Pro Musicis presents in Review Solange Merdinian, mezzo-soprano; Laetitia Grimaldi, soprano; Ammiel Bushakevitz, piano; Ciro Fodere, piano in Review
Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, NY
October 11, 2022
Founded in 1965, the prestigious arts organization, Pro Musicis, is a Paris and New York based non-profit which stresses internationalism and diversity. Their mission, as stated in the printed program, is to “awaken the human spirit,” and their artists are chosen for both their “high level of performance and their passion for social outreach.
Tonight’s concert featured two singers and two pianists, all multi-national and multi-lingual. Mezzo-soprano Solange Merdinian in (who won a 2019 Pro Musicis International Award) is an Armenian-Argentinian-American; soprano Laetitia Grimaldi (who won a Pro Musicis International Award in 2017) was born in France and grew up in Lisbon and London; pianist Ammeil Bushakevitz (who also won a Pro Musicis International Award in 2017) was born in Jerusalem, raised in South Africa, and studied in Leipzig and Paris; and pianist Ciro Fodere is from Uruguay and now lives in the United States. The performers’ multi-national backgrounds led to a most interesting and unusual selection of music.
This program of mostly unfamiliar music was bookended by two very familiar vocal duets- the Flower Duet from Lakmé, by Léo Delibes, and the Barcarolle from Les Contes d’Hoffmann, by Jacques Offenbach. As the two women launched into the Flower Duet, I was immediately struck by how well the two voices blended and how perfectly in synch they were in terms of both dynamics and tempo. Without looking at each other they executed the small ritards and diminuendos as if with one voice. Their voices are well matched in terms of size and timbre, Ms. Merdinian’s strong mezzo balancing Ms. Grimaldi’s higher but equally rich soprano. I thought they must have been singing together for years. Not so! I found out later that, although they were good friends, having once lived in New York at the same time, and having long nursed a desire to collaborate, this wish was unrealized until October 10, 2022, the very day before this concert! Here is the story: Ms. Grimaldi now lives in Paris and Ms. Merdinian in Miami. Plans were made to meet in New York City several days before this concert to rehearse. However, Ms. Grimaldi’s air travel plans went awry, as happens so often these days, and it wasn’t until noon on October 10, one day before the concert that her plane touched down at Kennedy Airport. They met at a studio in Manhattan and rehearsed that afternoon. On the afternoon of the day of the concert, just a few hours before their performance, they had their dress rehearsal in the hall. Forget about jet lag! Forget about resting the voice before a big performance! The show must go on!
After a soothingly lovely performance of the Flower Duet, Ms. Merdinian left the stage, and Ms. Grimaldi and Mr. Bushakevitz performed three songs by Rachmaninoff: Spring Waters, How Peaceful It Is Here, and What Happiness. Ms. Grimaldi’s exciting voice projects well throughout her registers. In the songs of Rachmaninoff the piano writing is often virtuosic. The composer is considered to have been one of the greatest pianists of all time. A smaller voice might have been overpowered, but Ms. Grimaldi held her own as the brilliant Mr. Bushakevitz flew through the difficult passages with panache. There was one problem, however. As is customary, the texts of the songs were printed in the program. This is of the greatest importance because, without this aid, the listener doesn’t know what the song is saying; the title gives only a general idea. But it was too dark to comfortably read in the audience area of Weill Recital Hall! This happens frequently in song recitals, and it implies a lack of appreciation for the poetry. Singers spend a great deal of time thinking about and analyzing texts and then working to reflect their subtleties with voice and gesture. I would recommend that the performers, who put in all this work, make a point of letting the house know that the lights should be bright enough for the texts to be read with ease. For, although Ms. Grimaldi sang with commitment and passion, there were, no doubt, subtleties in her delivery which I, who speak no Russian, could not perceive.
For the next set, Ms. Merdinian, accompanied by the always excellent Mr. Fodere, sang four Armenian songs: The Rose, by Romanos Melikyan, (1883-1935), The Sad Little Girl, and My Sweet Harp, by Khachatur Avedisian, (1926-1996) and Song of Merriment, by Aram Khachaturian (1903-1978). These folk-like songs, alternately sad and joyous, are obviously dear to Ms. Merdinian’s heart, and her compelling and plangent voice was a perfect vehicle for them.
The balance of the first half of the program was given over to music by women. Ms. Grimaldi and Mr. Bushakevitz returned to the stage and gave a fine performance of Clara Schumann’s Lorelei. Then Ms. Grimaldi lent her lustrous soprano to Songe (Dream) by the little-known French Composer, Mélanie Bonis, commonly known as Mel Bonis. To end the set, stormy seas were evoked in After the Squall, by the English composer Ethel Smyth (1858-1944).
The concert’s first half concluded with both singers, accompanied by Mr. Bushakevitz, performing Titania’s Lullaby from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by the Argentinian composer Lucia Caruso (b.1980). This duet was composed for a concert in Stratford-upon-Avon honoring the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. It is an attractive tonal piece with a few well-placed dissonances. The fine diction of the two women was gratifying as they exhorted spotted snakes, newts, spiders, beetles and worms to “come not near our fairy queen.”
Ms. Merdinian and Mr. Fodere began the second half with short songs by six composers: the Spaniard, Fernando Obradors (1897-1945), the Argentinians Carlos Guastavino (1912-2000), Alberto Ginastera (1916-1983), Carlos López Buchardo (1881-1948), Pablo Ziegler (b.1944) and finally, another Spaniard, Jerónimo Giménez (1854-1923). A typically Spanish mood prevailed with frequent imitations of guitars in the piano part and sultry vocalizing and seductive gestures by the singer. The last song of the set, La Tarantula, by Giménez, brought down the house as Ms. Merdinian ended it on a high note with her hands above her head. Her childhood in Argentina was not wasted!
Neither was Ms. Grimaldi’s Lisbon upbringing, as was evidenced in the next set. She was accompanied, as before by Mr. Bushakevitz in Brazil’s Heitor Villa-Lobos’s Melodia Sentimental, from Florets do Amasonas, Villa-Lobos’s foray into movie music. Two works by Obradores followed and then, in a delightful twist, we heard the French composer Delibes’s take on Spanish music in Les Filles de Cadix.
The well-loved Barcarolle from Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann gently completed the program. The happy audience, with loud applause and cries of bravo, leapt to its feet and was then rewarded with Vidila, a duet by Carlos López Buchardo.
