At Lunch Two (2019 / 2020 season) : With Britten Sinfonia at West Road Concert Hall (work in progress)

At Lunch Two (2019 / 2020 season) : Britten Sinfonia at West Road Concert Hall (work in progress)

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)

21 January

At Lunch Two (2019 / 2020 season) : With Britten Sinfonia at West Road Concert Hall
(work in progress)

Piano Trio in D Major, Op. 2, No. 8 (1728) ~ Jean-Marie Leclair (1697 – 1764)

1. Adagio
2. Allegro
3. Sarabande
4. Allegro assai


The initial theme of the Adagio, and its gestures, wholly attract our attention – to the extent that it almost sounds as if the movement (or, therefore, the work as a whole) has opened near the end (or, at least, in the middle of what might be expected of such a work). We soon notice that the violin and viola are echoic – the latter, certainly, repeats the former (though does not mimic it per se), if not vice versa, and the writing is in an especially expressive tone, which one could, of course, rely on cellist Caroline Dearnley to bring out beautifully from her wonted instrument.

In the Allegro, again an element of the catch or round, if not of antiphony. However, now with the piano* more obviously joining in, and with a 'frisky' overall ambience, which, as the psychology of music tells us (though perhaps not consciously), operates by way of preparation for what follows within the composition as a whole : the succeeding Sarabande - as so often with the Bach Suites for Solo Cello (or the keyboard or violin Partitas, whose dates of 1685 to 1750 virtually mirror those of Leclair) – is the heart of the piece.

Here, there is a melding of the string-sounds of all three instruments - maybe we forget to our cost that, though some might encourage us to think of the piano as percussive, there are strings (just not bowed (or - in this repertoire - plucked)). The balance that John Lenehan achieves with his fellow...


* * * * *



[...]

At @WestRoadCH, people were saying afterwards such enthusiastic things about the reduction, to smaller forces, of the Mahler settings :)

In one person's case, who was going to urge the London gig on a friend, what had been kept or captured in the skill behind the concision ! https://t.co/SqvwfpXLhI

— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 25, 2020

[...]


Bukoliki (1952, 1962 (arr. comp.)) ~ Witold Lutosławski (1913 - 1994)

1. Allegro vivace
2. Allegro sostenuto
3. Allegro molto
4. Andantino
5. Allegro marciale


To begin, 'an intensity' of very vigorous writing for cello in the Allegro vivace, but which is, as the movement plays out, a contrast to the succeeding section's more meditative or musing nature – and which, as the set of pieces plays out, is part of a pattern of juxtaposition. And then, Lutoslawski has Clare Finnimore (viola) and Caroline Dearnley (cello) jump back, at least to Tempo I and to the initial variety of affect, but not to a note-for-note reprise, but another re-working of the material. Then, more or less betokening the close, a re-working of Tempo II follows – which is a sort of ABAB that we might associate with, or recognize from, Bartók ?

In the Allegro sostenuto, there is – more evidently (or as one adjusts to this set of pieces ?) – a juxtaposition, at the start, of a deft pizzicato cello and a languidly legato viola – another alternation of an ABAB kind ? – whereas, in the third piece, maybe Lutosławski has sufficiently stated his folk-music credentials to pass the work off as that, but then sneaks in some illicit jazz chord-progressions or intervals**, and, as if he is a covering-up naughty school-boy, behaves as if they were never there... ?

Of the set, the wildly atmospheric Andantino had open sounds and spaces, which spoke of yearning and tenderness, and which also provided yet another point of contact (as well as of contrast), this time with the rhythmicity of the final Allegro marciale : its emphasis is on metrical stress, as the material is first presented us, but then on employing it teasingly – leading us on, and holding us off from, our expectations.

We love this photo of Claire Finnimore and Caroline Dearnley rehearsing Lutosławski’s Bukoliki at @WestRoadCH on Tuesday (taken by our Principal Second Violin Miranda Dale). pic.twitter.com/OwEEpHukJP

— Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) January 23, 2020

No surprise at all that these accomplished musicians***, so used to each other (and to us) from their time with Britten Sinfonia, and to each other’s playing, should play the Lutoslawski so compellingly, but - as is the norm rather than the exception with the Sinfonia programming - rather how this beacon of composition shone in its setting in this hall and in this selection of At Lunch works !


[...]


End-notes :

* Surely, in 1728, not written for even an early forte piano ?

** In Ida (2013), Pawel Pawlikowski seeks to use his authorial / directorial position to allude to the Polish underground jazz-scene, but only as part of a tale with a would-be ‘conversation’ between the secular and sacred (or, rather, the sacred and profane), which was probably better left to Hermann Hesse ?

Joanna Kulig - who ‘migrated to’ Cold War (2018) - as ‘Singer’ in Ida (2013)

*** Both the composition / arrangement and the accomplishment reminded of when Thomas Gould and Clare Finnimore had played a selection of Béla Bartók’s Duos), in At Lunch 4 (2015 / 2016 season).


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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Music is a thing of togetherness ~ Nik Bärtsch

This is a review of At Lunch One, with Britten Sinfonia at West Road Concert Hall

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2017 (19 to 26 October)
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21 November

This is a review of At Lunch One, with Britten Sinfonia at West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, on Tuesday 21 November 2017 at 1.00 p.m.

Programme :

1. Sarah Kirkland Snider ~ Pale as Centuries

2. Mark Bowler ~ Deep Green

3. Nik Bärtsch ~ Module no. 5

4. Judd Greenstein ~ City Boy

5. Bärtsch ~ 9_3_7



1. Sarah Kirkland Snider (1973-) ~ Pale as Centuries (2011)

(1) Pale as Centuries begins with what sounds like a riff, on electric guitar (James Woodrow), which, after the other instruments have made their introductions, re-enters. Flute, clarinet, piano and double-bass are all heard with varying degrees of attack in the piece, and, in time, that difference in attack passed to Woodrow, too, and – via some use of effects-pedals – some very vigorous sounds. A circular work, but one that feels obliged to end explosively (although Mark Bowler, composer of the next work on the programme, made a different choice with his OPUS2017 composition).



2. Mark Bowler (1980-) ~ Deep Green (2017)

Written for clarinet, flute and double-bass, (2) Bowler’s Deep Green, when the woodwind players are at the height of their pitch in the opening section, draws out the similarities in their timbre (with Joy Farrall on clarinet, and Thomas Hancox on flute). When Roger Linley (double-bass) starts the next one, he is playing – unusually for this instrument - sul ponticello, and leading into a passage with open chords that seemed reminiscent of Debussy (or of early Stravinsky ?). After an episode of faster writing, a deliberately drawn-out rallentando to close (after a very low note on the bass) on solo flute.

Tim Watts (pictured upper), from the Faculty of Music at University of Cambridge, hosted the post-concert event with Mark Bowler (lower) (and Nik Bärtsch – pictured below)

Asked, in the post-concert event, about whether it is fair to hear those other composers' sound in Deep Green, when his programme-note had referenced a Ligeti Etude, Bowler did not seem to engage with the question, but to state where he had quoted the source-material to which he was alluding : co-curator Nick Bärtsch commented that he liked the exchange for showing the contrast between what the composer wants to point to as in and influencing the piece, and what the listener may otherwise hear in it...

#WigmoreWednesday - did you know we record each of our pre-concert talks @wigmore_hall and release them as podcasts? Listen to the latest featuring Nik Bartsch & @MBowlerComposer https://t.co/G7GcRolG2w

— Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) December 20, 2017

3. Nik Bärtsch ~ Modul 5

Nice to meet pianist / composer Nik Bärtsch at @BrittenSinfonia's At Lunch One at @WestRoadCH this afternoon ! pic.twitter.com/taXfSEdUOX

— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) November 21, 2017

Nik Bärtsch seemed to be referring to (3) Modul 5 in the post-concert talk (with Mark Bowler and Tim Watts - pictured above), appearing to say that he had been playing the piece for ten to fifteen years before learning how to realize it in, and play it in, public : did this fit with his comments about the use of prepared piano, and with one's having wanted to ask – if there were such a thing ? – whether this had been ‘a typical performance’ ? It felt as if (as with the famous Cologne concert of Jarrett, and another case of the piano that one arrived to find at the venue and ended up having to play) it might have begun in improvisation…

Whatever quite this work is, it begins in fascinating analogue sound-manipulation, and – exploiting the semi-tone – with over-tones and bell-like fringe-effects. As, though, its sound-palette broadened, one’s attention luxuriated in the assurance of, as Bärtsch described afterwards, the piece being presented to us at its best*, and stopped concentrating on exactly what sound one was hearing (or the mechanics of its production - as one did when Maggie Cole performed Ligeti's Continuum (1923-2006)), and very glad that this work – which was not included in the printed one – had been part of the programme.



4. Judd Greenstein (1979) ~ City Boy (2010)

Scored for the quintet of Instruments, and - after Quiet City (1939), and despite an ostentatious ostinato on electric guitar - not implausibly referencing a near-mid-twentieth-century American tradition, (4) City Boy sounds quite Coplanesque : when one looks to form, and beyond the actual individual Instruments, bass and guitar stand, in a way, for the typical harmonic lines of a symphony orchestra.

Initially, in the second section, there is a ‘jazzed-up’ treatment, and, when those elements recur, they just subside : hence the composer’s programme-note to the effect that, with the work’s rapid movement from idea to idea, relatively – fans of Zappa, Brittelle, Babbitt, or Brian Wilson will be disappointed. When we hear the original material on Woodrow’s guitar, it is via the effects-pedal-mediated world of reverberation and distortion. At a signal, and after Copland-like rain-drop effects on flute (whilst the piano has the ostinato), the players all come off together.



5. Bärtsch ~ 9_3_7 (2017)

Maybe (5) 9_3_7 seemed like a punked-up (?) iteration of what preceded it, to which Bärtsch was explicitly responding. He employed some interesting writing for the bass versions of the standard orchestral clarinet and flute, which were also less aurally ‘defined’ than the bass or the guitar. To his own part, Bärtsch brought both jazzy intonations and intelligence in deploying the sound of the held piano notes. Ending, after a slow introduction, with a slow, fumry?? coda, he used the space to work over the four-note motif (with its longer, final note).


Introducing works from the stage, as well as talking afterwards, Nik Bärtsch had been at pains to say how the works had been programmed, including leading to the choice of Mark Bowler's piece as the OPUS2017 award-winner : Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) is, of course, renowned for its novel and thoughtful approach to programming, and here, in works that (in two cases) one could only have heard before by being at Wigmore Hall (@wigmore_hall) on the preceding Friday, was a set of pieces where they 'talked to each other' and had their place, and quite apart from the customary exemplary playing (the hard work that goes into which we should never take for granted) !


End-notes

* Bärtsch told us that he has heard the notated work played twice by two other pianists and not – he did not use this word – related to it, and thereby throws up the larger question – before there was an established performance-practice (unless that was through Ralph Kirkpatrick's monograph, or in the encores of Vladimir Horowitz ?) – how, say, we know what Domenico Scarlatti’s sonatas do, or should, sound like, i.e. from where do we now derive what we think is how Scarlatti played (or heard his royal pupil play) these pieces ?

Relatedly, if Leon McCawley plays, for example, the whole of a set of Rachmaninov Preludes (Opus 32) in the chapel at King's College (@ConcertsatKings) – or Joanna MacGregor a set of four Chopin Nocturnes at The Fitzwilliam Museum (@FitzMuseum_UK) - we know [what] ‘the famous one(s)’ ['are meant to' sound like] (with which no pianist can thus take many liberties), but how do we relate to the surrounding compositions, which may - despite such family-groups - very much feel like strangers to us ?


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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

'Energetic and energizing' : At Lunch Two with Britten Sinfonia

This is a review of Britten Sinfonia's recital At Lunch Two on 14 February 2017

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2016 (20 to 27 October)
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14 February

This is a review of Britten Sinfonia with At Lunch Two at West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, at 1.00 p.m. on Tuesday 14 February 2017

Programme :

1. Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) ~ Three Pieces for String Quartet (1914¹) [4 players]

2. Mark-Anthony Turnage (1960-) ~ Prayer for a great man (2010) [2 players]

3. Oliver Knussen (1952-) ~ Cantata for oboe and string trio (1977) [4 players]

4. Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) ~ Introduction and Allegro (1905) [7 players]

5. Turnage ~ Col (2016) [8 players]

6. Stravinsky ~ Concertino for String Quartet (1920) [4 players]



Stravinsky I ~ Three Pieces for String Quartet (1914¹)

1. Danse

2. Eccentrique

3. Cantique


(1) Vibrant tone-colour from Jacqueline Shave (1st violin) and vigorous pizzicato on cello (Caroline Dearnley) characterized the first impression of the work, with Miranda Dale (2nd violin) making lively interjections in the brief Danse. Even so, we hear that Stravinsky’s writing is of a contrasting nature, and – in the overall somewhat atrophied sounds of the opening bars of Eccentrique – is juxtaposing inertia and lyricism. Before, that is, the intense flowering of the development section, and a return to this quirky form of spikiness, and the opening material’s serving partly as punctuation, partly as an ending.

Last, sensitively rendered by the violinists and more mournful, Cantique resembles a less-uninformed version of Beethoven as processed in Strauss’ Metamorphosen : quicker, but a mutated theme. Again, the writing relies on a contrast between passages and their affective colouring, but evoking a memory that is rooted, not in nostalgia, but in grief.



Turnage I ~ Prayer for a great man (2010)

(2) Prayer is uplifted, and positive, if stoic – it is, as with the preceding work, a fascinating blend of sounds, those of cello and of the horn – Martin Owen – with all its connotations of the martial, the inward, and the rustic. As the short piece progressed, we were aware how Caroline Dearnley’s freely-flowing cello-line worked with the latter : in the string legato, melding tones, although there was a deliberate, gentle mismatch with the horn’s timbre. A final, muted, section perhaps seemed to speak of adieu, or farewell.



Knussen ~ Cantata for oboe and string trio (1977)

Before Oliver Knussen’s instrumental (3) Cantata, the statesman-like tone and appearance of Nicholas Daniel (later, in a post-concert workshop (with / for Jago Thornton’s prize-winning composition), maybe less so ?), who said that we could expect to hear some of the instruments in tempo, others playing ‘out of time’ : as he put it, Strict, but flexible – parenting, I suppose ?

Nicholas Daniel also told us that he favoured – over Knussen’s own account of the work – when Knussen had shared, with Sinfonia players, that it is ‘like a series of diary-entries’, but ones that are technically connected. Compared with other works, rehearsing this one had apparently been more intense, but also more rewarding, and, although Daniel says that he is usually hesitant to say the word ‘masterpiece’, he promised (not wrongly) that Cantata was one - and jewel like…


Characterizing – or trying, and failing, to characterize – the mood or feel of such diary-entries, when Knussen is deliberately being holistic with them, would not let his work be the centre-piece that it was of this superbly wrought and planned Sinfonia recital. Here, the incalculably strong overall effect of a moving entity, comprising people and a feeling of place, of being placed into the timeless eternity of Time :

As one would know from typically thoughtful Sinfonia programming, pairing how the Stravinsky ends with Turnage’s reaction to the passing of his father-in-law naturally fits with Knussen’s conception of Cantata - with all the changeability that we are aware of with, say, Bach’s portraits of the facets of the seeking of a soul in penitence [counter-tenor Robin Blaze with BWV 170, Vergnügte Ruh, beliebte Seelenlust], or Handel’s Un’alma inamorata, HWV 173 [Mhairi Lawson, with La Serenissima (LaSerenissimaUK)].

Or, of course, it could be Handel’s much more famous and beautiful da capo aria Lascia ch’io pianga [Almira / Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno / Rinaldo], or Bach’s even more famous Erbarme dich, so beautiful where it comes in St Matthew Passion (BWV 244) : at such times, what is Time ?



Ravel ~ Introduction and Allegro(1905)

Maurice Ravel, though, has a radiance that is rarely outshone, and so we aptly heard next, in the familiar (4) Introduction and Allegro, his feeling for poesie and fantasie in the intensity of an imagined world : in the first harp solo, it became very clear that Ravel, in being commissioned to write this work to show off a new make of harp (pace Donald Macleod on Radio 3, that self-same day, with the evening repeat of Composer of the Week [#COTW]), is scoring in the spirit of writing for piano.

Further on, and starting with the delicacy of the cello (Caroline Dearnley), the other players (Miranda Dale and Clare Finnimore) joined her in pizzicato to accompany Jacqueline Shave's bowed violin, before another gorgeous, rapt harp solo from Lucy Wakeford. With the ensemble embodying faerie and fruitfulness, we came to the flowering and fecundity of the Allegro section – with the very lovely phrasing of Lucy Wakeford, who was given a well-earnt accolade by her fellow Sinfonia performers.



Turnage II (1960-) ~ Col (2016)

A tradition in music of The British Isles that goes back well before Elgar’s variations presents portraits in music (of a sort, Façade (1918-1923) is also one). Unfortunately, this is what Mark-Anthony Turnage does in (5) Col, in a piece that starts in open terms, but becomes first ruminative, and then – with or at the return of that initial material – becomes downright maudlin.

This is unlike the spirit of Ravel’s Tombeau de Couperin (1914-1917), Arvo Pärt in In memoriam Benjamin Britten (1977), or Stravinsky’s Epitaphium (Für das Grabmal des Prinzen Max Egon zu Fürstenberg) (1959), for flute, clarinet and piano, [or Double Canon ‘Raoul Dufy in Memoriam’ (1959)], and, rather, a requiem that is yet a birthday cake, but which serves as neither : though it is imperfect, one may be better hearing Colin Matthews the man, by watching Barrie Gavin’s Colin Matthews at 70 [seventy minutes or so of film about Colin Matthews, as screened at 2016’s Aldeburgh Festival of Arts and Music² (on which, see more, below)]…



Stravinsky II ~ Concertino for String Quartet

NB The programme-notes (by Jo Kirkbride) credit the (6) Concertino as dating to 1952 – having wondered about this, and then checked more authoritatively than on the Internet³ [Wikipedia®], the Concertino actually dates to 1920⁴, and its arrangement for small ensemble to 1952…

Given that L’histoire du soldat (The Soldier’s Tale) (1919) was from the year before 1920, it seems to endorse the comment above that one can hear hints of that work here. The Britten Sinfonia String Quartet plays the Concertino with aplomb : they happen, all, to be women, but the important point is that they are excellent musicians and communicators, and it is by their quality, not their gender, that one would commend their musicianship⁵.

Starting from a high level of excellence, Jacqueline Shave, Miranda Dale, Clare Finnimore and Caroline Dearnley keep on impressing...

— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) February 14, 2017

In this work, as brought out here, the motivic elements underlie, but do not belie, its meditative qualities – the recapitulation that we heard was brimful of feeling, and tacitly contradicts a conception of Stravinsky as cool and unemotional. Just as did, one reflects, this string quartet with the Stravinsky piece(s) with which it / they opened a tribute to Louis #Andriessen at Milton Court last year (at The Barbican).


End-notes :

¹ Please see the note at the beginning of the section (below) for the second Stravinsky work for string quartet (and its dependent end-note⁴).

² One way in which the Festival is on a human scale is that, during the interval of a concert that had featured Matthews' work last year, one had the informality to address him on the stairs - to shake his hand, and briefly thank him.

@lucieskeaping @yorkearlymusic Kindly signing my York programme didn't give that impression - scary being on air at St Margaret's !#Coughs

— THE AGENT APSLEY (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) January 1, 2017

Sadly, at some more 'protective' venues - unlike, for example, The National Centre for Early Music (NCEM / @yorkearlymusic) - one may not approach performers, even though they are just a small distance away (though not evident, stewards are there to prevent it) : those on stage have to be at a signing, or otherwise choose to come out into the foyer, for approaching them to be permitted.

³ In Roman Vlad's monograph entitled Stravinsky, pp. 79-81 (Oxford University Press, London (1978)).

⁴ With Three Pieces for String Quartet, it initially seemed that they were written in 1914, revised in 1918, but probably not published until 1922.

Roman Vlad (ibid, p. 50), after saying ‘Although very little known, these pieces are extremely significant as far as Stravinsky’s stylistic development and inner artistic motivation are concerned’, and then devoting several pages to them [in which, by analysing them, Vlad explains their importance to Stravinsky's and other composers' works], goes on to tell us (p. 54) :

Stravinsky himself was always greatly attached to [the Three Pieces], so much so that in 1917 he transcribed them for orchestra under the titles of ‘Danse’: ‘Excentrique’ : ‘Cantique’ [my emphasis] […].

⁵ On which point, initiatives such as Holly Tarquini's F-Rating (F-Rated (@F__Rating)) at Bath Film Festival (@BathFilm), or Cambridge's Reel Women (@ReelWomenUK), might take pause ? [Unless, of course, one claims that inclusion in a programme at the latter, or the former's Festival, is an absolute guarantee, per se, of outstanding quality.]


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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)

Swinging it at Saffron Hall

More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2015 (3 to 13 September)
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22 November

This is a review of an evening at Saffron Hall (Saffron Walden, Essex) with Britten Sinfonia, Eddie Gomez, Sebastiaan de Krom, and conductor Kristjan Järvi, on Saturday 21 November 2015 at 7.30 p.m.

Part I :

1. Igor Stravinsky ~ Tango
2. Improvisation by Steven Osborne (on material from Keith Jarrett)
3. Frank Zappa ~ Igor’s Boogie
4. Stravinsky ~ Ragtime for 11 instruments
5. Zappa ~ The Perfect Stranger


Before playing (1) Tango, and then an improvisation, pianist Steven Osborne told us that the latter was not going to be a reflection on the Stravinsky (as the programme said), but a reaction to having heard Keith Jarrett in a solo concert the night before, at the EFG London Jazz Festival (@LondonJazzFest) at The Royal Festival Hall (@southbankcentre) – something so beautiful from Jarrett that it had been with him ever since, and which he wished to share with us.

To Stravinsky’s Tango (1940), in its original form for solo piano, Osborne brought a slight holding-back on the off-beat in the second, companion bar of those with which it opens. Initially, he was quite measured, and, when it came the first time, let the chromatic writing speak for itself. However, this was as preparation for it to repeat, where he now let rip for a few bars, and then brought a charmingly smiling humour to the succeeding passages, of greater restraint : on its third appearance, even a feel of the strident, and then just enjoying the riffy rumble in the bass. The work does not end with bravado, and Osborne brought it to us unforced and placid.


Whether or not the first section of his (2) improvisation also derived from Jarrett (to begin with, one was a little reminded of Staircase, with its bassy, deliberative ascents), Osborne brought in elements of contrary motion. As, with time, he rose up the keyboard, his playing increased in note-richness, and spikiness of attack, to very high and piercing notes, which then unleashed a wild torrent of discords : with movement up and down the keys, they subsided.

A sustained note linked to what clearly possessed the serenity and beauty of Jarrett’s recent solo recordings, and with his simplicity and understatement : the theme rippled for a while, before a moto perpetuo developed under notes of longer value, and there was a very strong feeling that there was something quite incredible about how vibrant the chordal progressions were. With a subtle diminuendo, the piece died away, to end very quietly.


The (3) first Zappa piece was very short, foregrounded woodwind, brass and marimba, and, after coming to resemble a march, had a fanfare-like close. (Starting at this point, Kristjan Järvi was conducting Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) (and those who joined in with it later).)


Stravinsky’s (4) Ragtime (1918) has none of the concision or – for want of a better word – ‘moderation’ of his Tango, more than two decades later. Right at the start, beats on the bass-drum are part of the fabric, although they are used, as off-beats and in combination with harmonies that sound off (almost in a ‘sick’ sort of way), to create an unsettling effect. Alongside all of which, we soon hear the crazily energetic sound of the cimbalom, which creates a sort of unease (if not disquiet) of its own, as does the later use of the snare-drum.

The connotations of the title ‘Ragtime’ may have led us to expect something of a more easy-going nature, but the piece itself, in its origins in the ambiguous world of The Soldier’s Tale (1917), is loaded with questions, epitomized by the use of trombone, which, played with a mute, sounded sneering and sour, or by the ironic sound of the cymbals, or even a prominent slide-effect by Jacqueline Shave (on violin). The mood appears to require the instrumentalists to play a little sharp, but, in structural terms, the work is relatively straightforward to follow (unlike much of what followed¹), and so we hear a phrase passed from Joy Farrall (clarinet) to Jacqueline Shave, sounding as an echo. In this first longer piece, one could appreciate the precision of the ensemble, but also the way in which the named individuals, amongst others, were bringing a swing and a sway to their part.


Frank Zappa’s (5) The Perfect Stranger (1984) is written for a great diversity of forces, including two grand pianos (the pianists double on celestes), and three percussionists on either side of the stage and at the rear, each with an array that incorporates snare-drums, marimbas, and tubular-bells. String-players were ranged across the front (with principal cellist Caroline Dearnley on one end, stage left (and next to Clare Finnimore, principal violist), and her fellow cellist on the other, with Shave (as leader) in the middle (flanked by two other violinists). Behind them, and centrally in the ensemble, a harp.

A motif on tubular-bells opened the work (and later we could keep seeing the two or three percussionists, primed by their sets² to give us a chord or a pair of chords). When we heard twin marimbas with what sounded like a xylophone, the effect was, for a moment, almost Boulezian³, but his is not the sound-world that Zappa inhabits, because (early on) he had Shave playing Zigeuner style, and had written passages with an extreme, highly slurred form of legato, as well as a jerky type of staccato.

Some moments in the work jumped out, such as a lovely short passage for Sarah Burnett on bassoon, and when the harp (Sally Pryce) came in and out of prominence. Likewise, we suddenly heard from the three blocks of percussion on snare-drum, or doubled marimbas with tubular-bells. All in all, though, the work had a quirky moodiness of its own, revolving its material ruminatively, but with occasional bright – and seemingly uncynical – overlays of brass (or of overshadowing with it), and we seemed a long way from where the evening had begun.

* * * * *

Part II :

6. Claus Ogerman ~ Excerpts from the Second Movement of Symbiosis (1974)
7. Darius Milhaud ~ La création du monde
8. Simon Bainbridge ~ Counterpoints


At this point in the evening, Eddie Gomez first came on stage, looking assured and relaxed along with Sebastiaan de Krom : with Steven Osborne, they were to form a neat trio, stage right, on piano, bass, and Pearl drum-kit, respectively. (Gomez’ bass had a pick-up so that he could monitor himself.)

The piece by (6) Ogerman began with a piano statement, passed to the woodwind and strings, and which, as it continued to be played, started to sound to have oriental overtones. Eddie Gomez waited, holding his bass, and with one leg casually resting on the calf of the other at one point. Steven Osborne then made a shorter utterance, with which the Britten Sinfonia players joined in, and which reminded of Aaron Copland. On Osborne’s third utterance, Sebastiaan de Krom joined in, using brushes, and Gomez started quietly strumming, although, since this was a work that might have had an improvised element, he seemed to be closely reading his score.

As the movement proceeded, Gomez was playing very far down the finger-board, in a way that sounded somewhat agitated at times, and plucking very close to the bridge. After a repeated note, with quiet strings, the sound of Gomez on bass became more agitated, but with piano-textures underneath it. Towards the end, he employed a lot of tremolo, and the impression made by the Sinfonia strings was quite luscious : it concluded with piano, bass, and strings.


Having first looked at the evening’s programme, and somehow confused reading the title of Milhaud’s La création du monde (his Opus 81a) with expecting to hear his Le bœuf sur le toit, Op. 58, one was more than prepared, in one’s head, for the insistence of its rondo-like form (from more than three years earlier****, and before he had heard jazz for himself in the States).


In the introduction of (7) La création du monde, he uses saxophone, and a Spanish style to his trumpets, to create a stately air, but it was not to be long before a jazzy bass, snare-drum and trombone launched first Paul Archibald (trumpet), and then Joy Farrall, with a ‘kick’ and a swing on clarinet. All of which, with Milhaud, very soon gets out of hand, with a riot of woodwind and brass – or seems to, because he suddenly drops down, eventually to the more subtle forces of string-quartet and flute. At this point, Bradley Grant gave thoughtful emphasis to some idiomatic writing for alto-sax, with some smooth slides and sinuous passages, before horn and other instruments joined in, and became more prominent.

There is gusto in the quartet of string-players, to whom Milhaud resorts again (and it seems that he heard performances in New York City where a string-quartet adopted such a percussive role), adding in timpani, and building up to a swirling, Gershwinesque tutti. Again, he brings us down from there, to oboe (Emma Feilding), before developing into further lively writing for Farrall, and a pulsing sort of shuffle.

However, these are passages into which he has built what might be punctuations, but which sometimes feel like interruptions : with a tin-pan-alley section, what begin as clearly signalled developments grow into a sort of primaeval, if short-lived, cacophony, in which alto-sax (Bradley Grant) and bassoon (Sarah Burnett) have key roles. They continue to do so, as, initially with a slow rallentando, Milhaud closes the work : he evokes material from the beginning, but patterns it differently, for a brief last riff, before a quiet close.


For reasons that were not entirely clear, unless indicating that he had very much enjoyed conducting Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia), Järvi half-turned to the audience with a cheeky grin at the end of the Milhaud (which was not to be the last that we saw of such playful expressions).


At times, Simon Bainbridge’s (8) Counterpoints (2015) was musically quite bewildering, but it often came to resemble a one-movement Chamber Symphony (or Kammerkonzert). As has already been remarked**, in commenting on Zappa’s The Perfect Stranger, there was much going on to see happening, or about to happen, but here it would probably have been better heard, and not watched – as, for example, when a small gong was raised out of and lowered back into water ? One wanted to be able to be aware of such sounds in the whole (and maybe then peep out, to see what they were), not have one’s attention drawn visually to the mechanics of the sound-production : sometimes, less is more, because one may see eight double-basses on stage, but not hear the sound of eight instruments.

The work had a very quiet start, with strings and a ‘squeaky’ bass-effect from Gomez. More so than before in the concert, Kristjan Järvi was bringing piano or cymbals, say, in and out with very definite cues or strokes. As well as familiar pairings, such as of marimba and vibraphone, composer Simon Bainbridge used a variety of instruments, and so we had Gomez with the rarely heard bass-flute (Sarah O'Flynn), and we could sense, at times, that there was an underpinning beat to the whole concerto.

In one moment with Järvi, there was a strange face-off with Gomez as to whether he would play when directed. Then, as there were further games, and an encouraging gesture and grin from Järvi, it all seemed to have been in good spirits. A special feature of this part of the work was an extended section for oboe and soft bass. The concerto ended with downwards cascades of notes, finishing with Gomez.



End-notes

¹ Where one feels forced to give more of ‘an impression’, in more general terms, rather than describe the work and how it unfolded : completely unlike a fractal, where any part might give one the whole.

² It became especially true of the second half of the concert that being able to see so clearly what was happening was a distraction from listening (and so the opposite effect from hearing Colin Currie and The Colin Currie Group at this venue in an all-Reich concert)). The composition by Simon Bainbridge, which closed the evening, would actually have benefited from having closed eyes, had it not been realized too late.

³ This observation seems less unlikely, given that Jo Kirkbride’s programme-notes informed us that Pierre Boulez had commissioned the work, as one of three by Zappa that he recorded with The Ensemble Intercontemporain.

⁴ Apparently, according to Wikipedia® (@Wikipedia), Le bœuf sur le toit was originally to have been the score of one of Charlie Chaplin’s silent films (Cinéma-fantaisie for violin and piano).


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Echoes of the future in Beethoven's Septet in E Flat Major, Op. 20 ?

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18 March

A concert given by Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) at West Road Concert Hall (@WestRoadCH), Cambridge, on Tuesday 18 March

This lunch-time’s concert saw a pairing of Versa est in luctum, a new commission by William Cole for the same forces as and with Beethoven’s Septet in E Flat Major from 1800 (Op. 20), a string trio plus double bass, bassoon, clarinet, and horn – the Sinfonia and the Wigmore Hall asked Cole to write the piece after he won the Cambridge University Composers’ Workshop in 2013.

Cole’s piece preceded its illustrious forebear (as Jo Kirkbride’s informative programme note bears testament – in fact, too illustrious for Beethoven’s liking, as he came to rue it as a cultural straitjacket by means of which others sought to confine his artistic development), and ran to around one-quarter of its length, in one movement.

It opened with what seemed to be a canon*, Clare Finnimore (viola) following Marianne Thorsen on violin, which, as it recurred, had increasing levels of interjections from the other instruments. Not necessarily being anthropomorphic about the composition, but the original theme then started becoming fragmentary (and maybe with hints of an inversion ?) before an extrapolation that reduced any resemblance further.


By now, the sound had become an exciting hubbub, but this appearance subsided, leaving the violin over a repeated interval, and with a beat being kept by the bass (Stephen Williams). When this, too, had become intense, there was a long pause, as if the piece might be at an end, but a short pizzicato moment gave way to a section for clarinet (Joy Farrall), cello (Caroline Dearnley) and bassoon (Sarah Burnett). What then sounded like open notes from the horn (Susan Dent) led to a sonority with the reed players, before the work closed with a gesture from bass and cello.

As an experience, Versa est in luctum did not seem as though it were just ten minutes long, as there seemed to be worlds within it : fitting, indeed, as the text comes from the central chapter of what is known as Job’s closing monologue, and, given all that has happened to him over time, is of a reflective nature. It received its World Premiere on Friday in Norwich, and, of course, played with conviction and verve by members of the Sinfonia, was well met in Cambridge.


As to the Beethoven, its six-movement structure began with two marked Adagio, although the first turned to an Allegro con brio. Words that do not always fit in one’s mouth at the same time as thinking about Beethoven, from the opening unison chord it exuded charm and grace in the Sinfonia’s hands. After some writing that felt its way around the dynamics, and a theme that sounded as though it had a statement and a response built into it, the material proper began with a melody that the composer might have been disgruntled to have described as Mozartian, with that sort of ambience for clarinet that he so liked. The succeeding interplay of voices led us back to the beginning, ending soon after with a feeling of suspension.

The cantabile movement that came next gave the melody to the clarinet, with strings underneath, and then passed it to the violin, before a prominent passage for bassoon. An air of expectancy had been built, into which a series of horn notes fed, the strings then providing support as it went on, but leaving still a sense of restraint until the violin emerged and gave the movement its main expressive force. A short piece in Tempo di menuetto followed, with, as in the opening movement, a theme, of an accented nature, and a paired theme, the whole impression being somewhat grand, perhaps military.

A mildly staccato statement of the theme, as used earlier in the work, in the Tema con variazioni : Andante led to a set of six variations, a form that Beethoven was to turn to throughout his career and where his own voice became more apparent. The first variation began with violin and viola, and then introduced the cello, whereas the second had the other players responding to the violin giving the theme, with the cello in its upper register. Next, clarinet and bassoon with the strings beneath them, and then, in a variation reminiscent of a movement twenty-four years later in the Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, horn and violin together (then playing quickly underneath, with a pizzicato from cello and bass.

In another variation that evoked later writing, the fifth had some of the character of Beethoven’s masterly writing for string quartet, before the brass and reed players joined in, and with a real quality of sweetness of playing from Thorsen, as the theme passed back and forth. Finally, the bass and the cello in its lower voice were to the fore, and brought the set to a close. In the Scherzo : Allegro molto e vivace, a movement of equivalent length to that of the Minuet, the ‘parped’ horn theme reminded of somewhere in the first two symphonies (No. 1 being the next Opus number, and, as Jo Kirbride usefully tells us, performed at the same concert where this work was premiered). The cello then advanced, supported by the bassoon, with a softer version, and the movement proceeded in sonata form, ending quite quickly, but not before a short ‘pa pa’ from the horn to recall the opening.

Again, as Beethoven was to go on to do (and Mozart (and Haydn) had done before), the Andante con moto alla Marcia; Presto began in a funereal vein, before the full-blown finale broke through, with a great feeling of lightness. Nevertheless, he gave an insistence to the theme, and there were glimmerings of his writing to come in the Symphony No. 7 in A Major, just over a decade later, and wrote captivatingly, which Thorsen brought out, for her instrument. When the theme returned, the balance of the ensemble, as had been apparent all along, was just right, and, after a momentary suggestion that we were veering into the minor, this accurate and emotionally careful drew to a close.

There was immense appreciation for the quality and deftness of the musicianship that we had heard, and the concert will be a treat for Radio 3 listeners in the summer, not least for those who find similar evidence in this work of what was to come. At the same time, one can well understand, as he expressed himself to pupil Carl Czerny, Beethoven’s not wanting to be tied to this piece, and to look forward, not to be asked for something in the more agreeable style of the Septet ! How many times are we grateful to true artists for being true to what they felt that they should compose, or paint, or write…


End-notes

* Which Cole tells us, in his note, is from a fifteenth-century motet by Alonso Lobo, setting a verse featuring instruments from the Book of Job (Job 30 : 31).



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Britten Sinfonia Voices : life, song and wine

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14 February

A concert given by Britten Sinfonia (@BrittenSinfonia) at West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge, on Tuesday 11 February


This concert comprised three compositions by baritone Roderick Williams (two of which had received their World premiere at the Sinfonia’s concert in Norwich the previous week), four-part songs by Schubert and Schumann, and a Lied by the latter.

It started with Williams’ Red Herring Blues for clarinet and piano (from 1994), which opened with a jaunty solo from the former, played by Joy Farrall. Tom Poster then joined in, but with similar material that yet sounded different on a different instrument. As it developed, there were some violent gestures from the piano, reminiscent of moments in Olivier Messiaen’s Vingt regards sur l'enfant-Jésus when some powerful chords are struck, and even of that composer’s birdsong. A short, meditative piece, it ended with what seemed like a quotation from the first bars of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue.

Next, the four members of Britten Sinfonia Voices (Susan Gilmour Bailey, Alexandra Gibson, Nicholas Mulroy, and Eamonn Dougan) gave two multipart Lieder of Schubert, Der Tanz (D. 826) from 1825, and then the earlier (1816) An die Sonne (D. 439), the second much longer than the first, which gave a taste of the operatic quality of these voices, which happily reached right to the back of the auditorium, and with very clear German diction. An die Sonne allowed us to hear what good voices they are individually, before blending them again so well.

Whereas the other Lied contrasted the despondency and infirmity of age with the energy and dancing of youth, this writer, Johann Peter, turns to weightier things : the poet’s persona enjoying creation in the immediate moment, even praising it, but suddenly realizes the truth of his mortality along with it. The line-ending of the final stanza, Staub (dust, in the phrase ‘Return to dust !’) is followed by a somewhat creepy tone from Mulroy’s tenor, but, as the stanza is reprised, resolving into a happier conception (via the word Laub, meaning ‘foliage’).

The first of Williams’ two commissions by the Sinfonia and Wigmore Hall was The last house on the river, for all forces, and had an eerie quality to its opening, and hints of Boulez’ writing for piano, before we heard from the clarinet in its chalumeau register. The work went round in cycles of Williams responded to by the singers in close-harmony style, and with regular instrumental intermissons.

Karen Hayes’ highly poetic text (she is the librettist for both works) is deftly set by Williams, and the very English sound of the group of four anchored this very specific evocation of time and place, with the intensity of the what is perceived picked out by the almost improvisatory feel of the clarinet writing. An enthusiastic round of applause met this new work, and the sensation in West Road Concert Hall was that there was appreciation for a well-conceived and performed programme of music by and sung by Williams and his colleagues.

A solo Schumann Lied followed, Auf einer Burg (from Liederkreis, Op. 39, setting Joseph von Eichendorff), where Williams’ mastery of his vocal resources, and of telling a story with his intonation and phrasing, were to the fore. As with the earlier Lieder, where there was a movement from a joyous state to – or to contemplating – a state of decline, this Lied leads us up, through all the surrounding circumstance, to a wedding, but the final image is that the beautiful bride (die schöne Braut) is crying.

Staying with Schumann, Britten Sinfonia Voices brought us Mondnacht, from 1840, which had a feeling of floating, of calm, with a change of mood as it ended just with piano. Then Schubert again, Schicksalsenker (D. 763) from eighteen years earlier, which began with tenor voice, and gave the feeling of being taken back in time, partly in the restraint with which the quartet sang, and partly in the repetition of the word from the title (Fate’s Anchor). The link is that there is a feeling of transcendence, of the soul stretching wide its wings (Und meine Seele spannte / Weit ihre Flügel aus), and of a world where every pain has escaped far away (Fern entfoh’n ist jeder Schmerz).

The feeling of Gemütlichkeit in the Trinklied (D. 183) from 1815 set the mood for this final group of works, with even a table and drinks of some sort as the Stammtisch of the Voices, as they gave us this drinking song, praising friendship and wine, and with variants of the sentiment of Ohne Freunde, ohne Wein, / ich nicht im Leben sein (‘Without friends, without wine, I should not like to be alive’) as the closing couplet to each verse.

Next, the second Williams’ commission In His Cups (again setting Karen Hayes), so one could see why it was keeping company with this Schubert genre. For this piece, Joy Farrall played off stage in a piece that evoked a Britten-like sort of Englishness, of a village pub, and of secular and church life in small communities in an earlier decade, and with outbursts from the piano. The diction and syntax of Hayes’ poetry takes one beyond John Clare and ‘The Deserted Village’ even to Shakespeare : But in his cups he’d thought her beautiful could evoke the topers in Twelfth Night, and Williams had carefully matched his setting to a pastoral of yesteryear, such as might parallel an inland Peter Grimes.

The final two short songs, both by Schubert (Lebenslust(D. 609) from 1818, and another Trinklied (D. 75) from 1813), ended the recital, and both stir up the notions of friendship. In the first, we have allein sein ist öde, wer kann sich da freu’n (‘To be alone is bleak, who could enjoy being there ?’), and the delivery was both crisp and emotional. The second had a clarinet line added to the scoring for tenor, chorus and piano, so it was a rousing close to the proceedings, with even a Schiller-like invocation of the spirit of brotherhood in Laßt uns all Brüder sein ! (‘Let us all be brothers !’) – perhaps the correct context of the ‘Ode to Joy’ is the pub ?!

A recital that delivered many flavours and juxtapositions, all of which seemed to enrich each other.


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Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)