Two Orchestras, One Symphony: Jacques Hetu – Symphony No.5
National Arts Centre Orchestra Canada; Orchestre Symphonique du Québec; Toronto Mendelssohn Choir; Alexander Shelley
Analekta AN2 8890 (nac-cna.ca/en/orchestra/recordings/hetu-5)

The combined forces of two orchestras and a symphonic choir, all under the superb leadership of conductor Alexander Shelley, came together in March, 2024 for this magnificent recording of Jacques Hétu’s bold work. Indeed, it was a work the composer was never to hear in performance, as he passed away three weeks before its premiere in February, 2010.  

This recording is a reminder of Hétu’s skill and significance as one of Canada’s finest composers. Having studied as a young man with Clermont Pépin and Jean-Papineau Couture in Canada and Lukas Foss at Tanglewood, he went to Paris in 1961, won the Prix D’Europe and furthered his studies with Henri Dutilleux and Olivier Messiaen. 

Paris is the subject of the fifth symphony, with programmatic titles depicting pre-World War II, the Invasion, the Occupation and, finally, a complex and glorious choral finale to the text of Liberté by Paul Elouard (brilliantly set previously by Francis Poulenc in his cantata Figure humaine). Hétu’s setting is defiant and harmonically thrilling. The whole symphony packs an emotional punch and possesses an anti-totalitarian message that’s important to hear at this particular time. 

The performance is sincere and committed, with some fine wind and brass solo work. The choir’s sound is full and strong. The recording was the culmination of a number of live performances during an extensive tour through Ontario and Québec. It is a tribute to the close association that the NACO had with the composer over many years, having premiered his third symphony in 1971 (under Mario Bernardi’s direction) and taken it on a tour of Europe in 1990. Alexander Shelley continues to develop important large-scale projects at the National Arts Centre for which we can be grateful and proud. 

Three of Twelve and Another
Graham Flett
Redshift Records (redshiftmusicsociety.bandcamp.com/album/three-of-twelve-and-another)

Ontario composer Graham Flett’s album of two electric guitar works has an intriguing backstory. The composer writes, “One summer I happened upon an old 12-string guitar that was extremely but very intriguingly out-of-tune. Hearing it made me consider how an ensemble of such out-of-tune guitars might sound.” Inspired by that untuned chance encounter Flett began to explore four separate, yet related guitar tunings of the conventional 6-string electric guitar. In the final score he meticulously stipulates the tuning of each of the 24 strings of the four guitars, their web of interrelationships taking into consideration string harmonics and other acoustic phenomena. 

There’s also poetry. Flett took inspiration from W.H. Auden’s Twelve Songs. Thus, the three movements of his Music for Four Retuned Electric Guitars are tagged with Auden’s poetic phrases characterising each movement: the silent statue; the smokeless hill; the hot sun. Stillness, heat and perhaps negative space are being evoked.

The second work Unadorned, for solo electric guitar, is no less complex sounding. Here Flett explores a continuous series of three-note chords employing many harmonic groupings. The use of messa di voce - a musical swell here applied to a guitar note or chord - removes the initial attack of the plucked guitar strings, leaving puffs of sonic clouds to linger, gently pulse or grate against each other. It’s an album signature. 

Spain-based guitarist Elliot Simpson, who took on the considerable task of retuning and then multi-tracking the guitars, renders these enigmatic, challenging works with commitment, elegant musicianship and attention to detail.

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Imagine Many Guitars
Tim Brady; Instruments of Happiness; Bronwyn Thies-Thompson; Janelle Lucyk; Sarah Albu; Marie-Annick Beliveau
Redshift Records TK550 (redshiftmusicsociety.bandcamp.com/album/imagine-many-guitars)

Imagine Many Guitars is real; a well-thought out and brilliantly performed electric guitar recording by Montreal-based Tim Brady, who composed, played and recorded all the guitar lines, which he multi-tracks in the four compositions here.

The opening 25-minuteThis one is broken in pieces: Symphony #11 (2019-2024) is held together by Brady’s eight electric guitars (with effects pedals), and overdubbed sopranos Bronwyn Thies-Thompson, Janelle Lucyk, Sarah Albu and Marie-Annick Béliveau singing texts taken from the late Ian Ferrier’s book Coming & Going (2015). This very symphonic music with classical and contemporary overtones features guitar effect backdrops to guitar grooves alternating with vocals – suspenseful a cappella singing and moving spoken lines. Guitar strums and held notes add an echo effect to high sung notes.

Slow, Simple (2022) for 20 electric guitars is not really simple sonically but is easy-listening! The tempo is slow, with Brady’s low held chords opening and the guitars build as the chords slowing change with simultaneous descending lead lines, held notes, strumming, single note atonal lines and held note effects.  

Five Times: four guitars (2022), a shorter five-movement change of pace, features a more open and playful style and a rocking lead guitar in Everywhere, and more atonal experimental lines resembling playing at home sounds in Alone.  

The earlier four-part work (very) Short Pieces for (jazz) Guitar (1979) shows off a jazzier side of Brady’s playing with clean lines, rhythmic strums and accents.

Brady is amazing and inspirational throughout Imagine Many Guitars.

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Rebecca Bruton – a roof or mirror, blossom, madder, cracks; Jason Doell - together
Quatuor Bozzini; junctQin keyboard collective
Collection Quatuor Bozzini CQB 2433-2 (collectionqb.bandcamp.com/album/rebecca-bruton-jason-doell-a-root-or-mirror-blossom-madder-cracks-together)

Montreal’s internationally renowned contemporary string quartet Quatuor Bozzini is known for championing composers. On this album of two new works, they join forces with Toronto’s junctQín keyboard collective, a trio of expert advocates of the rare art of six-hand piano playing. 

Toronto composer Jason Doell in his performance notes reflects on his work together in poetic terms. It’s “a work born of strange conversation caught in webs that cling to beliefs still continuously being spun….” Early in together a mysterious ppp drone appears. Unlike most drones however, it continuously and very slowly, drifts down in pitch by a disciplined half-tone. While the string quartet skilfully tunes to the shifting drone, the piano cannot. For much of the work’s 20 minutes therefore Doell creates the perception of a transient out-of-tune-ness in the slowly flowing texture as the two sonic components drift apart. The consequent tension is finally relieved by a complex tonal quasi-resolution at the work’s close. 

Alberta composer Rebecca Bruton’s eight-part The Faerie Ribbon consists of four initial movements each with its own magical subtitle, each mirrored by its own alter-version. The string quartet textures are punctuated by deep sustained piano chords, contrasted in two sections by voices singing consonant harmonies. What to make of the title? Faeries in folklore are anthropomorphic liminal creatures associated with nature and magic. In some myths they haunt specific locations and dangerously lead travelers astray. Could Bruton - and Doell - be evoking the power of music to catch us unaware, acting as a transformative agent of the musical medium and listeners alike?

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Butterfly Lightning Shakes the Earth
India Gailey; Symphony Nova Scotia; Karl Herzer
Redshift Records TK552 (redshiftmusicsociety.bandcamp.com/album/butterfly-lightning-shakes-the-earth)

Cellist India Gailey’s latest album continues her dedication to the fusion of natural and supernatural worlds, depicting powerful images of our changing environment while revealing early influences of her Buddhist lineage.

Opening with three miniatures, Mountainweeps (originally written for cellist Arlen Hluska for Instagram posts needing to be around 1 min each), Gailey uses her vast range of minimalist colours to paint the scene of melting glaciers and the migration of creatures following the disappearing ice. With the use of fleeting harmonics, the composer sets the scene for frigid temperatures, and the flowing arpeggiated passages describe fleeing plants and animals. 

This short set aptly sets the stage for Gailey’s first symphonic composition Butterfly Lightening Shakes the Earth, a concerto for cello and orchestra composed during a Banff Residency and premiered with Symphony Nova Scotia under the baton of Karl Hirzer. The first movement, SKY, beginning with heavenly high notes on the cello paired with fluttering harmonics and high triangle chimes throughout the orchestra, is textural while supporting the melody of the cello. The second movement, GOLDEN, blends the double basses and lowest reeds to bring a dark and mysterious element behind the gorgeous melody in the cello, morphing into tonal shifts and scattered drums like oncoming rain and a sudden storm, leading to the third movement, JOINING, where we hear a rainstorm beautifully rendered throughout the orchestra. The heavens seem to break open with a string quartet of almost plaintive chant which quickly grows throughout the ensemble, when the cello bursts into the group with a storm of its own. The sound of birds ebbs and swells again to end in a majestic firestorm of cello pyrotechnics and a mountain of sound. It’s worth a trip over to YouTube to see the capture of this performance as the storm effects are wonderous to watch, and Gailey’s playing is exact and clear while maintaining a natural and relaxed delivery. The future looks very bright for this exceptional artist.

Awake and Dreaming – Music of Alice Ping Yee Ho
Katherine Dowling
Independent (katherinedowling.com)

In her first solo album, pianist Katherine Dowling presents music by Chinese-Canadian composer Alice Ping Yee Ho. Colourful and dynamic, Ho’s writing makes impressive use of the piano’s resources, including some imaginative strumming and plucking of strings, and Dowling relishes the significant technical and interpretive demands of these works with assurance. Dowling has a keen ear for texture and colour, but also an impassioned – even impulsive – sense of forward momentum and line.  

Inspired by Dali, the album’s opening work, Aeon (2012), provides a good sense of Ho’s piano writing as a dramatic and resonant slow introduction leads into a brilliant and driving toccata. Dowling’s characterization of the non-stop passagework is impressive. The most recent work on the album, There is no night without a dawning (2023) was commissioned by Dowling herself for this recording. An elegiac, meditative beginning works up to an agitated climax featuring ringing chords and trills. The album’s emotional high point is The Weeping Woman (2022), inspired by a series of portraits by Picasso. Dowling movingly captures the work’s depiction of the suffering of war, ranging from hushed mystery to searing intensity. Lighter, more playful moods are explored in shorter works such as the scherzo-like Fire of Imagination (1991) and Cyclone (1994), a repeated-note toccata.   

Recorded at the Polaris Centre in Calgary in a resonant but detailed acoustic, Katherine Dowling’s portrait of Ho is an impressive achievement. Her extensive experience with and commitment to contemporary music results in authoritative interpretations, underlining both the drama and the atmosphere of Ho’s piano writing. Highly recommended for anyone interested in contemporary piano music, and the chance to hear music by one of Canada’s most acclaimed composers in compelling and virtuosic performances.

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landscapes of memory – solo piano music by Emilie Cecilia LeBel
Wesley Shen; Luciane Cardassi
Redshift Records TK551 (redshiftmusicsociety.bandcamp.com/album/landscapes-of-memory)

Alberta-based Canadian composer Emilie Cecilia LeBel’s landscapes of memory features her subtle, delicate compositional style in two solo piano works with extensions. Both are over 30 minutes in length, inspired by nature, and each is performed by the work’s commissioner. A distinct highlight is LeBel’s use of EBows, electromagnetic exciters which are commonly used on electric guitars. The E-Bow is placed inside the piano causing the strings it is put on to create a continuous vibrating drone effect dependent on the pianist’s articulation, volume and tempo.

Toronto pianist Wesley Shen performs ghost geography (2022) which is inspired by the North Saskatchewan River. This is slow, very hypnotic and reflective, using a wide piano range with a repeated held chord, higher interspersed notes, ascending single notes and low tones blending with one continuous quasi-background drone. Especially moving is how the ends of the piano held notes blend with the drone sound.

Brazilian-Canadian pianist Luciane Cardassi performs the five-movement pale forms in uncommon light (2023) which is inspired by the Montane ecoregion in Alberta and its filtering light patterns through trees. The middle register positioned EBow drone is louder throughout, moving string position with each movement. Alternating low, mid-range and high piano notes against the mid-pitched drone creates a shimmer effect.

Both pianists perform brilliantly, effortlessly combining each composition’s inherent texture, resonance and tone colour with the drone. The unique hypnotic slower tempos, chromatic harmonics, held notes and drones are worth the possibly challenging listen.

Kaleidoscope – Contemporary Piano Music by Female Composers from Around the World
Isabel Dobarro
Grand Piano GP944 (naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=GP944)

The Spanish pianist Isabel Dobarro has long championed music by contemporary female composers. Born in Santiago de Compostela in 1992, she studied at the Madrid Royal Conservatory and has been a prize-winner in several competitions. While she has frequently taken part in premieres, this recording, titled Kaleidoscope and featuring the music of 12 female composers all born between 1943 and 1996 is even further proof of her commitment to modern music. The names are perhaps unfamiliar to the average listener and come from different backgrounds, but all are composersDobarro particularly admires for their individualism. 

These compositions may have been written during the last 25 years, but there is little of the avant-garde here; instead, a decidedly neo-Romantic flavour pervades the program, which is marked by contrasts. The disc opens with the languorous Nocturne by the Grammy-nominated Bulgarian composer Dobrinka Tabakova – do I hear echoes of Rachmaninov? Very different in style is the Estudio 3 by Gabriela Ortiz, an angular perpetuum mobile composed in 2007. While Nkeiru Okoye’s Dusk and Suad Bushnak’s Improvisation are quietly introspective, Tania Léon’s Tumbao is all frenetic energy.

Clearly, Dobarro has a deep love for this repertoire. She truly makes these works come alive, combining a sense of tonal warmth with a fine resonance, while demonstrating a flawless technique in the more demanding compositions. At almost 14 minutes, the lengthiest piece on the program is Gustav le Grey by the American Grammy and Pulitzer Prize winner Caroline Shaw. Just as Tabakova’s Nocturne harkens back to Rachmaninov, this piece is more than a nod to Chopin in its quasi-extemporary style and use of mazurka-type rhythms.

Kaleidoscope is aptly titled - a fine performance of engaging music by 12 living female composers whose works deserve greater

Passages
Blackwood
Sanctuary Concerts (jeffreilly.bandcamp.com/album/passages)

For over 25 years, the Canadian instrumental duo Blackwood has performed their lyrical music touching on jazz, classical, improvisation, minimalism and contemporary soundscapes. Talented musicians/improvisors/composers Peter-Anthony Togni (pipe organ/piano) and Jeff Reilly (bass clarinet) work closely together “inspired by plainchant, improvisation and holy minimalism.” Passages features Togni on three different Atlantic Canada pipe organs, and Reilly on bass clarinet in three Togni, and two Togni and Reilly compositions. They are joined by special guest cellist India Gailey on two tracks. 

Togni/Reilly’s Passages is a colourful accessible duet. Repeated lower organ notes form an accompaniment to a glamorous bass clarinet  melody.  The piece builds much louder and then, after a a short silence, birdlike clarinet sounds and organ flourishes are enchanting. Togni’s multi-sectional Benedicite (To Alison Howard) opens with Gailey’s calming cello lines above organ sounds. A short silent break is followed by reflective slow clarinet and cello conversations above organ held notes. It makes for gratifying listening as organ chordal modulations, lyrical cello melody, clarinet flourishes and organ volume builds to another silent break. The next “orchestral” section is highlighted by lyrical cello and clarinet lines to an intriguing closing low organ stop. There are mysterious cello and clarinet lines, cello slides, hilarious low clarinet notes and held organ notes in Togni’s To Look Out Beyond Oneself. Togni’s duet Silentio features contrasting lower clarinet below higher organ notes. Togni/Reilly’s Feathery Spirit is mood-lifting, subtle jazz flavoured with slow/fast bass clarinet, and loud wide-ranging pitched organ. 

Blackwood performs their musical sections as one, creating calming, mesmerizing music.

Esfahan – Chamber Music of Reza Vali
Various Artists
Navona Records NV6647 (navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6647)

At the University of Toronto’s recent New Music Festival, Reza Vali (b.Qazvin, Iran 1952), professor emeritus at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Mellon University, was the Roger D. Moore Distinguished Visitor in Composition. This two-CD collection of his music is named for its longest work, the rhapsodic 15-minute Esfahân (Calligraphy No.17) for string quartet. Persian-infused modal melodies and rhythms celebrate the cultural riches and architectural splendour of everyone’s favourite Iranian city (mine, too; I visited there in 1996). The Carpe Diem String Quartet also performs Vali’s melismatic Châhârgâh (Calligraphy No.19) and the drone-filled Dashti (Calligraphy No.18), featuring vocalises by the musicians and contralto Daphne Alderson.

The shortest work, the four-minute Zand (Calligraphy No.2) for ney (end-blown flute) and string trio is sweet and soulful. I found the over-repetitive, minimalist figurations of Hajiani (Reality Music No.1) for karnâ (valveless trumpet) and electronics less pleasing. Four Persian Mystic Poems for mezzo-soprano, guitar, percussion, harp and piano are set to verses about “love,” “sorrow,” and “eternity” by Hafez, Rumi and Sepehri. They’re sung in Farsi by Kara Cornell, the instrumentalists occasionally adding their voices to the fervent, ecstatic music.

The five-movement Persian Suite No.2 for flute(s), piano and string quintet contains lighter fare, suggesting cinematic travelogue music, except for the fourth movement, a mournful solo for alto flute. Winds and percussion dominate Vali’s four-movement Sornâ (Folk Songs. Set No.17) for Persian wind instruments and ensemble, ending this intriguing collection with a richly exotic, colour-drenched sonic barrage.

From the Sea to the Stars
Lindsay Flowers; Andrew Parker
Navona Records NV6666 (navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6666)

In From the Sea to the Stars, Americans Lindsay Flowers and Andrew Parker present a rich and varied exploration of works for oboe and English horn. The album showcases both contemporary and classical compositions, highlighting the expressive potential of these often overlooked instruments.

Andrea Clearfield’s Daughter of the Sea, a seven-movement piece for oboe and English horn, opens the album with quirky charm. The work is a fascinating blend of timbres, featuring moments where the musicians vocalize to enhance the emotional depth of the piece. Flowers and Parker’s playing is beautifully expressive, with a rich tone color that allows the instruments to blend seamlessly.

Alyssa Morris’ Brokenvention, accompanied by pianist Satoko Hayami, offers a lyrical, introspective moment in the album. This short duet is delicate, with subtle interplay between the oboe and English horn. Erin Goad’s Overheard on a Saltmarsh takes a more melancholy turn, with pensive melodies and dissonant interjections. The work evokes the imagery of nature, with the oboe and English horn creating haunting, almost otherworldly sounds.

Federigo Fiorillo’s Sinfonia Concertante is a delightful nod to the Classical era, showcasing the technical skill and stylistic playing of both performers. The album concludes with Eugene Bozza’s lush Shepherds of Provence: Sous les Étoiles, a beautifully atmospheric duet that complements the unique timbres of the two instruments.

From the Sea to the Stars is a captivating celebration of musical diversity, demonstrating Flowers and Parker’s artistry and the versatility of the oboe family.

The Dawn of the Bicameral Clarinetist
Gary Dranch
Navona Records nv6693 (navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6693)

Pulse-Tide
Liam Hockley
Aural Terrains (liamhockley.bandcamp.com/album/pulse-tide)

What have we done with music? We didn’t invent it, but we have certainly messed around with it. Music is a way we have of organizing sound (I owe John Cage a beer); sound is pervasive, even maddeningly so. No wonder humans take stimuli and organize them, visually or sonically, even kinetically, and often all at once.

Such deep thoughts help me cope with my own prejudices, especially my dislikes, when it comes to assessing the discs I have before me. The Dawn of the Bicameral Clarinetist is a survey of works for solo clarinet and electronic media, dating between 1968 and 1979, by composers whose names may be familiar to those who pay attention to this type of art. Comprehensive accompanying notes about performers, composers as well as performance dates, fill out the story. Clarinetist Gary Dranch demonstrates commitment and virtuosity in service of this niche (one decade, all clarinet, plus or minus electronics), or as he puts it, “time capsule.” It’s interesting, even fascinating. My aesthetic sense is rewarded, and my skepticism about the value of such a retrospective is forced to sit in the back and listen.   

By preference I gravitate to the traditional form of James Drew’s St. Dennis Variations, the most recent work with the most ancient roots. Dranch is an expressive and able player; these recordings may sound a bit raw but it’s because they were initially recorded live on cassette tape! Talk about ancient.

More up-to-date, and yet less satisfying in terms of recording quality, is Liam Hockley’s Pulse Tide. The B.C.-based Hockley performs spectral works for the hound of the clarinet family, the basset horn. Ana-Maria Avram exploits the wolf-ish tone of this somewhat balky beast in Penumbra. Hockley produces a hypnotic, ASMR-inducing quality from a series of multiphonics, flutter and slap tonguing, key clicks and vibrato-laden micro melodies. The dry recording environment sponges up any reverb, which works in a way and seems artificial at the same time; room-bounce has been sponged up.

Artifice also characterizes the charming Egress, by Thanos Chrysakis. An overlay of five tracks all played by Hockley. What an oddity, a humoresque of argumentative fowl. 

Next, Hockley plays un-self-accompanied, i.e. solo, in Aura by Iancu Dumitrescu. I have trouble connecting the title to the series of new-music-y effects. A second listen might have been in order, but life is, after all, short. On content, I think 75% is a good average, and who can account for other tastes than one’s own? 

In contrast, Horatiu Radulescu’s Capricorn’s Nostalgic Crickets, is the capper at 25+ minutes. Not content to provide a mere five voices, Hockley here plays seven overlay tracks. I wonder whether a Basset choir (pack?) would be possible in practical terms (few owner-operators, fewer gigs). In this incarnation it’s not easy to discern separate parts, or whether he overlayed the same material seven times, the overlap generating the interest. Imagine a slow repeated kind of organic instrumental respiration. This one is the oldest work by more than two decades. It serves, like Avram’s, to induce a meditative Beta state. The crickets are certainly extra-terrestrial, but benign. Perhaps they’re angels? Give this track time and space, it’s the coolest.  

Hush – New Works for Flute and Electronics
Roberta Michel
New Focus Recordings FCR422 (newfocusrecordings.com/catalogue/roberta-michel-hush)

Roberta Michel’s intrepid musicianship has caught the attention of avant-garde artists and groups such as the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Bang on a Can, the Wet Ink Ensemble and others. On Hush she takes the flute – her chosen instrument – out of the confines of the chamber (or orchestral) context on solo flights following, unfettered, wherever this audacious music beckons.

Ditching what certainly appears to be a reliable technique, she puts paid to predictable finger movement and conventional breath controls to seemingly turn her body’s whole cardio-pulmonary machinery into a system plotted around the efforts and exertions required to make a multi headed monolith of pure sound made from mouthfuls of air.

 The whirling ellipses of Jane Rigler’s Red are eminently suited to Michel’s restless creativity, and it surges in a mad rush of blood to the head, and her flute. Victoria Cheah’s edifice, And for you, castles sees Michel mindfully abseiling through its sonic architecture. Jen Baker’s piece, The Great Bridge and a Lion’s Gate is painted in washes of muted and vivid coloured brushstrokes by Michel. Mert Morali’s Quintet sends pungent sonorities through Michel’s bass flute echoing through four speakers. Meanwhile Angélica Negrón’s Hush echoes the silvery quietude of Michel’s father Fred’s plant photographs. Cheah, Morali and Negrón join Michel to perform on their works. 

Meanwhile the conventional meaning of the word “hush” apart, metaphorically speaking Michel blows her way through her flutes right past the sound barrier.

Listen to 'Hush: New Works for Flute and Electronics' Now in the Listening Room

Ink Traces
Julia Glenn; Konstantinos Valianatos
Navona Records NV6670 (navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6670)

American violinist Julia Glenn has lived, taught and performed in China, immersing herself in China’s language, music, dance and poetry. Together with Athens-born pianist Konstantinos Valianatos who, like Glenn, has taught at Tianjin Juilliard School, she plays works by composers who embrace both Chinese and Western classical idioms.

Chen Yi’s Romance and Dance (1995-1999) begins with the very Chinese-sounding Romance, the violin’s bent notes wailing plaintively over sporadic pianistic water-droplets. Dance is a wild ride, with frenzied violin flourishes and rapid piano ostinatos. Chen’s Memory for solo violin (2010) movingly mixes Chinese and Western elements, progressing emotionally from apprehensiveness to determination.

The fragmented melodies and rhythmic inertia of the other solo violin pieces – Yao Chen’s Air (2015) and Pan Kai’s Ink Traces of Sigh (2017/2022) sound thoroughly European, as does Gao Weijie’s The Road (1996), though with longer violin melodies and some momentum from the piano.

Much more enjoyable are Sang Tong’s Night Scenery (1947), the violin ruminating above the piano’s irregular walking bass, the lovely melodies of Nostalgia from Ma Sicong’s Inner Mongolia Suite (1937) and, most of all, Chen Gang’s delightful, unmistakably Chinese Drum and Song (1974-1976) in which rollicking jollity frames blissful dreaminess.

Whining Chinese glissandi and martial Western propulsion clash violently in the CD’s longest work, Chen Yihan’s 11-minute EHOHE for baroque violin and electronics (2022), commissioned by Glenn. Happily, the disparate cultures eventually reconcile and the disc ends in peaceful serenity.

Playfair Sonatas
Ethan Iverson
Urlicht Audiovisual (musicalconcepts.net/recording/ethan-iverson-playfair-sonatas)

Ethan Iverson is a pianist and composer who helped found the American jazz group The Bad Plus in 2000. He has performed jazz with a diverse group of musicians over the years (Lee Konitz, Ron Carter, Ingrid Jensen etc.) and composed for a variety of groups along with writing on music for several magazines. Playfair Sonatas is named after Piers Playfair who agreed to pay Iverson’s studio’s rent for six months in exchange for him composing six sonatas where Playfair would choose the instrumentation.

Along with piano accompaniment, the six instruments are: violin, marimba, clarinet, trombone, alto saxophone and trumpet. All the works are lively and take advantage of each solo instrument’s unique characteristics. For example, Violin Sonata is relatively classical sounding while Alto Saxophone Sonata includes classical, Broadway and jazzy lines. One of the most intriguing aspects is where Iverson dedicates a movement to well known musical figures. For example, Clarinet Sonata II (Music Hall) is dedicated to Carla Bley and it has a sultry and ironic melodicism which matches Bley’s musical personality. Violin Sonata II Blues (for Ornette Coleman) is melodic with brief forays into atonal territory which matches Coleman well. 

Playfair Sonatas is an elegant and innovative addition to the world of chamber music.