The Ansonia Trio

The Ansonia Trio
Angelia Cho, violin
Laura Metcalf,  cello
Andrea Lam, piano
Bechstein Artist Series at Bechstein Piano, New York, NY
June 11, 2010

 

Ansonia Trio

Ansonia Trio

A relative newcomer to the chamber music scene, the Ansonia Trio was formed in 2009, and won the Grand Prize of the Daniel Rutenberg Chamber Music Competition the same year. The Trio made its New York debut at the New York House Concert series, has performed in various venues in and around New York, and participated in the Prussia Cove Festival in England.

Violinist Agelia Cho received her Bachelor of Music degree at the Curtis institute under the late Jascha Brodsky and Ida Kavafian, and her Master’s degree at the New England Conservatory of Music under Donald Weilerstein. She has won wide recognition as soloist, recitalist and chamber musician.

Cellist Laura Metcalf received her Master of Music degree at the Manes College of Music, studying with Timothy Eddy, and, upon graduation, was honored with the James E. Hughes award for excellence in performance. In addition to being active as soloist and teacher, she is a member of various chamber groups, such as the Tarab Cello Ensemble, a group of eight cellists with whom she has performed and recorded. She is assistant principal of the Chamber Orchestra of New York.

Australian pianist Andrea Lam studied with Boris Berman at the Yale School of Music, where she won the Woolsey Hall Competition, and with Arkady Aronov at the Manhattan School of Music, where she won the Roy M. Rubinstein Award. She was a semi-finalist in the 2009 Van Cliburn Competition, and has performed and recorded concertos with Australian orchestras and chamber music with the Takacs Quartet. She was featured at the 1999 and 2000 Sidney Festivals, playing for audiences of 180,000.

The Ansonia players say their goal is to “present programs that engage and inspire modern audiences.” The June 11 concert – their final one of this season – featured two romantic repertory favorites, Mendelssohn’s D-minor Trio Op. 49, and Brahms’ C-major Trio Op. 87, and two of Piazzolla’s “Four Seasons of Buenos Aires.”

The Trio is clearly a fine, very promising group; only a year after its formation, the strings’ intonation is excellent, the players’ phrasing, dynamics and expression are unanimous, their ensemble and rapport – complete with approving looks and smiles – are close; they obviously enjoy their companionship and collaboration.

 
Technically, they were more than equal to the music’s demands, negotiating Mendelssohn’s brilliant writing with easy facility; indeed, the Scherzo, though not too fast for their fleet fingers, was too fast for human ears. They projected the work’s ardent romanticism without excess or sentimentality, capturing the dark, ominous tension of its corner movements and the calm serenity of the second. The Brahms was carefully paced, austere but expressive; the first movement’s tempo changes were smooth and organic. They made Piazzolla’s idiom sound as natural as their native language.

 
The concert’s only flaw was the balance. The intimate Bechstein auditorium is just right for chamber music, but the piano, a vintage concert grand, is much too big and loud for the space and the music. When kept wide open, even the most careful, well-intentioned pianist cannot help sometimes overpowering the strings. The late great cellist and teacher Felix Salmon, exhorting the string players in his student groups, used to say: “Just look at its size!”

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

New York Philharmonic

New York Philharmonic
Alan Gilbert, conductor
Lisa Batiashvili, violin
Avery Fisher Hall, New York, NY
June 12, 2010
Alan Gilbert

Alan Gilbert

This concert was the first of three to be conducted by Alan Gilbert this month to conclude his opening season as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic. His adventurous, imaginative programming has brought us more contemporary works than have been heard here for many years. One of the most prominently featured composers was Magnus Lindberg (b. 1958) from Finland, whom Gilbert installed as the Philharmonic’s Composer-in-Residence. Indeed, the current season opened with one of Lindberg’s works, EXPO, and this program began with the Philharmonic premiere of another, Arena for Orchestra. Commissioned to write the required test work for the first Sibelius Conductors’ Competition in 1995, Lindberg deliberately made it an obstacle course for the conductor, with frequent tempo and meter changes and drastic textural and dynamic contrasts. Scored for an enormous orchestra whose percussion section uses every known and some unknown instruments, it begins in a sonic haze, but soon erupts into brass fanfares; occasionally something resembling a melody tries to emerge, but is immediately driven away by the next outburst of brass and percussion. Gilbert has performed the work many times and conducted it with confidence and authority; the Philharmonic negotiated all the hurdles with admirable aplomb. The composer was present to share the applause.

The program’s soloist was the phenomenal young Georgian violinist, Lisa Batiashvili, in the Sibelius Concerto. It has become her signature piece since, aged 16, she won second prize as the youngest-ever competitor at the 1995 Sibelius Competition. After that, her career on stage and recording became meteoric, and no wonder. She has the flair of a virtuoso without the flourishes and mannerisms. Her technique is dazzling, but she never calls attention to it, making the most hair-raising fireworks seem as easy as breathing, blithely taking risks with supreme confidence. Her tone, enhanced by a famous Stradivarius violin, is gorgeous, capable of infinite variations of color, nuance and intensity. Best of all, her playing is expressive but never exaggerated or fussy, and her stage presence, too, is simple and natural. From the Concerto’s icy, misty beginning, the stormy climaxes built up organically; the slow movement was all inward tenderness, the Finale all driving, rocking energy. 

Lisa Batiashvili

Lisa Batiashvili

The program ended with Brahms’ Second Symphony in a lovely performance that balanced dignity with exuberance, warmth with austerity, repose with excitement. The orchestra played splendidly.  

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

The European String Quartet Tradition in America:The Henschel, Kuss, Orion and American in Performance

June, 2010; New York, NY
The American String Quartet

The American String Quartet

Central Europe has always been regarded as the cradle of the classical chamber music performance tradition. Its basic elements were inner involvement, outward restraint, respect for the composer’s style and intentions, and observance of the letter and spirit of the score. In America, the seeds of such a tradition were planted comparatively recently, but flowered in a dazzling proliferation of string quartets much sooner than anyone expected. This was aided in part by the immigration of a large number of European quartets, such as the Galimir, Busch, Budapest, Kolisch, and Pro Arte, who passed their knowledge, experience, and dedication to living composers on to a younger generation of musicians. These have now become the guardians of the venerable old tradition, while their European counterparts seem to have cut themselves off from their roots and moved in an entirely different direction. This was illustrated by recent concerts of four quartets: two German and two American.

Formed in 1994, the Henschel Quartet is a family affair: its players are violinists Christoph and Markus Henschel, violist Monika Henschel-Schwind, and cellist Mathias Beyer-Karlshoj; the Kuss Quartet’s players are violinists Jana Kuss and Oliver Wille, violist William Coleman, and cellist Mikayel Hakhnazaryan. Both groups have won prestigious international prizes and perform in concerts and festivals world-wide. The Henschel was invited to play Haydn’s “Seven Last Words” for the Pope last March.

Technically, both groups are equal to every challenge; their intonation and ensemble are impeccable, their phrasing and dynamics unanimous, their tone is vibrant and intense. Musically, they overdo everything; emphasizing contrast, speed, energy and drive, they lack repose and inwardness, so perhaps it is natural that they showed more affinity for the contemporary works on their programs than for the classical and romantic ones. Indeed, the Kuss’ players say they have “given much thought on how to restore the string quartet to where it once stood at the cutting edge of cultural and compositional life.”

The Henschel’s playing is extroverted, aggressive, over-projected, powerful, often harsh in sound, with stark contrasts and great liberties taken; sometimes every measure had a different tempo, and rhythms were wildly distorted. The cellist is unusually strong, and the first violinist is clearly the “boss,” leading ostentatiously and missing no chance to display his virtuosity. At its April 11 concert, a late Haydn quartet lost its elegance, humor and graciousness, and the whimsical, waltz-like Trio became a showpiece for the first violin. Schumann’s Quartet No. 1 was long on forcefulness, short on poetic intimacy, ardor and tenderness. In contrast, the Adagio of Barber’s Quartet Op. 11 sounded rich and lyrical, and Erwin Schulhoff’s Quartet of 1924 was riveting. Born in Prague in 1894, Schulhoff perished in a Nazi concentration camp in 1942, but though the quartet was written long before the Germans invaded his country, it has a dark, foreboding, grotesque quality, which the Henschel brought vividly to life. The Kuss’ style is less assertive and willful and more democratic than the Henschel’s. Yet at its April 9 concert, the playing, while efficient and polished, was a bit superficial. Tempi were too fast to capture the grace and expressiveness of Mozart’s “Hunt,” or the good humor and passion of Brahms’ Quartet No. 3. It was the performance of Alban Berg’s Quartet Op. 3 that was most persuasive. The players projected the work’s urgency, intensity and lyricism, and, despite its dense texture, brought out the themes, lines and voices.

The American String Quartet (Peter Winograd and Laurie Carney, violinists, Daniel Avshalomov, violist, Wolfram Koessel, cellist) was formed in 1974; the Orion Quartet (Daniel and Todd Philips, brothers and alternating violinists, Steven Tenenbom, violist, Timothy Eddy, cellist) in 1987. Both embody the essential traditional qualities of quartet-playing: tonal beauty, technical control without showiness, expressiveness without excess, and projection tempered with intimacy. They are equally at home in the standard literature and the works of living composers; the American has commissioned, premiered and recorded quartets by Richard Danielpour, Kenneth Fuchs, and Curt Cacioppo, the Orion quartets by Leon Kirchner, Wynton Marsalis and John Harbison, among many others. Both groups also continue another important tradition: they train future chamber musicians through residencies in colleges, conservatories and festivals.

The Orion’s concert on April 18 included Brahms’ Piano Quintet with Peter Serkin, Beethoven’s “Harp” Quartet, and a work written for the group: Kirchner’s Quartet No. 4. The players’ style is distinguished by its warmth, expressiveness, fraternal ensemble and tonal and emotional balance. Their immersion in the Beethoven Quartets began with a series of free concerts for the Millenium, and includes a recording of the cycle. Serkin has played the Brahms with many great quartets; he fitted into the ensemble with uncanny unanimity, and never overpowered the strings – an extraordinary feat.

The American’s program on May 1 began and ended with late Schubert: the Quartettsatz in C minor and the great G major Quartet, flanking Berg’s Quartet Op. 3 and Webern’s Five Movements Op. 5. The performances were beautiful, as always: technically flawless, tonally vibrant, involved and concentrated.
The European string quartet tradition is in good hands – in America

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

Benjamin Britten: Noye’s Fludde

The Church of the Transfiguration, New York, NY
June 6, 2010

Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) composed his chamber opera “Noye’s Fludde” in 1957 specifically for church performance. Writing for musicians and actor/singers, all a mix of professionals and amateurs, and a large group of children, he deliberately kept his music simple, accessible, tonal, and only mildly dissonant. The text is based on W.H. Auden’s adaptation of a Chester mystery play, and tells the story of how God commanded Noah to build the Ark and save himself, his family, and assorted animals from the impending storm and flood. Noah’s wife is depicted as a shrew; she refuses to leave, but is overpowered by her husband and their children, and, once on the Ark, gives up her resistance. The audience is invited to join in the singing of three hymns, and given a chance to learn the tunes during the first of several verses.

The lovely Church of the Transfiguration (affectionately known as “The Little Church Around the Corner”) was an ideal setting for this endearing, intimate work. Judging from the performers’ names, the production was a community effort, with entire families participating in various capacities. Conducted by the Church’s Music Director, Claudia Dumschat, the performance was a delight.

The work begins with the percussion erupting in a frightening imitation of the coming storm; then God’s voice is heard through a loudspeaker. The trumpets go into glorious action to announce and celebrate good news; two pianists at one piano provide a harmonic framework; the organ adds sonority in the climaxes; the orchestration – for strings, recorders, percussion and handbells – is so discreet and the playing at this performance was so fine and sensitive that the instruments never covered the voices.

The staging used the Church’s layout to good advantage. The cast entered through the aisles, affording the audience a close-up view. The singing, acting and dancing were excellent; Andrew Martens’ Noah, Leslie Middlebrook’s Mrs. Noah, the Gossips, and several of the older children stood out. Some of the younger children were at times unsure of the pitches and their voices were a bit shrill. However, all the children’s performances were admirable, natural and spontaneous, carefully coached but not drilled. Their animal costumes were simple but imaginative; one hopes they will wear them again at Halloween.

The Church’s Boys’ Choir got its turn in the spotlight in the program’s opening works. The oldest such choir in New York, it is the only one not affiliated with a school. Coming from various backgrounds, its 16 members are selected by audition and rehearse several times a week. Their seriousness and hard work showed in their performance of Vivaldi’s Laudamus Te, Parry’s Jerusalem, and especially Franck’s Panis Angelicus, which featured an impressively talented boy soprano, Ajonte Anderson. The arrangement was by bassist/composer Victor Kioulaphides, who also contributed an original work called Purcelliana; a slow prelude and a lively canon, it was played beautifully by the strings.

The audience displayed as much involvement and enthusiasm as the performers; a record number of flashing cell phones preserved this enjoyable, successful event.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

Sing for the Cure

Sing for the Cure
A Concert for Healing & Hope
Distinguished Concerts Orchestra International
Distinguished Concerts Singers International
Carnegie Hall: Stern Auditorium, New York, NY
June 6, 2010

DCINY

DCINY – Heartsongs- “Photo by Stefan Cohen/DCINY Production.”

This unusual concert was less a musical than an emotional event. The first of its two parts (each of which could have filled an entire program), was called “Heartsongs” and celebrated the life and poetry of Mattie Stepanek, who died just before his 14th birthday of a rare neuromuscular disease; his words were set to music by Joseph Martin. Pamela Martin Tomlinson provided the text for the second part, called “Sing for the Cure”: ten poems, linked by a narration, based on stories told by breast cancer survivors and the families of those who died. The musical settings were by ten composers: Michael Cox, Alice Gomez, Rosephanye Powell, Robert Seeley, Jill Gallina, Patti Drennan, Stefania de Kennessey, David Friedman, W.T Greer III, and Joseph Martin.

Receiving its world premiere, “Heartsongs” was performed by six children’s choruses from Texas, Mississippi and Tennesee, conducted competently but a bit phlegmatically by Stephen Roddy; “Sing for the Cure” featured four adult choruses from Ohio, Florida, Georgia, and Texas, conducted with enormous verve, authority and involvement by Timothy Seelig. Getting all these choruses from so many places together must have been a formidable undertaking. With their parts thoroughly learned, they congregated two days before the performance in New York, where the children’s and adults’ choirs each rehearsed for eight hours.

The children, singing from memory, were accompanied by a small orchestra, the adults by a huge one; its percussion section, manned by four players, contained not only five timpani of different sizes, but seemed to include every percussion instrument known to mankind. The stage was full to bursting, producing an impressive visual effect that was further enhanced by the singers’ clothes: the children’s were black, but, for reasons unexplained, a few boys wore silver vests; the adults’ were multi-colored; all wore long pink scarves.

The music, with its simple, semi-popular tunes usually doubled by voices and instruments would have been more at home in a Hollywood studio than a New York concert hall. Martin’s “Heartsongs” included adaptations of spirituals and a conflation of “Simple Gifts” with the famous theme from Dvorák’s “New World” Symphony. The vocal writing was almost entirely in unison; the majority of the songs were slow. In the second part, the unison was partly replaced by thirds and sixths, and there was more variety of tempo and character. The most successful songs were those derived from waltzes, blues, gospel shouts and jazz, with the singers swaying lustily to the rhythms. Numerous impressive soloists stepped out from the chorus, singly and in groups.

The orchestra was a tower of strength, offering solid, sensitive, but unobtrusive support. In addition to the percussionists, special praise is due to concertmaster Jorge Avila, who played many demanding, stratospheric solos brilliantly, and to pianist Russ Rieger, who provided what sounded like an improvised background to the second part’s narration, subtly modulating from one song to the next.

But there was no doubt that the evening’s primary impact came from its literary and human components. Mattie Stepanek’s “Heartsongs” were introduced by his mother, who is herself suffering from the same disease and came on stage in a wheelchair, with a ventilator, accompanied by her service dog. Mattie reportedly started writing poems at the age of three and never stopped. Expressing hope, faith, and a deep appreciation of nature and beauty, they were described as “inspirational” and were clearly “inspired” by what he heard from the people around him, who must have been extraordinary themselves. In addition to being sung, the poems were read and narrated by two famous rock stars, Nile Rodgers and Billy Gilman.

Pamela Tomlinson’s words were narrated by Rene Syler, a cancer survivor. They described the reactions of cancer patients to the various stages of their illness, and also the responses of their families to the roller-coaster of hope, despair and loss. Perhaps most wrenching were several sections focusing on mothers and children. In one, an adult daughter recounted a recurrent dream of being visited by the mother she lost as a child; it must have broken the hearts of everyone present, not only those who have lost a mother.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

An Evening of American Song: “And If the Song Be Worth a Smile”

An Evening of American Song:
“And If the Song Be Worth a Smile”
Lisa Delan, soprano
Kristin Pankonin, piano
Matt Haimovitz, cello
The Allen Room, Frederick P. Rose Hall, Jazz at Lincoln Center
May 21, 2010, New York, NY

This concert of songs by six living American composers was presented by PentaTone Classics to celebrate its release of Lisa Delan’s recording of the program, also entitled “And if the Song be Worth a Smile.” Three of the composers – Gordon Getty, David Garner, and Luna Pearl Woolf – were present; Woolf’s cycle was written for Ms. Delan and her pianist, Kristin Pankonin, whose empathetic support contributed greatly to the evening’s success.

Lisa Delan

Lisa Delan

Of the Three Folk Songs arranged by Jake Heggie (b. 1961), two were plaintive, one was cheeky and chattering. The accompaniments underlined the melodies’ mood and character, but were often too elaborate. “Cabaret Songs” by William Bolcom (b. 1938), on texts by Arnold Weinstein, evoked sensuousness, inebriation, and yearning.

“Odas de Todo Mundo” (“Odes for Everyone”) by Luna Pearl Woolf (1973), to poems by Pablo Neruda and sung in Spanish, were commissioned by Ms. Delan. The music mirrored the mercurial changes of the poetry – Latin dance rhythms, descriptions of nature and the human condition – and ended in a blaze of exuberance. The performers were joined by the composer’s husband, cellist Matt Haimovitz, renowned for his masterful playing and his multi-faceted career. Once a famously talented prodigy, he is now a versatile, communicative artist; in a demanding part tailored to his virtuosity and beautiful tone, he added intense, compelling power to the performance.

Three Cabaret Songs by Corigliano (b. 1938) to poems by Mark Adamo poked fun at various aspects of the musical experience, punning on the atonalists’ tone-rows, parodying the latest electronic recording device, lampooning the transformation of the friendly neighborhood record store into an impersonal coffee-bar. The songs sounded less “cabaret”-influenced than Bolcom’s, but, like much of Corigliano’s music, bore traces of many other styles. Though Mss. Delan and Pankonin had performed the songs separately, this was the complete set’s premiere.

Getty (b. 1933) wrote his own poetry for his three-song cycle, “Poor Peter:” a pensive love song, a rollicking dance with surprising, quirky rhythms, and a mournful, pleading ballad sung by an old beggar (recalling the blind “Harpist” of Goethe and Schubert). Words and music mimicked the style of Merrie Olde England, with words like “easterly” and “southerly.” The program’s title is taken from the third song.

The seven-song cycle “Phenomenal Woman” by Garner (1954) incorporated jazz, blues, rock and cabaret styles. The proudly feminist poems by Maya Angelou ranged from defiance, protest, and tongue-in-cheek self-promotion to religious fervor and resignation.

Lisa Delan has made these songs entirely her own, textually and musically. Her voice encompasses a wide range and she can color and inflect it for mood and expression. Her excellent diction was especially important in the humorous songs. She used “light” amplification to reflect the sound back to the performers; this made it difficult to fully judge the quality of her voice, and probably caused some shrillness in the topmost register and some imbalance with the instruments. She was most persuasive in the slow, lyrical, pensive songs; the fast, skittish ones seemed least suited to her voice and stage presence.

The audience’s warm response proved that all the songs were worth a smile, so Mr. Haimovitz returned for an encore: Ms. Woolf’s trio arrangement of Getty’s “The Going from a World We Know.”

Makers, dealers, and experts in violins, violas, 'cellos, and their bows

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

Victor Goldberg, piano

Victor Goldberg, piano
Pro Musicis
Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY
April 21, 2010

Victor Goldberg is an excellent pianist with a formidable technique, a powerful tone, and a romantic soul (and a distracting habit of tossing his hands way up). Russian-born, he has studied, performed and won competitions in Europe, Israel and America, and is the recipient of the 2008 Pro Musicis International Award.

His Weill Recital Hall concert, rather enigmatically entitled “From the Depths of the Creative Spirit,” showed his pianistic strengths, emotional projection, and stylistic versatility. Except for Domenico Scarlatti’s famous E major Sonata – played with filigree delicacy, crystal-clear runs and elegant leaps – the program featured music of the 19th and 20th centuries. The beginning of Chopin’s B-flat minor Scherzo immediately demonstrated that Goldberg subscribes to a key element of today’s performing style: utmost dynamic contrast. The opening figure’s ominous whisper and the crashing chords following it seemed to skirt the outer limits of the instrument’s sound, a tendency toward extremes that continued throughout the concert. But within these parameters, Mr. Goldberg has a wide range of nuances and colors, which he used with great skill and imagination.

Shostakovich wrote his second Sonata in 1942 during Hitler’s infamous siege of Leningrad that claimed 632,000 lives. One of the victims was Shostakovich’s teacher Leonid Nikolaev, to whose memory the sonata is dedicated. The Shostakovich family had been evacuated from the besieged city, but, though composed in the comparative safety of the countryside, the sonata has an eerie, unsettled quality and a desolate ending; Mr. Goldberg’s intensely expressive performance had a powerful emotional impact.

The program’s highlight was Brahms’ Variations on a Theme by Handel, one of the most daunting masterpieces of the repertoire. Goldberg met its instrumental and musical challenges with masterful technical and tonal command. Combining careful planning with spontaneity, austerity with romantic passion, he made the variations building blocks in an overarching structure, yet he also brought out their individual characters, using the repeats to underline different voices. With the final fugue as a true culmination, it was a most impressive performance. Responding to the audience’s enthusiasm, he played encores by Debussy, Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

The Madison String Quartet

The Madison String Quartet
Musica de Camara
Museum of the City of New York, NY
April 11, 2010

Founded and directed by Eva de La O, Musica de Camara has been presenting Hispanic musicians for 30 years in concert halls, community centers, churches, libraries and museums—often for audiences with little access to classical music. One of its recent discoveries is the Madison String Quartet, an adventurous, enthusiastic young group dedicated to exploring the Hispanic literature, for whose idiomatic rhythms and colors the players have a natural affinity. The performance, apart from some intonation problems in octaves and unisons, was admirable: secure, well-balanced, expressive, homogeneous in sound, unanimous in spirit.

In a quartet arrangement of Four for Tango by Astor Piazzolla, the players exploited all the resources of their instruments, including harmonics, slides, and knocking on the wood to imitate percussion. Teresa Carreno was born in Venezuela but spent most of her life in France and Germany. One of the first great women pianists and famous as a formidable virtuoso, she was also a conductor, singer and composer. Her String Quartet in B minor was written in the 1870’s during her marriage to the first of her four husbands, the violinist Emile Sauret. A substantial, four-movement work, it is clearly influenced by German romanticism; the Scherzo recalls Mendelssohn, the slow movement sings, the corner movements are fast, intense and turbulent. Its weakness lies in the modulations, that ultimate test of compositional skill. All four parts have demanding solos, which the players negotiated with panache.

The program’s most unusual work, which the Quartet recorded in 2004, was Miguel del Aguila’s Life is a Dream, inspired by Caldéron de la Barca’s play of the same title, La vida es sueno. It opened with three players on stage producing eerie-sounding tremolos with their bows behind the bridge; the first violinist, heard off-stage playing very virtuosic music, eventually joined them. All four musicians took turns reciting portions of Caldéron’s poem while playing; the music built to an intense climax, recapitulated the spooky beginning and faded away. The poetry and the music are arresting enough to stand alone; they did not seem to add anything to each other.

The audience demanded and got an encore: Aldemoro Romero’s Fuga con Pajarillo, Variations on a popular Venezuelan folksong. A fun piece, it began like a Bach Contrapunctus and became an intricate maze of multi-layered rhythms.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

Temple University Symphony Orchestra

Temple University Symphony Orchestra
Louis Biava, conductor;
Terell Stafford, trumpet
Alice Tully Hall, New York, NY
April 9, 2010


This concert “celebrated the American creative spirit” by combining photography and music. The program featured the “three B’s” American style – Barber, Bernstein, and Brubeck (Dave and his son Chris) – and included two New York premieres: the Brubecks’ “Ansel Adams: America,” and Bill Cunliffe’s fourth stream… La Banda (The Band). Composers Dave Brubeck and Bill Cunliffe were present, as were several members of Adams’ family.

The program’s only non-jazz work was Samuel Barber’s 1942 Essay No. 2, three continuous movements, the first slow and stately, the second an energetic fugue, and the third a “solemn chorale.” In Leonard Bernstein’s own symphonic arrangement of the Three Dances from his “On the Town,” the orchestra admirably captured the nostalgia of the middle section and the vibrant liveliness of the outer dance movements.

The program’s centerpiece was “Ansel Adams: America,” the Brubecks’ collaborative work written to accompany a projection on screen of Adams’ photographs of the American West. The concept was inspired by the composers’ discovery that Adams intended to become a concert pianist until, overwhelmed by the scenic beauty of Yosemite, he turned to photography instead. At the concert, the orchestra performed the music while Adams’ photographic images were displayed on a huge screen behind it. Proceeding without pause or interruption, this visual and auditory experience created a riveting cumulative impact. However, concentrating on both eventually became difficult; and, since each element was absorbing and beautiful enough to stand on its own, one began to wonder whether the simultaneity acted as an enhancement or a distraction.

Bill Cunliffe cites as his inspiration John Lewis and the Modern Jazz Quartet as well as the distinctive rhythms of Latin music. For his La Banda, a jazz band with a large percussion section was added to the orchestra; the players were splendid, but so enthusiastic that they obliterated virtually everything else. Trumpeter Terell Stafford was fine but also had only one dynamic: fortissimo. The orchestra, apart from some doubtful intonation in the winds, was excellent throughout. Maestro Luis Biava was at home in every style and in full command of his forces. The audience was extremely responsive, but included a large group of friends whose behavior was more suitable to a private party than a public cultural event.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY

SoNoRo Festival Bucharest

Ensemble Raro:Diana Ketler, piano;
Alexander Sitkovetsky, violin;
Razvan Popovici, viola;
Bernhard Naoki Heidenborg, cello;
Roxana Constantinescu, guest mezzo-soprano
Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall
New York, NY
February 16, 2010

Formed in 2004, Ensemble Raro (named after Master Raro, the wise old arbiter of Schumann’s imaginary Davidsbündler) must be one of the best, most versatile young groups before the public. Resident Ensemble of the SoNoRo Festival, founded in 2006 by violist Popovici, the group appears in concert halls world-wide; this was its New York debut. SoNoRo has released two recordings, and fosters living composers through performances, and young musicians through scholarships.

The players of Ensemble Raro, who also pursue individual, solo, chamber music and teaching careers, are splendid technically, musically and communicatively, making this a true collaboration of equals. Although they were born and trained in different countries, their rapport is so close that they seem to share and anticipate one another’s whims and wishes; the strings’ tone, which is warm and expressive, blends together without losing its variety or individual timbre, and their intonation is impeccable, as they take over lines imperceptibly on the same note. Totally immersed in the music, they never call attention to themselves by sound or gesture. The only flaw, endemic to this combination, is the balance, which favors the (wide-open) piano, despite pianist Ketler’s obvious sensitivity.

Their program featured two novelties by Enescu and Peteris Vasks. Enescu’s Sept chansons de Clément Marot combines Romanian folk melodies with medieval modes and elegant French sophistication. Mezzo-soprano Constantinescu and pianist Ketler brought out the songs’ different character and moods beautifully. Born in 1946, Peteris Vasks gained recognition in the 1990s and has received several European honors and prizes. His Piano Quartet (2000-2001) is extremely difficult and almost unremittingly intense. The strings often alternate with the piano in textures featuring solos, duets, chordal unisons, long glissandi, double stops, and drones. Some of its six movements flow together, some are obsessively repetitive, and all have powerful climaxes (Vasks calls one “a black hole”). The Raro Ensemble introduced it in Germany and England; in this New York premiere, their performance was committed and authoritative.

The players’ youthful romanticism showed to fine advantage in a wonderfully spontaneous, exuberant, expressive but unsentimental performance of Schumann’s Piano Quartet. But the playing of the slow movement of Brahms’ C Minor Piano Quartet as an encore was even more impressive for its deeply felt inwardness.

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by Edith Eisler  for New York Concert Review; New York, NY