Year: 2022

Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Los Angeles, Piano

New Universes: George Crumb’s Makrokosmos at 50

On March 15, 2022 Brightwork Newmusic and Tuesdays at Monk Space presented New Universes: George Crumb’s Makrokosmos at 50. The concert, featuring pianist Nic Gerpe, consisted of the first volume of zodiac music by George Crumb as well as twelve new pieces inspired by Makrokosmos . These made up the movements of The Makrokosmos 50 Project, the second work on the concert program and a Los Angeles premiere. George Crumb was born in 1929 and, after a long and creative life, passed away suddenly on February 6. This concert, planned earlier in the year, unexpectedly became a commemoration for George Crumb as well as the performance of one of his more popular works.

George Crumb was one of the most influential composers of late 20th century, winning the Pulitzer Prize for music in 1968. Makrokosmos Volume I, written in 1972, dates from what was a very fertile and artistically productive period in the composer’s career. His use of amplified piano, along with extended techniques and graphical scores, expanded the possibilities of piano music to new horizons. Crumb once noted that with Makrokosmos he intended to write “an all-inclusive technical work for piano ([using] all conceivable techniques).”

Makrokosmos, Volume I is subtitled Twelve Fantasy-Pieces after the Zodiac for Amplified Piano. There is about an hour of music in total, organized into three sections, each with four separate pieces. Each piece also has its own title, and while the work is based loosely on the signs of the zodiac, there is no attempt to characterize them with a personality. The pieces are given titles such as “Night-Spell”, “Primeval Sounds”, “Music for Shadows”, etc and are generally dark and otherworldly, as is the music. During this concert the sound of the piano almost always defied the listener’s preconceived expectations. The amplification and close acoustic of Monk Space made it seem as if one were inside the piano rather than out in the audience.

Pianist Nic Gerpe was certainly kept busy during the performance. Only occasionally were the sounds initiated conventionally from the keyboard and these were generally spare melodies of solitary notes or short, simple phrases. In some ways this trang casino trực tuyến work resembles the prepared piano music of John Cage, but instead of the strings being populated with various bits of hardware, the pianist must lean in to provide the external stimulus. Most of the time Gerpe had his hand inside the piano plucking, strumming or pounding on the strings even as he was also called upon to chant, whistle or sing miscellaneous phrases during the various sections. All of this was done with an amazing smoothness and economy of motion – there were no awkward pauses or sudden gestures as the music flowed forward. It is striking how differently the piano sounds in Makrokosmos, yet Gerpe was completely at home during the entire performance.

After an intermission, Gerpe performed the second work on the program, the Los Angeles premiere of The Makrokosmos 50 Project. This was twelve new pieces, each inspired by the original George Crumb work with twelve individual composers having created short piano pieces based on one of the zodiac signs. In some ways this was similar to a concert given by Synchromy in January where Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Tierkreis zodiac was presented along with twelve new pieces from contemporary composers based on the original. A small instrumental ensemble was used for the Stockhausen concert and the new pieces displayed a wide variety and independence from the style of the original.

Makrokosmos 50, however, was entirely piano music and held closely to Crumb’s vision of a piece consisting mainly of extended techniques. Each of the new pieces generally began with some integral component of the associated section of the Crumb zodiac: perhaps an opening chord or tone cluster, a direct quote, part of a phrase or fragment of a melody. Two of the composers actually submitted graphical scores and all made effective use of the many specialized sounds heard in the original Makrokosmos. The Crumb vocabulary for the amplified piano is highly original and yet was easily absorbed by each of the contributing composers: Juhi Bansal, Viet Cuong, Eric Guinivan, Julie Herndon, Vera Ivanova, Gilda Lyons, Alex Miller, Fernanda Aoki Navarro, Thomas Osborne, Timothy Peterson, and Gernot Wolfgang. The twelve new pieces convincingly evoked the powerful style of the original and served to illustrate why George Crumb is such a significant influence on contemporary composition.

There was an unusual incident during “Ghost of Manticore”, composed by Nic Gerpe, the fifth piece of this second half. The hall seemed to shake as fierce sounds poured from the piano like a volcanic eruption. It was as if the dark powers ,so prominent throughout the Crumb original, were being summoned by the pianist all at once. As the volume crested to its ultimate intensity, an alarm in the back of the hall went off and wailed continuously. The sounds mixed with the tones in the piano strings for a few moments until the performance was suspended and the alarm eventually silenced. It was probably just an old smoke alarm or motion detector that was overwhelmed by the sound pressure, but I prefer to believe it was George Crumb signaling his approval and wanting to join in. The Makrokosmos 50 Project was instructive listening as well as a fine tribute to an immensely influential composer.

by Paul Muller
CD Review, Contemporary Classical

Molly Pease – Inner Astronomy

Inner Astronomy is an album of new vocal music from 4Tay Records and composer Molly Pease. Inspired by the poetry of the late Randall Pease, Inner Astronomy is structured as a cantata with exquisite singing and a superbly understated accompaniment from a small string ensemble. The music on the album reflects “ ..the poet’s search for strength and meaning through spare and metaphorical language…” and incorporates a number of experimental techniques. The result a testament to the emotional power of vocal music when guided by a spiritual theme.

The poetry of Randall Pease reflects the struggle of the poet with addiction, recovery, dementia, and cancer. But it contains, at the same time, vivid imagery and instances of hope and joy within its economical framework. Here is a fragment from the first track, Recovery Family:

Our love
Above
lip buds bloom as if they’re moons
Spirits starring, still eyes shining
To pass to others
As if one mother

The music for this is similarly concise, starting with a single vocal tone, whose pitch bends as it is sustained. The strings enter quietly underneath with a series of active phrases that contrast effectively with the smoothly expressive vocal line. The text is delivered calmly and deliberately as the strings, never dominating, add an undercurrent of uncertainty. This compact architecture is perfectly aligned with the feelings and sensibilities inherent in the poetry.

The other pieces on the album proceed in similar fashion – the vocals are always in the foreground with the string ensemble offering a subdued counter commentary. The overall sound is always under control and seldom includes any technical fireworks. Most of the tracks are short – less than eight minutes – but the emotional impact, rich details and technical precision are more than sufficient to fully engage the listener.

Track 5 is Higher Power and this piece combines three treble voices in close harmony along with the strings in a beautiful mix of interlacing parts and textures. The feeling is warm and expressive and the instrumental accompaniment is reminiscent of John Luther Adams’ string quartet music. The vocals enter again, building to a high dynamic peak, then subsiding back to the slow, lush sounds of the opening. The music reinforces the organically peaceful spirit of the text:

Green shadows
guide the way off
through tunnel trees
toward the sea
above.

While just a short piece, deer proud of our climbs extends the artistic horizons with three voices curling in and around each other with masterful harmony and a beautifully balanced vocal technique. Tree’s Me is another short piece that mixes a light violin pizzicato with whispering wind and voice reciting the text. Two singing vocals enter and are heard mingling with the words in a lovely harmony of sustained tones. In general, when multiple voices are heard in any of the pieces in this album, the singing is precise, the tones are pure and the balance with the accompaniment is extraordinary. Inner Astronomy is compelling vocal music.

The sound engineering, mixing and mastering by Umberto Belfiore deserves special mention. All the pieces were performed live in the sanctuary of First Congregational Church, Los Angeles but the result is as precise as any studio recording and every subtle detail is clearly heard.

The poetry and music of Inner Astronomy brings us face to face with our inevitable human anxieties, even as its graceful elegance bequeaths to us a quiet confidence.


The personnel on Inner Astronomy are:
Poetry by Randall Pease
Molly Pease, Kathryn Shuman, Sharon Chohi Kim and Lauren Davis, vocals
Rachel Iba, Nigel Deane, violin
Patrick Benkhe, viola
Tal Katz, cello
Miller Wrenn, bass
Fahad Siadat, conductor


The Inner Astronomy CD is available at Amazon Music. The CD and digital downloads are also available at Bandcamp. A book of poetry by Randall Pease and the published score are available at See-A-Dot Music Publishing.



by Paul Muller
CD Review, Contemporary Classical

Tasha Smith Godinez – Metamorphoses

Centaur Records has recently released Metamorphoses, a new CD of harp music by Tasha Smith Godinez. The album features six new works by five different contemporary composers who are friends and colleagues of Ms. Godinez. The result is an engaging variety of new music carefully crafted and brilliantly performed.

The opening piece on the album is Hidden, by Sidney Marquez Boquiren. This is intended as a social commentary on the current US immigration situation and was also inspired musically by another work for harp, Pièce Symphonique, by Henriette Reniè. Hidden opens with a strong chord by the harp rising from the lower registers marked by an unsettling, scrambled rhythm. There is a strong sense of the unseen and the mysterious. Clear notes and elegant arpeggios are heard that offer a vision of purity and order, but the rougher sounds invariably follow. At times the harp is strummed in the manner of a guitar, evoking the music of distant Mexico.

The variety of of sounds in this piece are impressive, with plucked harp notes heard as clearly as from a piano keyboard. The arpeggios are smooth and nicely shaped and the playing artfully sustains a sense of hidden uncertainty over long passages. The mix of standard intonation and extended techniques is masterfully applied throughout. Towards finish the tempo and dynamics build, increasing the tension between the clean notes and scratchy sounds. As the music softly fades away, the listener is left reflecting on the absence of justice and compassion. Hidden powerfully articulates the emotional conflict between the unseen world of the undocumented immigrant and the promise of a brighter future that is kept just out of reach.

Obsessive Imagery, by Michael Vincent Waller is next and the liner notes explain that his “…music can be described as lyrical and introspective, drawing inspiration from impressionism, post-minimalism and world music.“ All of these elements are present, beginning with a quiet opening arpeggio that is soon accompanied by an expressive counterpoint in the higher registers. As the piece proceeds the notes become ever more active, like the patter of a gentle summer rain. A simple piece that is gracefully beautiful and elegantly played, Obsessive Imagery manages to be both lyrical and introspective simultaneously in a way that adds to its appeal.

Track 3 is Born on a Wednesday by José Gurría-Cárdenas. Although this track is less than four minutes in length it features a strong pulse and a wide variety of playing styles. The piece works as a metaphor of the emotional oscillations of teen age youth, as based on memories by the composer of his son. The strumming here resembles a guitar as much as a harp and the piece swings between a heady optimism and brooding concern, never sure where it wants to land. There are lovely lyrical stretches and these are balanced by somewhat darker sections heard in the lower registers. About halfway through, the tempo slows to a more languid and gentle feel, brightening in the higher registers and returning to the strong beat of the opening just before it concludes. Born on a Wednesday is a nostalgic reminiscence of sunny youth, artfully performed.

Diomedea, for Harp and Khaen, by Christopher Adler follows, inspired by the great albatross sea bird species of that name. The khaen is a bamboo reed mouth organ associated with Southeast Asia that somehow sounds like a subdued brass section in the soft chords of the opening. The harp melody rides atop this accompaniment, much like a wandering albatross might glide along on the winds above the ocean waves. There is a wide and somewhat lonely feeling in this piece that evokes the long migratory flights of the diomedea across the vast and empty Pacific. The reedy sounds of the khaen nicely compliment the often dazzling notes coming from the harp. There are occasional syncopated lines from both instruments playing against each other, and this produces some interesting textures. A slower tempo towards the finish is heard with spare, melancholy notes in the harp – a bluesy feel that completes the piece. Diomedea is a fine tribute to a little known but impressive sea bird and its peripatetic seagoing lifestyle.

Track 5 is Mobile Active Simulated Humanoids, by José Gurría-Cárdenas, who “…takes into consideration how we as a society become disenfranchised, isolated and hopeless.” Soft plinking in the upper register of the harp opens this piece, accompanied by a stream of ominous underlying eighth notes below. A modest groove develops from this that soon morphs into a series of fragmented passages freighted with a feeling of alienation. The tension is sustained by the precise technical playing and contrasting emotions. The intonation is always clean and the notes crisply heard.

There is movement and direction in this music but it is also full of quiet desperation, with patterns that recur without any sense of resolution. Mobile Active Simulated Humanoids embodies the futility of an act of repetition that never improves its outcome and makes a gentle, yet powerful commentary on how we are continuously conditioned by society for conformity.

The final track of the album is Transfigured Verse, for Harp with Computer-generated Sound, by Jon Forshee, a piece inspired by an Old Testament story of David and a verse from Psalm 57. 1 Samuel 16 relates the story of how God, having rejected Saul as King of Israel, sends Samuel as his prophet to anoint the young David as the new King. An evil spirit sent by the Lord torments Saul, whose councilors observe: “See now, an evil spirit from God is tormenting you. Command the servants who attend you to look for someone who is skillful in playing the lyre; and when the evil spirit from God is upon you, he will play it, and you will feel better.” After some searching, David arrives with a lyre and his playing pleases Saul who takes him into royal service. Psalm 57:8, attributed to David, rejoices in the musical power of the lyre.

Awake, my soul!
Awake, O harp and lyre!
I will awake the dawn

The opening of Transfigured Verse is mysterious, quiet and introspective with a slight tension that builds from a high electronic sound. The playing starts out slow but the tension gradually increases as the harp and electronics contrast, perhaps recreating the mental distress that Saul may have felt. The electronics drone along in the background, never dominating, but delivering a relentless sense of oppression. The harp notes and chords gradually become more active, generating a restorative vigor that infuses the overall sound. Towards the finish the tempo slows and the harp notes are spaced out between silences and scattered electronic blips. The final feeling is one of relief so that Transfigured Verse softly and artfully brings out the healing powers of the harp.

The harp is known to most listeners from a few predictable solos in an orchestral context. In Metamorphoses, Tasha Smith Godinez continues to expand the vocabulary of the harp by exploring new horizons in contemporary music.

Metamorphoses is available from Amazon Music.

by Paul Muller
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, File Under?

A Pandemic Recording from Sasha Cooke (CD Review)

how do I find you?

Sasha Cooke, mezzo-soprano, Kirill Kuzmin, piano

Pentatone CD

 

Mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke and collaborative pianist Kirill Kuzmin supply an entry in the “pandemic recording” subgenre, how do I find you?, named after the title piece by Caroline Shaw. Cooke performs a great deal of contemporary repertoire, creating roles in operas and premiering art songs by composers including William Bolcom, Nico Muhly (Marnie at the English National Opera), and Joby Talbot. Apart from a selection by Muhly, all of the songs on the release are with new collaborators, composers in the under-fifty age bracket. Written in 2020, the songs are inspired by topics from that fraught year of pestilence, protests, and political rancor. 

 

The first two songs on the album, Shaw’s and Kamala Sankaram’s,  are particularly well written and moving. Here, as elsewhere, Cooke sings with great beauty, deploying a richly hued voice with impressive diction and expressivity. Shaw focuses on the ability of natural beauty to provide succor, those distanced walks so many treasured as a respite from lockdown. Sandaram’s “Listen” is a moving and harmonically rich musical tribute to George Floyd, with an eloquent poem written by Mark Campbell, one that could be classical music’s equivalent of “Strange Fruit.” Elsewhere, Missy Mazzoli’s “Self-Portrait with Disheveled Hair,” with words by opera librettist Royce Vavrek, is an aria in its own right, inspired by Rembrandt’s painting and bifurcated into a soaring recitative and post-minimal main section. One could easily imagine her writing a role for Cooke; has Mazzoli’s Met debut been cast yet?

 

Nico Muhly knows Cooke’s voice well, and deploys it in the touching and delicate “Intimate Things.” Hilary Purrington counts on Cooke’s legato control and brings a mix of added note chords and chiming interjections to “That Night’s” fetching accompaniment, creating a piece that resembles a musical theater scene, albeit with no belting required. Gabriel Kahane writes both music and lyrics for “The Hazelnut Tree,” a touching song about fear of global warming and the gloom of the daily news being soothed by a beautiful scene in the backyard. Timo Andres provides some of the highest notes on the recording for Cooke to sing to a jaunty accompaniment. Her control and Kuzmin’s incisive playing are both impressive.

 

“After the Fires,” referencing the California wildfires, by Lembit Beecher, uses expressive vocal devices, such as melisma, to create a keening and harrowing ode to senseless destruction. The plight of immigrant detainees is encountered in Huang Ruo’s “The Work of Angels,” a setting of a 1978 poem about the imprisonment of Chinese emigres under the 1882 Exclusion Act. At nearly eight minutes, it is a powerful depiction of squalid conditions and suicide, decrying past and present US immigration policies. 

 

Andrew Marshall acknowledges the challenges of remote learning with a charming cabaret song, “(A Bad Case of) Kids.” Rene Orth’s “Dear Colleagues” also affords Cooke the opportunity to tear into an angst-filled scene. Chris Cerrone’s “Everything will Be Okay” is an understated setting depicting anxiety, in this case lost then found cash in a hotel. 

 

It is hard to know how long audiences will want to hear pandemic year music. Perhaps, rather sooner than one expects, it will become something left behind, as are (in some cases regrettably) many of the pieces dedicated to 9/11. Cooke and Kuzmin are to be commended for presenting every song in a strong performance with equally fervent commitment, creating a musical time capsule that is an evocative summary of the challenges facing many during painful pandemic days. If there is an album depicting 2020 to which I wish to return, this is it. 

 

-Christian Carey 

 

by Christian Carey
CD Review, Experimental Music, File Under?

“Wind Bells Falls,” Robbie Lee and Lea Bertucci (CD Review)

Wind Bells Falls

Robbie Lee and Lea Bertucci

Telegraph Harp

 

“Glitter and Gleam,” the leadoff single for Robbie Lee and Lea Bertucci’s collaboration Wind Bells Falls immediately brings you into the altered domain of their engaging approach to sound art. An essay for warped celeste, it provides a sense of musique concrète while also exploring a playful sensibility. Bell-like timbres ricochet throughout the soundfield, supplying exactly what the title suggests. 

 

Throughout the nine pieces on the recording, the duo deploys winds, keyboards, and tape machines. Their specialties include using acoustic instruments in unconventional ways and distressing tape to make it sound synthetic. “Image Mirror” features wild flute overdubs, once again kaleidoscopically transformed. They sound like the wailing riff from an Arkestra member’s free jazz solo chasing itself around the room. 

 

It is striking how willing the artists are to restrict their palette to a limited and distinctive set of sounds for each track. On “Bags, Boxes, and Bubbles,” chiming chords are set against glissandos in a reiterative dialogue. Via an excellent segue, this morphs into duets of slides and trills on “Division Music.”

 

The duo stretch out on “Azimuth,” retaining small collections of sounds for discrete sections but gradually morphing between them through a process of addition and subtraction of new timbres and motifs. Baying shards gradually build into a registrally delineated rhythmic canon, a venerable composition device redeployed in this experimental context. The album closes with a delicate miniature, “Somebody Dream,” in which chimes and delicate cooing afford a lullaby sendoff to this unusual and diverting recording. 

 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
Birthdays, CD Review, File Under?, jazz

Ethan Iverson’s Blue Note Debut (CD Review)

Ethan Iverson

Every Note is True

Ethan Iverson, piano; Larry Grenadier, bass; Jack DeJohnette, drums

Blue Note

 

Pianist Ethan Iverson received an excellent birthday present today: the release of Every Note is True, his debut recording on Blue Note Records. Since departing the Bad Plus, Iverson has worked on a number of projects as a composer, taught at New England Conservatory, written insightful criticism and pedagogical articles on his blog Do the Math and for other publications, and collaborated with musicians such as saxophonist Mark Turner, drummer Bill Hart, and trumpeter Tom Harrell. Followers of these activities will note that the pianist’s encyclopedic explication of the jazz tradition in his writings has mirrored trends in his recent playing. 

 

Iverson, ever unpredictable, takes a different approach on Every Note is True. Apart from a single tune, “Blue,” by drummer Jack DeJohnette, all of the compositions on the recording are originals by Iverson. Many resume a connection to the rock-inflected jazz he made earlier in his career. Not one to attempt to remake the past, Iverson has selected collaborators who are two of the best known players in jazz, DeJohnette and bassist Larry Grenadier. The absence of covers – a Bad Plus staple – and presence of fulsome swing from his current collaborators allows Iverson the opportunity to blend multiple approaches into a compelling amalgam distinct from his previous work. 

 

A couple of imaginary theme songs populate the recording. “She Won’t Forget Me” is likened by Iverson to a rom-com theme, although I have never heard a rom-com theme with as zesty a solo. The album itself starts with a quirky vocal number, “The More it Changes,” a commercial sounding song featuring overdubs of a number of Iverson’s friends, Sarah Deming (who wrote the lyrics), Alex Ross, and Mark Padmore among them, who sang their parts remotely. Brief enough to leave a listener just enough time to scramble to their playlist and settle back in their seat, it is followed by the avowedly not soundtrack-related “The Eternal Verities,” a sequential tune with a little chromatic twist as it turns around. Grenadier’s playing embellishes the changes and adds countermelodies that interlock well with the spacious solo that Iverson provides. A coda brings the progression to a sideways yet satisfying conclusion. 

 

“For Ellen Raskin” is dedicated to one of Iverson’s favorite children’s authors. It is a gentle jazz waltz with bluesy inflections and deft use of hemiola – moving from 3/4  to 6/8 – to give a little Brahmsian nod to the proceedings. “Had I but Known” is an uptempo tune with sequences of dissonant intervals and polychords in the bridge that allow for a suave extrapolation of Fats Waller’s language and voicings. Particularly persuasive is “Had I but Known,” which is through-composed rather than primarily improvised. It combines a balladic cast with tart melodic punctuations and Ivesian verticals. 

 

Iverson admired DeJohnette’s “Blue” when he heard it on John Abercrombie’s 1978 ECM recording Gateway 2. With powerful fills from the drummer, Iverson’s interpretation revels in the tune’s unadorned triads, particularly the one at the close that receives an expansive arpeggiation. Whereas jazz chords usually contain more than just the triad, with 6th, 7ths, 9ths and more added to harmonies, using a bare triad in the right context buoys the connection that Iverson is making throughout Every Note is True between commercial pop, rock, and jazz.

 

“Merely Improbable” presents a more traditional structure, providing a chance for Iverson and company to play rhythm changes, variants on the chord structure of Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm” that populate countless standards. As with the other compositions here, at three and a half minutes the run-time is relatively lean; I would have been happy to hear the trio stretch it out. “Praise Will Travel” is an ebullient piece performed with a tight groove offsetting florid soloing. Titled after an Agatha Christie story, the album closer “At the Bells and Motley” is a jaunty blues that demonstrates the trio’s simpatico interaction. Here we get the longed-for jam, with nine minutes of subtle shifts of emphasis and piano solos that build from restraint to sly quotation to gestures writ large and back again. Excellent solos from Grenadier and DeJohnette as well.

 

Every Note is True is an auspicious label debut that demonstrates the imagination, breadth, and wit of Iverson’s playing while maintaining a spirit of enthusiastic collaboration. Highly recommended. 

 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
Birthdays, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Electro-Acoustic, File Under?

Moog Celebrates Herb Deutsch with First Episode of GIANTS Series

On Wednesday, February 9th, Herb Deutsch turned ninety years old. Deutsch has been an icon of sound synthesis both as a composer and hardware designer. One of the inventors of the first Moog synthesizers, he designed the keyboard interface that served as the basis for countless synths that followed. Moog Music is using this auspicious occasion to kick off GIANTS, a series of films about synth pioneers. In the video below, Deutsch describes his life, musical inspirations, and the early days of creating versatile hardware to perform and record electronic sound. 

 

After the film about Deutsch, you will soon be able to view a number of films that celebrate pivotal figures in electronic music on Moog’s YouTube channel. Future episodes will feature Suzanne Ciani, Bernie Krause, and Daniel Miller. Alongside the recent Sisters with Transistors documentary, the documentation of electronic music’s early luminaries is a welcome opportunity to reassess its legacy. 

On a personal note, as a fellow Long Islander, Deutsch’s long tenure at Hofstra University and co-founding of the Long Island Composer Alliance helped to provide many events that opened my ears to the possibilities of sound, and for that I remain ever grateful.

 

by Christian Carey
CDs, Composers, Contemporary Classical, Deaths, Experimental Music, File Under?

George Crumb (1929-2022)

We are saddened to learn of the loss of George Crumb, who passed away on February 6, 2022 at the age of 92. A winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the composer was one of the most important musical figures of his generation, both as a creator and, for many years, as a professor at University of Pennsylvania. Considered by his students to be a supportive and gifted teacher, he mentored a number of composers who went on to major careers.

 

Crumb composed a large catalog of works, and many of them have become touchstones of the contemporary repertoire.  The bracing amplified string quartet Black Angels (1970) decried the atrocities of the Vietnam War; from that same year, the poignant and colorful Ancient Voices of Children is a standout among a host of eloquent settings of Federico Garcia Lorca’s poetry. He often wrote series of pieces; Madrigals from the 1960s for soprano and mixed ensemble, Makrokosmos from the 1970s for amplified piano, and American Songbooks from the 2000s for male and female voices and mixed ensemble are among them. Occasional pieces, including a few depicting his beloved mischievous dogs and a gloss on Thelonious Monk’s “‘Round Midnight,” were witty and equally memorable.

Photo: Rob Starobin

From the outset of his career, Crumb referenced a different set of influences than many of his relative peers, with Bartôk, Debussy, Cowell, Cage, and the burgeoning movement of postmodern Europeans informing him as he struck out on his own path. Crumb was a tremendously imaginative orchestrator, in particular expanding the role and number of percussion instruments in chamber music. The look of his scores, which were frequently graphic in design, was also distinctive. Crumb’s music provided chamber groups, especially new music ensembles, with repertoire that stretched them technically and encouraged them to listen carefully to find the character and balance of the distinctive sound combinations he supplied. His work gave generations of other emerging composers permission to use an expansive set of resources and think outside the box. 


In 2021, a recent piano cycle (2015-2020) in two books, Metamorphoses, in which each piece evoked a work of visual art from a disparate collection of painters, was released on CD by Bridge Records as the twentieth volume of their George Crumb Edition. The composer was involved in the recordings, active until near the end of his extraordinary life. 

by Christian Carey
Birthdays, CD Review, Chamber Music, Classical Music, File Under?, Piano

Celebrating Mendelssohn’s Birthday with Piano Works

Celebrating Mendelssohn’s Birthday with Piano Recordings

 

February 3rd is Felix Mendelssohn’s birthday. To celebrate, here are two reviews of recent recordings of piano music by the composer.

Felix Mendelssohn

Complete Music for Solo Piano, Vol. 6

Hyperion CD

Howard Shelley

 

Pianist Howard Shelley has been making his way through the compendious catalog of Felix Mendelssohn. The latest entry in his complete set, Volume Six, contains several well-known favorites as well as gems without opus numbers. If one has the impression of Mendelssohn as a neo-Mozartean composer of grace without the oomph of a creator like Schumann from the Romantic generation, the powerful Reiterlied presents a different side of the composer, as does his Sonata in B-flat Major, which should be programmed far more than it currently is. The Fugue in E minor reminds one of Mendelssohn’s affinity and advocacy for Bach’s music. Shelley makes the case for versatility in Mendelssohn but retains the quintessentially burnished and characterful nature of his “Songs Without Words” in recordings of two of the books of this collection. A lovingly crafted addition to what is becoming a benchmark complete works edition.

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy

Complete Music for Piano Solo

Hänssler Classic 12 CD boxed set

Ana-Marija Markovina

 

Ana-Marija Markovina has released her Mendelssohn cycle all at once in a well-appointed 12 CD boxed set. Where Shelley brings out the luminous qualities of the piano works, Markovina is a classicist, creating interpretations that are lucidly detailed. I am particularly fond of Markovina’s playing in the sonatas and fugues, where she reveals the architecture of these pieces with abundant clarity.

The pieces without opus number, including fragments and juvenalia, are spread throughout the collection rather than put in an appendix. At first, this may seem surprising, however it is an excellent way to measure Mendelssohn’s prodigious development. The composition teacher in me immediately thought of using the fragments and short pieces with students, asking them for Mendelssohnian completions as assignments; they are ideal models. It is wonderful that both pianists have taken on this project, as there is ample room for their distinctive approaches.

 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey
CD Review, Contemporary Classical, File Under?, Orchestras, Twentieth Century Composer

Michael Gielen Edition Vol. 10 (CD Review)

Michael Gielen Edition Volume 10: Music After 1945

SWR Sinfonieorchester, Michael Gielen conductor

SWR 6xCD boxed set

 

The tenth and final boxed set in SWR’s Michael Gielen Edition spotlights his considerable contributions to post-1945 concert music. Seven hours of live recordings of music by European avant-garde figures Pierre Boulez, Luigi Nono, György Ligeti, György Kurtág, Jorge E. López, Maurizio Kagel, and Bernd Alois Zimmerman and Americans Morton Feldman, John Cage, and George Crumb. Gielen’s own compositions are featured as well. Gielen (1927-2019) may not have been prolific, but proves to be a fine composer, one whose works should be considered for programming more regularly. Vier Gedichte von Stefan George (2010) (“Four Poems of Stefan George”) finds the SWR Vokalensemble joining a chamber segment of the SWR Sinfonieorchester in a performance that displays the virtuosity of both groups to excellent advantage. Pflicht und Neigung (1988) (“Duty and Inclination”) is imaginatively scored for a sinfonietta sans strings, with muscular percussion writing, crystalline wind chords, and eruptive brass lines. 

 

As the previous nine boxed sets of the Gielen Edition attest, he was a conductor who excelled in many different eras and styles of music-making. Still, Gielen’s championing of contemporary music is legendary, as are some of the performances included here. Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Requiem für einen junge Dichter (1969) (“Requiem for a Young Poet”) has a particularly dark history that lends to the already harrowing nature of the work. Both the narrator, a pivotal performer in the piece, and Zimmermann himself committed suicide shortly after the Requiem’s premiere by SWR and Gielen. It has been widely debunked that Mozart was “writing his own Requiem,” but can one say that of Zimmermann’s riveting piece? Gielen reportedly wasn’t so sure. Ligeti’s Requiem (1965) is another selection that is a standout, with radiant singing of its tight clusters and affecting emotive delivery. Instead of the dizzying polyglot assemblage of myriad texts in the decidedly secular and even nihilistic Zimmermann piece, Ligeti uses portions of the Catholic Requiem liturgy as part of his postmodern setting. George Crumb’s Star Child (1977) is another textual amalgam, with references to Gnostic concepts of Advent and Apocalypse. As so frequently in Crumb’s work, his attention to declamation is only matched by imaginative and exquisitely detailed scoring. 

 

Having recently finished Nono’s collected writings, it was particularly wonderful to hear these fine recordings of his music. In the book, Nono mentions working out complex canons with Bruno Maderna as a focal point of his training, which he deploys here in Variazioni canoniche. His signature orchestral work, No hay caminos hay que caminar (1987) (“Walker, there is no path yet you must Walk”), and A Carlo Scarpa (1984), dedicated to the famous twentieth century architect, also represent Gielen’s staunch support of and insights into Nono’s work. 

 

Kurtág’s Stele (1994) is the piece that elevated his compositional career, and it remains one of his most durable works; SWR provides a rendition that could be the benchmark for a long time to come. Ein Brief (1986) (“A Letter”) by Mauricio Kagel is a piece for mezzo-soprano and orchestra that features angular vocalise and Schoenbergian harmony; it reads like an enigmatic sequel to Erwartung. 

 

The artistic breadth and consistently superior musicality of this set are extraordinary. Given their archival nature, listeners may be surprised at the fidelity of the recordings. Details are clear, and dynamic range is tremendous; the disc containing the pieces by Lopez even includes a warning to be careful of the dynamic extremes of the piece when choosing a volume level. The selections by this composer are all premiere recordings. Born in Cuba and an emigree to the United States, Lopez has for some years been a citizen of Austria, flying under the radar of much of the American musical establishment. His formidable scoring and the aforementioned extremes navigated by his music may also play a role. These prove to be right in Gielen and SWR’s wheelhouse; they make a case for Dome Peak (1993) and Breath-Hammer-Lightning (1991) as  compelling works that deal with a gargantuan spatial aesthetic.

 

Two of Pierre Boulez’s most important orchestra pieces are included here, Rituel in Memoriam Bruno Maderna (1975) and movements from the seemingly ever enlarging Notations (recorded in 1990, with an additional portion added in 2003). Rituel incorporates expressive gestures and formal bearing; it was truly a turning point piece for Boulez. Notations was a touchstone work emblematic of the composer’s willingness to build up and revise fragments of material throughout his lifetime. It is masterfully scored and tailor made for a detail-oriented Gielen. Once again, SWR displays extraordinary fluency in densely complex music.  

 

The late Feldman piece Coptic Light (1985) clocks in at nearly a half hour, which is short by the composer’s standards. It is still one of his most impressive essays, requiring 106 musicians to create a kaleidoscope of colors, staggered entrances, and off-kilter near repetitions. The Gielen set closes with another New York School piece, the totemic Concerto for Piano and Orchestra (1958), an audacious open form piece in which the conductor is literally a time-keeper, using his hands to indicate positions on the clock to move through the piece’s sections. The soloist’s part, written on single sheets, can be assembled in any order. Despite all of the chance procedures at work here, the SWR and Gielen understand the performance practice surrounding Cage’s output well, making clear that they are as equally at home in American experimental music as they are the European avant-garde. Highly recommended. 

-Christian Carey

 

by Christian Carey