is a versatile pianist, who matched Marisa Karchin’s attention to the intricacies of the texts and provided vivid accompaniment. The two were a powerful pair when demonstrating the intensity of “The Storm.” 

Beck frequently plays with instrumentalists too, and he performed Sonata quasi un Capriccio (2023, world premiere) with violinist Miranda Cuckson, a longtime collaborator of Karchin’s. This association benefited both piece and performance, as the composer knows how reliable Cuckson is, even in stratospheric altissimo lines. Sonata quasi un Capriccio is a white-hot piece filled with dramatic flair. It closed the first half.

The second half was also a mix of vocal and chamber music. The poet Steven Withrow heard Karchin’s music and was impressed. He approached the composer and suggested providing two texts based on paintings – San Vigilio: A Boat with a Golden Sail by John Singer Sargent and I And the Village by Marc Chagall – for Karchin to set as art songs, the result being Compositions on Canvas (2021, World Premiere). Soprano Alice Teyssier, joined by Beck, clearly reveled in the detailed texts, the first describing Sargent’s relationship to Italian patrons, the second detailing a virtual menagerie of animals found in Chagall’s painting. Karchin’s songs supply many coloristic shifts, dynamic gradations, and widely spaced gestures to encompass the imagery found in Withrow’s words. Teyssier navigated these handily, and Beck’s accompaniment glistened persuasively, particularly in the impressionist-simulating arpeggiations.

 

The concert concluded with a substantial work that, while maintaining Karchin’s musical language, provides a few hat tips to the concert tradition. Trio for Violin, Cello, and Piano (2019) was performed by the Horszowski Trio: Jesse Mills, violin; Ole Akahoshi, cello; and Rieko Aizawa, piano. Cast in three movements that run over twenty-five minutes, its first movement is marked Allegro con spirito and in sonata form. It begins with a mercurial upward arpeggio in the piano that references the opening gesture of Robert Schumann’s Piano Quintet. This is quickly countered by descending sixteenths. Gradually, lines compact into whorls of stacked thirds and seconds with trills adding zest. The presence of ascent is underscored by upward leaps in a subordinate theme in the cello. The tempo of the development shifts three times, slower and then quicker, with a misterioso section deconstructing the constituent themes. A recapitulation embellishes the material with even more scalar sixteenths, building in intensity until it closes with a forceful, registrally duplicated major third. 

 

The second movement, marked Lento, begins with thirty-second note pile-ups and octave bass notes in the piano undergirding a sustained violin solo. A tremolando duet between the strings is succeeded by sul ponticello playing. The cello and piano imitate the violin’s sustained tune in canon against pulsating piano left hand octaves. A slow chain of rising, alternating intervals unveils a gradual reference to the first movement. Silvery piano arpeggiations and long chromatic ascent in the piano accompany the theme in several string variations. 

 

The final movement, marked Vivace, begins with sustained low F octaves in the piano and a low F tremolando in the cello. The latter instrument adds short trills to abet a triplet-filled motive in the violin. These are succeeded by angular imitation in all three instruments, with the conflict between ascending and descending permutations of similar lines being restored. Pizzicato and trills in the strings are next set against the triplet passages in the piano, the variations in instrumentation opening a potent development section. Eventually, arpeggiations of seconds and fourths succeed the added note triads, and eighth note triplets once again propel the violin. A series of descending sustained bass notes in the piano are set against quarter note triplets in the strings, effectively stretching out the prior thematic material. This is followed by a kaleidoscopic reframing of all the motives from the third movement. The coda has a compound feeling, with quarter note and eighth note triplets overlaid and a fortissimo Bb major chord to conclude. 

 

One of Karchin’s gifts as a composer is the ability to employ a relatively consistent musical language to a number of expressive ends. The variety of the program at Merkin Hall was impressive, as was the high quality of all of the music. One hopes that recordings of these pieces will soon be forthcoming.

-Christian Carey 

 

by Christian Carey
CDs, Contemporary Classical, Guitar, jazz

Wolfgang Muthspiel with Etudes/Quietudes – Solo Live Recording at ORF Radiokulturhaus Vienna Celebrates Craftsmanship and Creativity

With his new solo program, Etudes/Quietudes, Austrian guitarist Wolfgang Muthspiel celebrates the acoustic guitar, the instrument he switched to at the age of 13. (He had been trained to play classical music on violin.) The core of this new recording is a collection of concert etudes composed by .Muthspiel. Each of these 11 etudes explores a different aspect of the music for guitar, ranging from reflective to animated.

The etudes are linked by four other pieces, such as Muthspiel’s heartfelt homage to Bill Evans (“For Bill Evans”); a sarabande by Johann Sebastian Bach (on which he improvises with elements from the sarabande, consisting of 3 pieces); a theme by Paul Motian (“Abacus”), partly improvised; and a fast miniature called,”Triplet Droplet.”

With Etudes/Quietudes, Muthspiel effortlessly spans the gap between the two musical worlds that have been decisive in his musical life: the classical guitar and the art of improvisation derived from jazz. However, this program is not a crossover effort, as Muthspiel blurs the boundaries that might limit his creativity. Both on stage and in the recording studio, the guitarist achieves an intimacy that de-emphasizes the music’s technical demands, yet places a continuous parlando, a constant musical speech, at the center.

Etudes are basic exercises for musicians. They serve to refine certain skills and develop into captivating concert pieces. “I wrote my own etudes to practise certain technical aspects. Then I fell in love with the compositional process they inspired,” says Muthspiel. “Etudes celebrate craft!” he continues, “Craft is a central point for me – all the musicians I admire have spent a lifetime working on their personal sound.“

“The composer and guitarist draws parallels here to meditation and sport and emphasizes the beauty of repeated practice, which he personally enjoys as a grounding ritual. Just like spiritual practices and athletic training, etudes foster a deep-rooted mastery,” he explains. “It’s a basic attitude from which creativity blossoms.”

The new album, Etudes/Quietudes presents compositions that are primarily concert pieces. Muthspiel enjoys playing in front of audiences. Although these pieces are written specifically for the classical guitar, they can also be performed on other instruments. The etudes were recorded at the Vienna Radiokulturhaus. The album was mixed in the south of France with the great Gerard Haro at Studio La Buissonne.

“For me, this album is a musical narrative – a reflection of my journey from violinist to classical guitarist to jazz musician,” shares Muthspiel. “I invite listeners to join me on this sonic journey to experience the essence of my story translated into music.”

Etudes/Quietudes is released on CD and LP on Clap Your Hands (CYH) and is available on all major streaming platforms. In addition, the score with the 11 etudes can be purchased as a download or in the form of a printed music book that also includes the CD.

TRACKS
1. Etude Nr 1 (Tremolo) 3:01
2. Etude Nr. 4 (Pedal) 3:31
3. Triplet Droplet 1:18
4. Etude Nr. 5 (Chords) 1:31
5. Etude Nr. 6 (Triplets) 2:29
6. Etude Nr. 7 (Brahms Minor) 3:41
7. Etude Nr. 8 (Melting Chords) 3:12
8. Etude Nr. 9 (Schildlehen) 2:31
9. Etude Nr. 10 (Sixths) 2:23
10. Etude Nr. 11 (Vamp) 1:36
11. Etude Nr. 12 (Furtner) 3:15
12. Etude Nr 13 (Arpeggio) 1:35
13. Sarabande (Johann Sebastian Bach Lute Suite BWV 995) 1:43
14. Between Two Sarabandes 2:53
15. Sarabande (Reprise) 1:46
16. Abacus (Theme by Paul Motian) 3:02
17. For Bill Evans 3:43

CD AND DOWNLOAD AVAILABLE ON OCTOBER 18, 2024. (CYH0012).
WWW.CLAPYOURHANDS.CH

Live Recording at ORF RadioKulturhaus Vienna – “Ö1 Radiosession” Host: Helmut Jaspar / Sound: Martin Leitner
Mixed by Gérard de Haro at Studio La Buissonne

by Antje Huebner
Contemporary Classical

VALIS by Tod Machover Opera Review

VALIS by Tod Machover

Opera Review

By Dana Reason, Oregon State University & Paris Myers, MIT Media Lab 

The lights dim. Nothing. Then pink. Sophia, played by Kristin Young, a NY based lyric coloratura, emerges in a neon pink bodysuit. She paces what appears to be a cat walk; both aware of and unbothered by the audience’s presence. Subtly, one of the pianists, Emil Droga, beautifully shapes improvised, ambient atonal phrases–a teaser warm up of sonic whimsy. The opera has begun.
In composer Tod Machover’s 2023 production of VALIS, frequencies of sound and light are woven together with advanced, algorithmic instruments to investigate the multidimensional nature of one’s reality. The opera is an adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s 1981 science fiction classic, VALIS, which follows the life of Horselover Fat, a schizophrenic man whose existence becomes consumed by a beam of pink light so visceral and otherworldly it could only be generated by God.
The story of VALIS first captured Machover ‘s imagination in 1987, while working with famed IRCAM composer and conductor Pierre Boulez. Machover was commissioned to write the first iteration of his opera VALIS for the Pompidou Center. His avant-garde use of improvisation, novel technology, and popular music history throughout the score is a testament to the innovative voice of the composer. In its 2023 premiere, VALIS provocatively investigates asynchronous, simultaneous existences. With its integration of AI and interactive systems, you’d think it was constructed yesterday. Machover’s creation of VALIS 35 years ago is a testament to his visionary musical, multimodal approach.

There is no orchestral pit in Machover’s 2023 production – the musicians are integrated in the same plane on stage–perhaps a modernist reckoning. The ensemble consists of several instruments: synthesizers, percussion instruments, and piano.Physically, the stage is triangulated with musicians on the audience’s left, separated by a walkway pointing going towards the audience, with the actors and singers to the right. Screens of all eras and sizes checker the stage, coaxing the viewer’s attention to and from timelines. Live video feed toggles between real and filtered existence. Feeding and refeeding us images; viewer and viewed.

With multiple perspectives of sensorial intake possible at any time throughout the production, the composer (Machover) and director (Jay Scheib) simultaneously occupy alternate spaces: Machover conducting the work he composed, Scheib, performing live video of the work he directed. Scheib’s live video is supplemented by other cast members gingerly holding video cameras. Screens became a vessel for the audience to feel an interactivity with the actors–to feel embedded in the characters’ happenings.
The main character of Horselover Fat–Philip K. Dick’s alter-ego–is played by artist-vocalist Davóne Tines. Tines, who recently performed in various operas such as Anthony Davis’ X:The life and Times of Malcom X,  immediately reminds us of the power, deep sensitivity, and grit required to embody such a complex character–musically and psychologically.  Vocally, Tines’ range exquisitely captures fleeting moments of euphoria and prolonged emotional chaos through his classically operatic and refreshingly original style.
Visually and sonically, real time improvisation and reactions create a living pulse between the composition, the performers, and their working with live technologies. This immediacy of working with responsive technologies creates alternative senses of space-time, being and non-being, conscious and unconscious–real and imagined narratives.

New instruments are imagined and actualized real-time throughout the opera, demonstrating the next generation of co-composition between humans and intelligent musical machines.  “Mini’s Jar,” a hand-held prism-like jar is discretely covered with sensors that transmit the performer’s creative, human input to a custom musical A.I created by Manaswi Mishra. Max Addae performs on stage with his new instrument “VocalCords.” Real time, he shapes and expresses musical tension–emotional vocal textures are magically reimagined through A.I. powered instrumentation.

A wide sonic spectrum envelops the audience–from very high notes arced into emotional invocations and evocations to the expressionistic deep bass-baritone sound of David Cushing (Dr. Stone).  Timur  Bekbosunov, (as character Eric Lampton), shares an evocative duet with soprano Maggie Finnegan. Rose Hegele (as Gloria Double), pulls us into her character with luminescent expressivity and an earthiness. The percussionist, Maria Finkelmeier is central to the energy, and the thrusts of change that Machover’s music embodies. There is counterpoint, and polyphony throughout: lighting, screens, sounds, interactive sheets of sounds, sparseness, then density (the kind you feel from a romp with a Cecil Taylor big band) and variance (the feeling of a Yiddish folk song at one point, a throwback to big early synth pop-rock and blues inspired American music).

Machover conducts a row of synthesizers with no bodies playing them.  One hears large swaths and patches of synths (and string music, but no strings). Unisons between the ensemble and vocalists act as a poignant creation of melodic syntax. The listener sinks into the sound, and is nearly swept away as it passes through the body of the audience.

VALIS rewards curiosity. And it will move you. It understands our collective reckoning with transient and nebulous systems. Chaotic, multivariate systems. But it’s not chaos. It makes perfect sense. The physicality of sound, movement, melody, and attention are always centered and central. The audience is invited to enter a private space. A memory, a life lived, a sound. Participate in the sensorial feast however you so choose.
Review of Valis: MIT Theater Arts Performance Cambridge, MA Sept 8-10, 2023
Watch the Valis Trailer
Click the link to learn more about  Opera of the Future
by Dana Reason
Contemporary Classical

Untuxed, and Shostakovich, return to Seattle Symphony

Untuxed, a series of informal, intermission-less Friday-night concerts, returned to Seattle Symphony last night in the hands of its inaugurator, Ludovic Morlot, the Symphony’s former Music Director and current Conductor Emeritus. The program consisted solely of Shostakovich’s wartime Eighth Symphony (1943), a massive piece that can betray a deficient ensemble, with its multitude of lengthy and exposed solos for woodwinds, cello and violin (whose associations with death and funeral music in European are readily embraced by its composer), and by the perennial balance challenges posed by Shostakovich, whose legacy is littered with the corpses of performances that conveyed only two dynamic levels: with brass and without brass.


The Eighth is also a piece that has languished in the shadow of its neighbors, including the epic Fourth Symphony (banished before its premiere in 1936, and still unheard at the time the Eighth was composed, suggesting that Shostakovich might have intended the latter as a substitute for the former), the popular Fifth (whose first movement is echoed by its counterpart in the Eighth with its broad tempo and dotted rhythms that are interrupted midway through by a rough march), the Sixth (whose long, slow first movement is followed by two faster, shorter ones), and the martial Seventh and autobiographical Tenth. No. 8, in fact, had only been mounted once before by Seattle Symphony: in 1985 conducted by the composer’s son Maxim.

For all these reasons, Morlot’s selection of the Eighth to anchor the season’s first subscription week (whose full-length Thursday and Saturday concerts additionally featured Boulez and Ravel) was an audacious one, especially coming right after the ensemble’s summer layoff, and requiring part-time players to to cover the additional flute, bassoon and percussion parts plus a fortified complement of low strings).Happily, the musicians were more than ready for the task. The sparse audience attending the huge onstage forces experienced the full expressive and dynamic range set out by the composer, starting with the somber main theme of the opening Adagio, presented by the first violins with minimal vibrato in contrast to the lusher tone used for the more extroverted second theme. The piercing climax that came ten minutes later was the loudest unamplified sonority I can recall hearing at Benaroya Hall since Bluebeard’s Castle in 2012, and its subsidence into the prolonged English horn solo that concludes the movement was handled exquisitely by the Symphony’s longtime specialist Stefan Farkas (who received the first soloist’s bow afterwards).The mechanistic viola melody that launches the second of the work’s two scherzos is the one excerpt from the Eighth that regularly gets quoted in popular media—usually in connection with wartime Russia. Its rendition Friday night was aptly militant but not muddled. The clattering climax that concludes this movement was another high point, with the drums’ brutal at the forefront, but not enough to drown out the dotted figures in the remaining instruments, whose subsidence from fff to pp as the fourth movement’s passacaglia theme emerges was another transition whose dynamic subtlety is often lost in less careful hands.The success continued in the closing Allegretto, which requires virtuosity from many instruments (including the bass clarinet), plus enough interpretive restraint to convey the slightest touch of optimism at the work’s C major conclusion (Mariss Jansons calls it “a small light at the end of a very long tunnel” that’s possibly just an illusion).

Shostakovich has always been one of the 20th century’s most controversial and contradictory composers. Haunted by censorship and the threat of imprisonment (or worse), his music was championed by Britten and Bernstein, and praised by Rudolf Barshai for “leaving its blood on the stage”, but also dismissed as “bad Mahler” and “battleship grey” by Boulez and Robin Holloway. Whatever one’s feelings about it, though, it’s impossible to survey the landscape of late- and post-Soviet music—Schnittke, Silvestrov, Ustvolskaya, Pärt, Gubaidulina, etc.—without recognizing its inexorable connection to Shostakovich. Unlike Prokofiev, who was arguably a greater composer, but a historical dead-end who left no stylistic heirs, Shostakovich articulated a world view that managed to embody the experience and expression of multiple generations of Eastern European composers.

Seattle Symphony has had a long affinity for Shostakovich, extending back to Gerard Schwarz’s lengthy tenure as Music Director. The presence of several orchestra members who grew up in the Soviet Union surely helps as well. In that sense it’s fitting for his music to accompany the resumption of the Untuxed series following a 2½ year absence brought on by post-COVID consolidation and the executive turmoil that reached a head with the acrimonious departure of Thomas Dausgaard as Music Director in January 2022, leaving a gap that will finally be filled by Xian Zhang’s arrival in Fall 2024. It’s a testament to the caliber of its musicians and the leadership of its section principals that the artistic standards of the Symphony have remained so high despite the organization’s offstage issues.

by Michael Schell
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, File Under?

Brett Dean – Rooms of Elsinore (CD Review)

Brett Dean

Rooms of Elsinore

BIS CD

Jennifer France, soprano; Lotte Betts-Dean, mezzo-soprano

Volker Hemken, bass clarinet

James Crabb, accordion

Juho Pohjonen, piano

Andrey Lebedev, classical guitar

Swedish Chamber Orchestra

Brett Dean, violist and conductor

 

Composer and violist Brett Dean has spent a number of years engaging with Hamlet, creating a controversial, successful, and musically compelling eponymous opera premiered in the UK in 2017 and subsequently produced at the Metropolitan Opera. Rooms of Elsinore (BIS, 2024) collects pieces serving as character sketches written in advance of the opera, those recasting material from the opera that premiered concurrently or subsequent to its premiere, and new musical imaginings of Hamlet. It is fascinating to compare to the opera’s music, but one needn’t have heard it to find Rooms of Elsinore an engaging stand alone listen.

 

The vocal work And Once I Played Ophelia is sung by soprano Jennifer France, who is accompanied by the Swedish Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Dean. Its text is adapted from Shakespeare by Matthew Jocelyn, and it is a visceral piece cast in five movements. Interestingly, Jocelyn uses words that Ophelia says in the play and also lines directed at her (Hamlet’s “get thee to a nunnery”) The first section, marked “Fast, breathless,” is rife with stridency (a deliberate expression, not because France’s voice is anything but pliant) and intense, angular lines. “Hushed, distant, mysterious” begins with pianissimo utterances that indeed sound far off. Eventually, the singing moves closer in the soundstage, now lyrical yet enigmatic in expression. The third movement, marked “Fast, agitated,” uses the text “This is the ecstasy of love” as a recurrent motif that is elaborately described. France demonstrates adroitly rendered, ringing high notes alongside intimidating vocal fry. Dean employs brisk ostinatos with tritone weighted harmonies to add to the hysteria. It closes with a breathless recitative passage, as if all the energy has dissipated like the air from a balloon. The music moves attacca into the fourth section, “extremely still.” From questioning pianissimo to altissimo sustained notes, an entire range of expressive vocality is brought to bear in the “willow tree” text by France. The section concludes with a high register cello solo recasting some of the soprano’s music. The final section, “Slow austere,” begins by harmonizing the cello’s music with the string section, with clarion sostenuto lines followed by ones in supple decrescendo, employing the “Good night ladies … sweet ladies” text. The piece ends with a mysterious, thwarted gesture in the instruments. And Once I Played Ophelia … brings the listener straight into the soundworld of Dean’s Hamlet, and is superlatively performed by France and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra. 

 

Dean and pianist Juho Pohjonen play the duo The Rooms of Elsinore, each musically describing part of the castle. It begins with “I. The Dark Gate,” with descending scalar string lines set against sepulchral bass melodies in the piano. Gradually, the viola and piano crescendo and ascend together to their high registers. The viola then plays rhythmic lines against chordal sections in the piano, the stringed instrument bridging to the second movement with an altissimo ostinato. “II. The Four Gate Courtyard” continues the viola line alongside lush verticals from the piano amid tuplet flourishes. A gradual decrescendo closes the movement, only to be followed closely upon by “III. The Platform,” with a sliding tone abetted theme in the viola against repeated notes and arpeggiations, including a bass register flourish, in the piano. A pause is followed by the viola descending in sliding harmonics against low register punctuations in the piano. Open strings close the movement. “IV. The King’s Chamber” positively bustles with florid runs, pizzicato passages, ascending chromatic harmonies, and quick attacks. As the centerpiece of the piece’s seven-movement framework, it is the longest movement (4’02”), and also the most developmentally consistent, presenting as a rondo. Sustained viola with microtones and punctilious fragments from the piano are developed in “V. The Chapel,” while silences are interspersed by duo attacks in “VI. The Queen’s Chamber,” which part way through splits runs between them. The movement ends with repeated note passages and a chromatic viola melody contrasted with color chords in the piano. Rooms of Elsinore concludes with “VII. The Trumpeter’s Tower,” in which repeated bass notes in the piano are juxtaposed with high chords and a liquescent viola melody. A long decrescendo ensues, with high viola harmonics and a slowed-down set of piano harmonies.

 

Photo: Bettina Stoess

Gertrude Fragments is performed by mezzo-soprano Lotte Betts-Dean and classical guitarist Andrey Lebedev. “I cast thy knighted color off” begins the group with a wide-ranging, angular setting. Betts-Dean has a versatile instrument, with a strong lower register and blossoming high notes. The guitar part is well-crafted, with elements of lute songs alongside chromatic harmonies and modernist gestures, notably the acerbic attacks in the second song, “Wring from him my cause.” The texts are adaptations of statements by Hamlet’s mother, Gertrude. They are more aphoristic than the Ophelia texts, but still afford wide emotional range. The third song, “My too much changed son,” is melismatic, almost sobbing at its beginning before a sense of gravitas is regained. “How is’t with you?” is the shortest and sparest of the songs, almost a preparation for the concluding “If words be made of breath,” which includes plaintive sighs alongside glissandos. 

 

Bass clarinetist Volker Hemken performs Confessio, a ten minute long solo that references the entrance of Polonius. It is a technical tour-de-force, depicting the emotional tumult of the scene in lines throughout the compass of the instrument, special techniques, and a wide dynamic range. 

 

In the final piece, accordionist James Crabb is the soloist in the twenty-minute long concerto The Players. Material from the analogous scene in the opera included Crabb as part of the cast, playing alongside pantomiming actors. The concerto includes an introduction and closing material for Crabb added to musical material from the opera, deftly translated in its scoring for the ensemble. In the play/opera, Hamlet nearly loses control of his faculties, with manic explosions and a clear desire for revenge. The scene is depicted not only by the accordion, but taunting winds, bumptious percussion, and bitonal strings. 

 

The Players is an energetic closer for Rooms of Elsinore, an inspiring recording that suggests that Dean’s obsession with Hamlet may have room yet for more music about the dark prince of Denmark. If the works here are his last exploration of the play, Dean is still left with a tremendous legacy. One of my favorites recordings thus far in 2024.

 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, File Under?

Joël-François Durand – Geister (CD Review)

Joël-François Durand

Geister

Kairos Music

Olivia De Prato, violin; Victor Lowrie Tafoya, viola;

Constance Volk, flute; Szilárd Benes and Katherine Jimoh, clarinet

Mivos Quartet, Quatuor Bozzini

Ensemble Dal Niente, Michael Lewanski, conductor

 

On Geister, a double-CD release on Kairos, the music of Joël-François Durand receives benchmark performances by some of the best performers in contemporary classical music today. It features works from 2005-2022. Originally from France and currently based in the United States, Durand is Professor of Composition and Director of the School of Music at the University of Washington. 

 

Over the course of his career, Durand has increasingly used microtones in his works. Since 2019, he has added the technique “beating,” in which two pitches are placed very close together, creating strong fluctuations. Another signature aspect of his style is intricate development of linear material.

 

His First String Quartet (2005), played here with fastidious detail by the Mivos Quartet, predates this investigation, but its use of simultaneous pizzicato and arco attacks, microtonal duets, and altered bowing, makes for an intricate musical surface. Written in the same year is In the Mirror Land, a duet played by Constance Volk, flute, and Katherine Jimoh, clarinet. The technique of shadowing, with the clarinet slowly emerging from its overlapping into the background, is important to the piece. Then the duo supply heterophonic overdubs of strident lines. La descente de l’ange (2022), for violin and clarinet, played by violinist Olivia De Prato and clarinetist Szilárd Benes, addresses similar concerns, but with its own distinct formal trajectory. 

 

De Prato also provides a tour de force performance of the solo work In a Weightless Quiet (2020). At twelve minutes long, the intensity of the piece’s energy never flags.The use of open strings in the aforementioned beating technique appears at structural points in the piece. Then fortissimo fast repeated notes and bowed glissandos are juxtaposed against the beating, harmonics. and multi-stops. It finishes with altissimo secundal passages, double stops, and harmonics – a difficult piece delivered with élan.    

 

Ensemble dal Niente, conducted by Michael Lewanski, performs Mundus Imaginalis (2015),  the largest of the works programmed. Bass drum and a clattering metallic ostinato supply a syncopated groove. Lines overlap, at times contrapuntally, at others doubling to create reinforced textures. The tempo fluctuates, and semitones suggest cadences, only to be canceled swiftly by dissonant verticals. The incorporation of microtones intensifies as the piece progresses. Forte lower brass and chimes are added as it reaches its climax. Then a gradual denouement with a slowing of the percussive groove, chimes, colorful chords, repeated notes in the harp, and sustained wind solos that disassemble the opening material. Overtone verticals provide the piece with a stirring conclusion.

 

Geister, schwebende Geister … (2020) is a highlight. It also uses off-kilter percussion, corruscating melodic intervals, and open strings against small intervals to create beating and copious glissandos. Soloist Victor Lowrie Tafoya and Ensemble dal Niente, conducted by Lewaski, provide a fantastic performance that would serve as an excellent introduction for anyone curious about Durand’s music.

 

Cast in four movements, String Quartet No. 2 (2020), “Cantar de amigo,” played by Quatuor Bozzini, once again begins by bringing together previously mentioned techniques: the pulsation of tight beating intervals, sharp attacks, and bent sustained notes. Another texture prominent in the quartet is repeated notes set against glissandos. The tuning pitch, A = 440Hz., appears over and over, treated by all of the aforementioned techniques rather than settling into the in-tune version one would expect to hear before the beginning of an orchestra piece. The second movement begins to add harmonics above the A. The third movement puts hollow retorts of different notes below A, most relating to fifths above and below (E + D: other open strings found in the quartet in conventional tuning). The A bends this way and that, with microtonal glissandos distressing its centricity. With loud utterances, a high E starts to take prominence, only for A’s to cluster against it, and then low open strings weigh in as well. The only movement that begins attacca is the last, which at nine and a half minutes is of a significantly longer duration than those preceding. It begins once again with glissandos, but this time these start in the low strings, only gradually having all registers represented. In addition, some move in lower sliding figures, thus are higher up on the stringboard than the usual open sonorities. This creates a bit more of a covered sound. Midway through, octave A’s make a veritable cadence, only to be replaced by beating seconds in various registers. After a significant absence,  a dash of repeated notes enter. Overlapping glissandos create a swath of blurred sonorities that persists throughout the middle section of the movement. Multi-octave A’s continue to announce each sectional division. As the piece progresses, glissandos ascend and descend into overlapping, mutable pitch schemes. High B cancels the penultimate octaves, leading to a final section in which the glissandos first grow smaller, prevailingly microtonal, and then wend their way towards A played pianissimo and cut off abruptly. String Quartet No. 2 is a combination of centricity, ambiguity, and extended harmony: a fascinating and successful work played with riveting poise and superlative attention to the smallest details by Quatuor Bozzini.

 

Geister is a collection to which I plan to regularly return to listen. It is one of my favorite recordings of 2024.

 

Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey