Ojai

Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Ojai

At the 2018 Ojai Music Festival

June 7, the opening day of the 2018 Ojai Music Festival, featured the usual welcome variety of lectures, interviews and pop-up concerts as well as performances of music by two notable mid-20th century Italian experimentalists. The first day of the festival was picture perfect and a large crowd milled about the outdoor venues, meeting and greeting. There was little evidence of the disastrous Thomas Fire of five months prior, and spirits were as sunny as the weather.

At 6:00 PM, Luciano Berio’s challenging Sequenza IXa for Clarinet, played by Vincente Alberola, was heard from the Libbey Park gazebo, to good effect. The amplification and the open spaces were nicely matched and Alberola’s precise articulations and dynamic nuances were clearly heard throughout the scattered crowd. This sensitive and virtuosic performance was received with enthusiastic applause.

At 7:30 PM somewhat larger crowd gathered for La lontanaza nostalgica utopica futura by Luigi Nono featuring Festival Music Director Patricia Kopatchinskaja on violin and Los Angeles-based composer Scott Worthington at the controls of the electronics. The program notes proclaimed: “A dynamic duet between solo violin and spatial amplified sound transforms the Libbey Park into an all-encompassing and immersive aural environment.” A seemingly tall order, but the array of large speakers positioned around the space and the formidable sound system panel looked promising. La lontanaza nostalgica utopica futura consists of 8 recorded tracks and a solo violin, and these were seamlessly integrated into the speaker system so that good hearing in the open spaces of the park was not an issue.

The piece began with the speakers filling the space with the soft sounds of what seemed to be string players warming up or tuning. A few odd words were heard, then some thumps and squeaks before a series of rapidly complex runs in the violin established an air of suspense and uncertainty. The recorded sounds often came from single speakers in opposite corners of the space, and this added spatial perception to the overall experience. The crisp precision of the live violin phrases was helpfully distinct from the recording. There is little form or structure evident in this work – at times the sounds were fast and intense while at other times slower and softly atmospheric. The violinist moved randomly about to a series of music stands located throughout the area, and this served to increase the sense of mystery. The crowd followed Ms Kopatchinskaja in a great mass, cell cameras in hand, but this did not disturb the performer whose furtive movements added to the drama of the moment.

This is complex, nuanced music, with stretches of quiet tension mixed with sharply phrased passages brimming with anxiety. I first heard La lontanaza performed indoors, in a converted warehouse and the atmosphere there gave the piece a sense of tension that was distinctly urban. Outdoors in Libbey Park the music lost none of its power, but rather emerged as more rustic and primal. In Ojai, even the ambient noise from the streets and some quiet talking among the crowd fit right in with the recordings, and actually added to the performance. As the afternoon light faded, Ms Kopatchinskaja became a spirit-like presence moving among the darkened trees. A long, looped final violin note signaled the conclusion of the piece and the crowd slowly dissipated, as if released from a magical spell.

The Ojai Music Festival runs through Sunday, June 10.

Photos courtesy of Bonnie Wright. Used with permission.

by Paul Muller
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Los Angeles, Ojai

ICE at Ojai Music Festival

ICE1The International Contemporary Ensemble – ICE – was one of the featured groups performing at the 69th Ojai Music Festival. On Friday, June 12, 2013 ICE presented a varied concert of virtuosic pieces at the gazebo in the center of Libbey Park. A good-sized crowd turned out to hear the ICE artists play traditional acoustic instruments artfully combined with amplification and electronics.

 

 

Dan Lippel was first with Electric Counterpoint, a piece for guitar and tape by Steve Reich. The music was immediately recognizable as classic Reich and bubbled along with a satisfying groove. The playing by Dan Lippel here was seamless with the tape and the sound reinforcement system seemed to be up to the task of projecting out into the open spaces of the park. The recorded bass line was particularly effective when present and there was all the energy typical of the music of Reich. The piece unfolded in several sections that were variously festive or a bit more introspective, but all consistently active and upbeat. This was the perfect opening piece for the afternoon and the audience was visibly pleased.

This was followed by Jennifer Curtis and David Bowlin performing Apophthegms, a piece by John Zorn for two violins. This was very different and surprisingly complex music, with fast runs, flurries of pizzicato and unexpected changes in direction. Quiet passages followed loud sections, and fast, complex sections were followed by softer and more uniform stretches. Some of the quiet parts had a decidedly sinister feeling and a creaking sound from the violins added to the tension. The amplification, for the most part, worked in favor of the instruments although there were times when very soft segments were lost in the ambient noise of the park. As the piece concluded, a faster and more animated feeling took hold as the two violins weaved wonderfully bright and complex patterns that shimmered to the finish. Apophthegms is a virtuoso piece in every respect – from both a composing and performing standpoint.

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Rebekah Heller was next, playing Concatenation, for bassoon and electronics by Rand Steiger. This began with a low rumble of notes that seemed to be re-processed for echo and delay and then sent to the speakers – this nicely increased in density as the playing continued. The sounds soon came in rushes with great clouds of notes pouring out over the audience. There were also slower sections where the sustained bassoon tones and electronics gave a distant, lonely feel that contrasted well with the busier stretches. These sounds were pleasantly matched to the backdrop of oak trees and shrubs, perfectly at home in the woodsy surroundings. As bursts of notes echoed away, it was as if the music was receding back into a forest. The sound also seemed to move from left to right at times, giving a convincing sense of motion and movement. A low trill accompanied by some futuristic electronic sounds at the conclusion gave the impression of a flying saucer rising rapidly upward, taking off and leaving the earth behind. Rebekah Heller’s performance – played with out a score – was a triumph of energy and concentration and the audience responded with enthusiastic applause.

Nuiko Waddenh followed with Polvere et Ombra a piece for solo harp by Suzanne Farrin. This began with a series of rapid arpeggios, fast notes and a low strumming sound that gave a somewhat darker edge to the piece. There was a sense of rapid movement and velocity throughout and a series of sharp, furious chords that were expertly delivered. Towards the end the feel of the piece turned a bit lighter, but still mysterious, becoming very quiet at the finish. The amplification was both necessary and precisely applied to allow the naturally soft harp to be heard in the open spaces of the park.

San, by Du Yun, a piece for cello and electronics was next, and this was performed by Katinka Kleijn. Ms Kleijn took the stage clad completely in black and wearing a white mask. A large bass drum, equipped with a foot pedal, was situated next to her chair. The piece began with low, scratchy tones from the cello and several solid strikes on the bass drum gave this a very Asian feel. Some higher knocking sounds coming from the electronics – and the white mask worn by Ms. Kleijn – added a strong sense of ceremony and ritual to this. As the piece progressed there were complex, layered sections that alternated with slower and more somber stretches. There was a sense of struggle woven throughout and as the piece concluded the percussive sounds in the electronics and the striking of the bass drum conjured images of a violent battle. The complex playing, the combination of electronics, a bass drum and the wearing of the mask were all smoothly handled by Ms. Kleijn who delivered a spirited and drama-filled performance.

ICE2Next was a piece by Mario Diaz de Leon, Luciform, for flute and electronics. This was performed by Claire Chase and began with some light trills and rapid runs from the flute with a kind of low roar in the electronics that seemed to be moving slightly in pitch. This soon became very complex in the electronics with the flute supplying a series of fast repeating phrases. The pace slowed and the flute took up a low, dark melody while the deep roar returned to the electronics, producing an overall sense of menace. As the piece continued the electronics became very active and the volume increased, as if sending a warning. The tension increased in the somber flute, evoking a melancholy sense of pervasive alienation and the piece concluded with a frenetic finish. Luciform was another instructive example of how electronics and solo instruments can be artfully combined given good writing, playing and sound engineering.

The final work on the program was Rock Piece by Pauline Oliveros and this was performed by all the ICE musicians. They began in front of the audience, each with two smooth ocean rocks, striking them together more or less randomly. There is not supposed to be a common beat or volume in this – your brain actually works to find rhythms and counterpoint from the perceived sounds. As the players fanned out into the audience, the sounds of the striking lessened and became more diffuse. The players slowly returned back to their starting point and the sounds again became more distinct. The outdoor acoustics ultimately worked against the hearing of this and the one piece in the concert that was performed without electronics seemed to suffer the most.

This concert by ICE provided a lively and forward looking series of pieces that featured exceptional playing and impressive writing that skillfully combined the strengths of acoustic instruments and electronics.

Photos by Bonnie Wright (used with permission)

by Paul Muller
Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Festivals, Los Angeles, Microtonalism, Ojai, Premieres

Ojai Music Festival – Sila: The Breath of the World by John Luther Adams

Ojai100The 69th annual Ojai Music Festival featured the West Coast premiere of Sila: The Breath of the World by John Luther Adams, staged outdoors in Libby Park as a free community event. Performers from ICE, red fish blue fish and Cal Arts – some 80 musicians in all – were placed in selected positions in the center of the park and the audience was invited to move around and among them as the piece progressed.

Sila is an Inuit concept for the spirit that animates the world and marks the second outdoor piece by John Luther Adams at Libby Park. Inuksuit was performed here in 2012 under similar circumstances and was judged a great success. Sila is perhaps a more ambitious piece in that there are more players and a more diverse orchestration. Inuksuit is a dynamic percussion piece that was spread out over the entire park. Sila has strings, horns, woodwinds and voices organized into sections, all ringed by percussion stations. Sila probably occupied a bit less than half the area of the Inuksuit installation.

Sila is also a more delicate piece – its subject matter is intangible and highly spiritual. In a recent article by Tim Greiving the composer was quoted: “My image of the piece is really quite simple, It comes up, very slowly, out of the earth, out of these very low sounds — of bass drums and double basses and bassoons and tubas. And over the course of an hour or so, it just gradually rises up through this series of harmonic clouds and goes out and rises, and blows away in the wind.”

Sila opens with a great roll of the bass drums accompanied by sustained tones from the low brass. There is a primal, elemental feel to this that increased as the bass clarinet and oboe entered. The entrance of each section of instruments, in turn, contributed more sustained tones that gradually rose and fell in volume. The early parts of Sila were heard in the lower registers, but the sounds gradually rose in pitch over the course of the one hour performance. The musicians and singers slowly rotated as they played, adding a swirling effect to the texture.

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Microtones were notated in the score and the musicians were equipped with a cell phone app that helped to monitor the pitches and provide stopwatch time to mark the entrances of the various sections. There was no formal beat, but rather a series of long tones – always entering and fading – and producing a constantly changing color and texture to the sound. At times the ensemble sounded like a great sigh.

The crowd pressed in among the musicians and depending where one stood, there was a markedly different character to the listening experience. Standing near the woodwinds or voices, for example, one heard a lighter, ethereal sound while standing near the brass or percussion evoked a feeling of expansiveness and grandeur. Given its more diverse instrumentation, Sila is a much more position-sensitive experience than the percussion-driven Inuksuit.

About midway into the piece there were high trills on some of the xylophones while others were bowed and this produced a lovely mystical wash on top of the sustained pitches coming from the instruments. The soprano voices were also very effective when within earshot. The press of listeners as they moved among the players had a somewhat damping effect on the sound – especially among the higher woodwinds, strings and voices. The audience was quietly attentive and fully engaged for the entire hour. The piece gradually wound down in volume and in the final moments all that could be heard was the rushing sound of air coming from the instruments and voices. John Luther Adams was in attendance and acknowledged the sustained applause that followed.

Ojai300This performance of Sila was well matched to the Ojai Festival which, after all, is built on the idea of music outdoors. Much credit goes to the 80 musicians who had to bring off a subtle piece in the park setting and contend with microtones, stopwatches and the distractions of having their audience moving among them. The performance was successful, in part, because it involves the audience in a way that can’t be duplicated in the concert hall. Sila – and the other outdoor pieces by John Luther Adams – have added an important new dimension to the presentation of new music.

 

 

by Paul Muller
Brooklyn, Chamber Music, Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Los Angeles, Ojai, Opera, Premieres

2014 Ojai Music Festival – The Classical Style

ojai2014-12The 2014 Ojai Music Festival opened on Thursday June 12 to begin 4 days packed with informative talks, movie screenings, parties and concerts. The Festival’s Music Director this year is Jeremy Denk and the resident musical groups included The Knights orchestral collective and the Brooklyn Rider string quartet. Friday night’s concert was built around an examination of the Classical period and featured a Haydn string quartet as well as the world premiere of a new opera – “The Classical Style” – by Jeremy Denk and Steven Stucky that was commissioned by the festival for the occasion.

The concert began with Haydn’s String Quartet in G minor, Op. 74, No.3 (1793), performed by Brooklyn Rider. Right from the opening passages of the 1st movement the light, bouncy rhythms combine with the classical harmonies and familiar Haydn wit to produce a lively and optimistic feel. As the instruments took turns developing the theme there was a sense of increasing fussiness that added to the fun. The playing was light and precise, setting just the right mood for the evening.

The second movement was more stately and slower – almost hymn-like – but easy and flowing. This turned a bit darker towards the middle, but soon returned to the lighter feel of the opening, giving a sense of resolution. The ensemble playing was impressive here and the ornamentation in the upper parts nicely done.

ojai2014-3 The third movement, in the traditional triple meter, was faster and featured close harmony. The balance and dynamic control were outstanding and the bright feel reinforced the sense that this was music that does not take itself too seriously. The final movement was faster still and had a dramatic feel that turned brighter with a series of bouncing rhythms that suggested a sort of gallop, hence the nickname of this Haydn string quartet as the “Rider”. This work is typical Haydn – bright, optimistic and not too serious. The precise and agile playing by Brooklyn Rider caught the essence of this piece exactly and it was an ideal prelude to the opera that followed.

Not being able to make it to Ojai, I listened to the concert as it was streamed on the Internet. The quality, both audio and visual, was excellent and there were no drop-outs or interruptions of consequence. The seeing and hearing are much like being in one of the back rows of the Libbey Bowl and was actually an improvement over my usual seating out on the lawn.

The streaming provided another benefit – a televised interview of Steven Stucky during intermission by Fred Child of American Public Media. The subject of the interview was the music for The Classical Style: An Opera (of Sorts). This is a comedy based loosely on The Classical Style by the late Charles Rosen, a textbook first published in the early 1970s and widely influential in the field of musicology. The libretto, by Jeremy Denk, was taken in part from the Rosen book but the opera also includes the personalities of Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Robert Schuman, Charles Rosen, and characters like the Tonic Chord, Dominant Chord, Sub Dominant Chord and the Tristan Chord as well as a host of supporting characters. The plot revolves around Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven returning to earth to reclaim their musical relevance and to rescue the classical style from academic over-analysis by appealing to musicologist Rosen. There are also scenes involving the several musical chords in a bar, and other assorted comic vignettes and sketches derived from musical theory and history.

Apart from the varied collection of characters, one of the challenges Mr. Stucky pointed out was the need to write music in the classical style, using the sonata form where appropriate, or in the romantic style during the Tristan Chord scenes. Another challenge was that much of the comedy was based on knowing something about music theory, and this needed to be put across in a way that all audiences could enjoy. The character of Charles Rosen, a close personal friend of Jeremy Denk, was portrayed as something of a hero, bringing order to the comedic chaos around him, and this necessitated a more serious musical sensibility when he was on stage.  Steven Stucky, while confident and articulate, nevertheless betrayed the look of a man who had spent the last two years of his life on a large-scale work to be premiered on Friday the 13th. He needn’t have worried.

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by Paul Muller
Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Los Angeles, Ojai

More From The 2013 Ojai Music Festival

incThe 2013 Ojai Festival continued its look at American composers with a performance of Suite for Symphonic Strings by Lou Harrison on Saturday, June 8 in the Libbey Bowl. A 24-piece orchestra comprised of the Mark Morris Dance Group Music Ensemble and the American String Quartet filled the stage with a strong presence. Joshua Gersen conducted.

Suite for Symphonic Strings is an assemblage of pieces composed at various times in Harrison’s career, and is loosely based on allusions to the Greek gods. One of his most-performed pieces, Suite for Symphonic Strings reflects a diversity of influences. The dance-like first movement Estampe and the fourth, Ductia: In Honor of Eros, clearly betray the Asian influences that Harrison absorbed as a West Coast composer. Other sections, such as the second, Chorale: Et in Arcadio Ego provide a warm, open sound full of lush harmonies. Still others such as number five, Lament and nine, Nocturne are poignant and quiet while number three, Double Fugue: In Honor of Heracles, has a anxious edge. It is a piece that is rich with a variety of feelings and emotions and these were put across effectively by the string orchestra.

During some of the quieter moments in the piece the inevitable outside noises of kids playing in the park, or the band playing in a nearby bar could be heard, but these did not detract decisively from a fine performance of Harrison’s lovely music.

After a short intermission For Lou Harrison by John Luther Adams was performed by the same string ensemble, but this quickly became problematic. Full disclosure – I am a big fan of this piece and was excited when it was programmed for this year’s festival. This performance, however, suffered from too much sound coming from the big orchestra. The beginning arpeggios washed over the listeners like a tidal wave and became relentless as the piece progressed.

The notes and tempo were correct – and what I heard certainly resembled the piece I love – but too much of the intimacy and sweetness of the piece was lost in the translation to larger musical forces.  It seemed to work best when at the lower dynamic levels and there were occasional flashes of the beauty that this piece contains. But much like the sacred music of Bach, For Lou Harrison is too much the chamber piece to be scaled up to the level we heard in this performance.  Additionally, the outdoor venue became quite chilly in the late evening after a long day of warm temperatures and this didn’t help the concentration of the listeners or the conditions for the musicians. The length of the piece, with all the players playing most of the time, eventually became wearing and the audience was visibly restless as the final chords sounded.

songbirds1 A much more satisfactory outcome was heard the following morning with the performance of songbirdsongs, another outdoor piece by John Luther Adams. The venue this time was Meditation Mount, a local Ojai landmark about 5 miles out of town. The location was high along a narrow winding road and buses were required to take the listeners up to a small promontory that overlooks the Ojai Valley. About 200 early-risers packed themselves into a performance space just a few dozen yards across. Red fish blue fish and two brave piccolo players formed the smallish ensemble. Percussion stations were scattered around the area and the players moved about as necessary for each section.

Written over several years (1974-79 and revised in 2006) and as the title indicates, songbirdsongs is a series of musical realizations of bird calls. As the program notes describe, the players are to “play with the free intonation and inflection of bird songs, not in exact temperament. Time should also be free and fluid…”

The nine sections of the piece are titled after the names or characteristics of various birds and evoke a wide variety of natural sounds. The piece proceeds with a back and forth calling of rapid, bird-like phrases between the piccolos. Other percussion pieces join in, generally at a low dynamic, and convincingly portray the familiar landmarks of a woodland or meadow. The music and the surroundings actually seem to merge together in the mind of the listener.

There are regular pauses in each section – and with the audience sitting stone silent – the natural sounds of the environment became part of the performance. This was remarkably effective – as a city fellow I don’t pay much  attention to the sounds of nature – but during the pauses in this piece I suddenly become aware of all of the birds in the surrounding trees calling back and forth. I am no naturalist but it seemed to me that some of the local birds were actually answering the piccolo calls. I talked later to one of the piccolo players who said that a bird swooped down and buzzed by her head during one passage.

The integration between performance and nature was virtually seamless and the audience agreed that this was an experience far beyond that found in the average concert hall. Music, intention and venue met successfully in this performance of songbirdsongs and it makes a powerful case for the direction John Luther Adams has taken with his art.

More information about the 2013 Ojai Festival is here.

by Paul Muller
Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Los Angeles, Ojai

John Luther Adams at the Ojai Music Festival

jla1The 2013 Ojai Music Festival began this week under the artistic direction of choreographer Mark Morris. The festival will focus on American composers including Charles Ives, Henry Cowell, John Cage, Lou Harrison, John Luther Adams and Terry Riley. Two pieces – Strange and Sacred Noise as well as songbirdsongs by John Luther Adams – were scheduled for outdoor performance in rural venues.

The first of these performances, Strange and Sacred Noise (1997) was sited on a knoll in Upper Ojai  that is part of a local country school about 10 miles out of town. The 8:00 AM concert time found the musicians and about 150 listeners wrapped in an early morning mist. The percussion ensemble red fish blue fish had set up several stations around the top of the hill and the players and audience were free to move about as the piece progressed. Folks sat on blankets or brought a chair, but most stood and watched, moving as necessary to hear each section.

The beginning of the performance was announced by a sharp field drum roll and a series of characteristic rhythms that comprise …dust into dust…, the first section of  Strange and Sacred Noise. The early morning stillness made for good listening in the open air, and a series of soft snare drum rolls that alternated in dynamics were clearly heard and very effective. Despite the unusual venue and informal atmosphere the audience was attentive; a series of pauses in this section would briefly restore the early morning quiet and this seemed to engage the listeners even more.

The second section, solitary and time-breaking waves, was played on a four tam-tams placed about 50 feet apart. A series of rolling crescendos rumbled through each register adding to the mystical atmosphere of the morning mist. The shimmering sense of waves and swift river currents invoked by this section reminded me of parts of Inuksuit, another JL Adams piece performed at Ojai last year. Inuksuit is on a much larger scale and was performed with several hundred in attendance outdoors at Libby Park and the audience reaction then was to watch and listen and to wander among the players while talking or calling on cell phones. For Strange and Sacred Noise, however, the audience was silent – as if in a concert hall. In both cases the audience reaction seemed appropriate and the staging of outdoor performances continues to be a good way to help people connect with new music.

The third section of Strange and Sacred Noise begins with a powerful roll of bass drums that vary in dynamics as higher register tom toms vary in tempo. Titled volocities crossing in phase-space this provides a muscular contrast to the previous section. The cross currents developed by the rhythmic interplay between the drum sets make for an interesting listen. The fourth section – triadic iteration lattices – consists of four differently pitched hand cranked air-raid sirens that are started at different time intervals. The sound of four sirens screaming out into the pastoral landscape was strikingly surreal, and the inclusion of these sounds in an outdoor percussion piece designated for a rural setting seems unusual. The rising and falling of four continuously changing pitches made for some unusual sonic combinations as this section progressed, however, and the fun of it is too much to resist.Sections 5 through 8 of this work are titled clusters on a quadrilateral grid and are performed on various marimbas, vibraphones and xylophones. The first part on marimbas is very quiet – a ten second pause by the players and then a switch of harmonies add to the mystery. The next part on xylophones is strident and dissonant and makes a fine contrast. After that a switch to bell-like registers form a lighter, faster texture and finally there is a return to the marimbas – a sort of da capo – completing section 8.

JLA2 The ninth and last section of Strange and Sacred Noise – titled … and dust rising… – is a return to the original field drum set that opened the piece. By now the haze had burned off revealing the mountains that surround the knoll and the soft snare rolls and louder rhythms recalled the opening section but in a changed environment.

Strange and Sacred Noise is one of the earlier pieces by John Luther Adams that explore the sense of place and its connection to the  environment. The little knoll in Upper Ojai was a fine venue and seemed well suited to the occasion.

Later that morning in the Libby Bowl Terry Riley’s In C was performed by 26 musicians including percussion by members of red fish blue fish. The sound system was in good form and those of us on the lawn could hear the precise rhythms and tight ensemble that was playing on the stage. To my ear there was a solid bass line and this gave the piece a sense of reserve and formality. But what it may have lacked in exuberance was more than offset by a consistently good reading as the piece progressed. Pronounced dynamic changes from time to time gave the texture some relief and the audience was for the most part engaged with a groove that was carefully sustained for the entire 65 minutes. At one point – about 36 minutes in – the combination of basses and voices was reminiscent of Wagner. At 49 minutes that same combination produced a definite sense of the majestic. Not what I expected but a very fine reading throughout.

This was a solid performance of In C and if recorded might make a good addition to the history of Terry Riley’s classic of minimalism. More information about the Ojai Music Festival can be found here.

by Paul Muller
Concert review, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, Festivals, Ojai, Percussion, Photos, Post Modern, Premieres

The West Coast premiere of Inuksuit at the 2012 Ojai Music Festival

Musicians on the outskirts of Libbey Park performing Inuksuit (note the percussionist playing water gong in the upper left hand corner)

They say a picture is worth a 1000 words, so consider this photo album a 26,000 word review until I file my story. Inuksuit was one of the most extraordinary pieces of music I’ve heard since–well, John Luther Adams’ orchestra and tape work, Dark Waves. (On Sunday, we’ll hear JLA’s two-piano version of Dark Waves.)

Do read Paul Muller’s account of this concert and Thursday evening’s concert.

To give you some idea of what the performance was like, here are some crude videos I made on my not-designed-for-filming camera. The mike on the camera did a reasonable job of capturing the changes in sound as you moved from one spot to another, as I did throughout the performance.

If you’re reading this before or around 11 a.m. PST June 9, hop on over to the live stream from Ojai to watch/hear Marc Andre Hamelin, Christianne Stotijn, and Martin Frost perform Alban Berg, as well as an orchestral work by Eivind Buene. Watch it here.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y900SzB2UMM&feature=channel&list=UL[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgnWNqAoy9Q&feature=bf_next&list=ULy900SzB2UMM[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qz6YH7z33So&feature=bf_next&list=ULPgnWNqAoy9Q[/youtube]

 

by Christian Hertzog
Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, Ojai

Ojai-oh!

Kicking off in just a matter of hours, this year’s Ojai Music Festival has a schedule sure to make a number of East-Coasties feel they picked the wrong ocean to live by.

This year features a multi-part symposium, starting at 3:30pm this (10 June) afternoon with “The 21st Century Musician“. Ara Guzelimian will lead a panel of diverse and creative musicians in exploring questions such as “Where is the music industry heading?” “What are the changing roles of musicians?” “What are the opportunities?” “What are the challenges?”… Panelists will include violinist and 2009 Ojai artist Carla Kihlstedt, LA Chamber Orchestra concertmistress and prominent LA musician Margaret Batjer, plus members of the Ensemble Modern. Then at 8pm’s main concert, members of Ensemble Modern, George Benjamin conducting,  joined by Hilary Summers (mezzo soprano) and Hermann Kretzschmer (piano) to take on works by Saed Haddad, Steve Potter, Elliott Carter and Arnold Schoenberg.

Friday (11 June) picks up at 11am with two more symposia: the first a conversation with George Benjamin, followed by this year’s centerpiece: discussions and concerts on Frank Zappa, the man and his music. Ara Guzelimian will be joined by Frank’s widow Gail Zappa, as well as Ian Underwood, Steve Vai, Todd Yvega and Dietmar Wiesner. All that leads to the 8pm all-Zappa concert (with of course a couple Varèse pieces parked in the middle): Music from Greggery Peccary & Other Persuasions and Works from The Yellow Shark — 14 works in all, performed by the Ensemble Modern, Brad Lubman conducting.

But wait! You really need to wake up early on Saturday (12 June), to head back at 11am and hear pianist Eric Huebner play Olivier Messiaen‘s Vingt Regards sur l’Enfant Jésus in its entirety. Then you can relax again until the evening concert, a double bill featuring George Benjamin‘s Into the Little Hill and Igor Stravinsky‘s L’Histoire du Soldat Suite.  Once again George Benjamin will be at the helm of the Ensemble Modern,  and Hilary Summers will be joined by Anu Komsi, soprano.

Sunday morning (13 June) takes a slightly different turn at 11am, as the group Wildcat Viols present Henry Purcell‘s Fantazias for three and four viols, followed by Aashish Khan (sarod), Javad Ali Butah (tabla) and John Stephens (tanpura) offering North Indian classical morning ragas. The big finale at 8pm brings most of our major players back on stage for what sounds like a stunning concert: Pierre Boulez‘s Memoriale, Benjamin‘s Viola, Viola, Oliver Knussen‘s Songs for Sue, Benjamin‘s At First Light, Gyorgy Ligeti‘s Chamber Concerto, and Olivier Messiaen‘s Oiseaux Exotiques.

The L.A. Weekly interviewed George Benjamin about the festival, and you can read all about it here.

by Steve Layton