Music is the Language of the Heart and Soul: Mahler – Symphony No.2
Ricarda Merbeth; Bernarda Fink; Netherlands Radio Choir; Royal
Concertgebouw Orchestra; Mariss Jansons
Cmajor 709708

Mahler – Symphony No.2
Christiane Oelze; Sarah Connolly; MDR Rundfunkchor; Berliner
Rundfunkchor; GewandhausChor; Gewandhaus Orchestra, Leipzig;
Riccardo Chailly
Accentus Music ACC10238

The above Blu-ray sets enter a well-populated community of commendable recorded performances that stretch back to c.1923 when Oskar Fried, who had conducted the premier performance in 1905 and to whom Mahler had conveyed all he should know about the work, conducted it for Polydor. Balancing orchestra, soloists and choir was a monumental undertaking in the acoustic era and one wonders how many sets they had hoped to sell, particularly when Mahler’s works were not as deeply admired then. That Polydor not-for-audiophiles recording is available on a 2-CD set from Pearl (CDS 9929).

Each of these new videos presents a performance that will satisfy the most ardent and jaded critic. Both orchestras are at home with the score and the soloists in each are well-matched. Of course, the vocal mavens may have their personal opinions about the choice of soloists but, to these ears, there are no good reasons for any petty or insignificant objections. There are no complaints about the state-of-the-art video production in either version and the audio is equally matched in presence and detail.

I watched the Jansons first and heard a very romantic performance, indicating that the conductor is comfortable with the score and views the work as belonging to its past and not as a portent of things to come.

I may not have felt this so acutely had I not, soon after, played the Chailly version. There is a real sense of hearing something new and exciting … from unexpected, subtle instrumental inflections and phrasing to the just perceptible spaces between phrases. The musicians are caught up in the excitement and significance of their parts, often playing like they have their feet in ice-water. The last movement and the closing pages are devastating. Repeated viewings have not dampened my enthusiasm for the Chailly in any way.

The Concertgebouw disc includes a 50+ minute videography of Jansons entitled Music is the Language of the Heart and Soul. There is a companion Blu-ray disc of the Eighth Symphony from the 2011 Mahler Festival in Leipzig that I have put off playing until the “right” time.

Still Sound
Bruce Levingston
Sono Luminus DSL-92148

Exquisite colours and haunting cadences highlight the remarkable solo performances of American pianist Bruce Levingston in Still Sound.

Levingston is powerful in his well thought out performances of Chopin, Satie and Schubert. He has a firm grasp of technique and style here. However, he is most striking when performing more contemporary works. Arvo Pärt’s popular Für Alina and Variationen zur Gesundung von Arinuschka are breathtaking in their bell-like charm and quality of attention to the spaces between the notes.

Levingston is also a champion of American composers. Augusta Gross is a fine composer in the contemporary American style and is featured in five tracks. Memorable is her polyphonic writing in Reflections on Air which is intricately captured by Levingston’s gentle performance. William Bolcom’s New York Lights is a solo piano version based on an aria from his opera A View from the Bridge. Bolcom’s clever use of a multitude of American musical styles makes this an accessible yet modern work. Unfortunately, Levingston is suddenly a bit too bangy and percussive in the climatic, louder section, though he retreats back to his mature musical touch for the end of the work.

Levingston is to be applauded for his choice of programming. This is a collection of reflective, personal music with which to enjoy, contemplate and unwind.

Time Transcending (Oehms Classics OC 832) is the first solo recital disc of the Australian-born violinist Daniel Dodds, and it’s quite stunning. The works range from Bach through Paganini, Ysaÿe and Ernst to 20th century works by Rochberg, Berio, Bram and Messiaen. You’ll find better — or, at least, more nuanced — versions of the great Chaconne from Bach’s Partita in D Minor, but you’d be hard pushed to find anything anywhere to match the playing on the rest of the CD. There are terrific performances of Ysaÿe’s Sonata No.3, Ballade, and Luciano Berio’s Sequenza VIII from 1976, followed by a stunning Caprice No.24 from the Paganini Op.1. The American composer George Rochberg published 50 Caprice Variations on this particular piece in 1970, and 12 of them are here, played with a quite startling range of tone, colour and special effects. The Etude VI by H. W. Ernst is his famous 1864 set of variations on The Last Rose of Summer, and a work of almost ridiculous technical difficulty — but apparently not for Daniel Dodds.

The phenomenal playing continues in Swiss composer Thuring Bram’s Uhrwerk (Clockwork), written in 1976; Dodds is called on to play a dazzling array of effects — thumps, harmonics, bow scrapings, left-hand pizzicato and more — in an engrossing piece that treats the violin, in the composer’s words, as “a sophisticated percussion instrument.”

Dodds is joined by pianist Tomasz Trzebiatowski for the final track, Messiaen’s Louange a l’immortalité de Jesus, the final movement from his Quatuor pour le fin du temps. The beautifully sustained long, high melodic line brings a breathtaking CD to a serene close.

We’re not exactly overwhelmed with viola concertos, so I was delighted to receive the latest CD by the marvellous young American violist David Aaron Carpenter, which features world premiere recordings of three Viola Concertos by Joseph Martin Kraus (ONDINE ODE 1193-2). Kraus, a German composer who spent most of his working life in Sweden, was an exact contemporary of Mozart, born in the same year and dying just 12 months after Mozart’s death. Until just a few years ago, however, these works were mistakenly attributed to his friend and compatriot, Roman Hoffstetter.

There are two solo concertos, in e-flat major and c major, and a double concerto for viola and cello (although really viola with cello obbligato) in which Carpenter is joined by Riitta Pesola. All three works were probably written around the time that Kraus moved to Sweden in 1778; not surprisingly, there are stylistic similarities with both Mozart and Haydn — who, apparently, named Mozart and Kraus as the only two geniuses he knew — but all three works are full of melodic and harmonic surprises.

Carpenter’s playing is superb: warm and rich across the entire range, and wonderfully expressive. He also directs the Tapiola Sinfonietta, an orchestra which has the Viennese music of this period as part of its core repertoire as is clear from their perfectly-judged accompaniment.

The Chinese guitarist Xuefei Yang, who is currently based in the UK, presents her own transcriptions and arrangements of three Bach Concertos on her latest CD (EMI Classics 6 79018 2) with the Elias String Quartet. The two solo Violin Concertos, in a minor and e major, are here, as well as the Harpsichord Concerto in D Minor BWV1052, which is believed to be based on a now-lost violin concerto.

Yang found the solo parts in the violin concertos to be perfectly playable on the guitar, but the real masterstroke here is her arrangement of the orchestral accompaniment for string quartet, thus ensuring that the guitar’s softer voice can always be heard. Her playing is clean, precise and beautifully shaped, and the balance with the quartet is excellent throughout.

Yang was drawn to the violin concertos by the guitar transcriptions of Bach’s solo violin sonatas and partitas, and this disc includes the Sonata in G Minor, transcribed by her to a minor. Nothing seems to be lost in the transcription; indeed, many sections sound smoother than in the violin original. The Prelude in C Major from the Well-Tempered Clavier, again transcribed by Yang to a major, and played on a seven-string guitar, and the Air on the G String complete an excellent and generous — almost 80 minutes — CD.

Carolyn Huebl (violin) and Mark Wait (piano) are the performers on a new Naxos CD of Stravinsky Works for Violin and Piano (8.570985). All of Stravinsky’s works for this combination were the result of his partnership with violinist Samuel Dushkin, with whom he toured throughout the 1930s, and this disc features the three most substantial pieces: the Suite italienne and the Divertimento, both arranged by the composer and Dushkin; and Stravinsky’s only original work for the medium, the Duo Concertant.

Mark Wait certainly has the credentials for these works, having recorded Stravinsky’s solo piano music for Robert Craft’s series of the complete works of Stravinsky some 20 years ago.

The performances here are solid and carefully considered if not spectacular, and tend to be a bit pedestrian at times. They were recorded at the Blair School of Music in Nashville’s Vanderbilt University, where both performers are on the faculty.

The low Naxos price makes this a decent buy, but if you’re seriously interested in Stravinsky’s music for violin and piano then for an even lower per-disc price you can buy the excellent Newton Classics 2-CD reissue set of the complete works by Isabelle van Keulen and Olli Mustonen that I reviewed last October. Their interpretations tend to be a bit “spikier” and capture the Stravinsky character more fully. There is also a Hyperion two-CD budget-price set with Anthony Marwood and Thomas Adès that I have not heard, but that should be well worth tracking down.

Volume 12 of the outstanding British series The Romantic Violin Concerto (Hyperion CDA67878) features the first two Violin Concertos of Henri Vieuxtemps in lovely performances by Chloë Hanslip and the Royal Flemish Philharmonic Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins.

The Concerto No.1 in E Major was actually written after the Concerto No.2 in F-sharp Minor, but the numbering follows the order in which they were published. The E major is a huge work, running over 40 minutes, and with a first movement that is longer than many full concertos. Written when Vieuxtemps was 20, it feels a bit episodic at times – perhaps not surprisingly, given its size – but is full of lovely moments. The F-sharp minor concerto pre-dates the E major by four years, and understandably shows signs of immaturity as a composer; the booklet notes correctly comment that it “makes more of a classical impression than a romantic one” with the influence of Mozart and Beethoven in evidence. The real forgotten gem here, though, is the Greeting to America Op.56, written for Vieuxtemps’ concert tour of the USA in 1843-44. It’s a fantasia on both The Star-Spangled Banner and Yankee Doodle for violin and orchestra, and brings another terrific Hyperion CD to a rousing close. Hanslip is in great form throughout, and given excellent support by Brabbins and the orchestra. The recording quality, as you would expect from this label, is exemplary.

Incidentally, Volume 8 of this series features Vieuxtemps’ concertos nos.4 and 5 (the “famous” one) in performances by Viviane Hagner and the same orchestral team.

In last year’s summer edition of this column I reviewed a short CD of the Concierto Latino by the Israeli violinist/composer Ittai Shapira. The same recording has now turned up on a full-length disc of Shapira: Violin Concertos, coupled with The Old Man and the Sea and the solo violin piece Caprice Habañera (Champs Hill CHRCD032).

The Old Man and the Sea was inspired by, and based on, Ernest Hemingway’s short novel of the same name; the idea came to Shapira, coincidentally, when he was in Florida for the US premiere of his Concierto Latino. Hemingway wrote his novel in Cuba, and it is the influence of Cuban music that is the common link between the three works on this disc.

The writing throughout both major works is accessible and highly idiomatic, although it is difficult to determine a truly individualistic voice; it tends to be music that keeps reminding you of something else. The Concierto Latino seems to be the stronger work on re-hearing, but that may well be due to the therapeutic nature of its composition, Shapira having written it in the aftermath of being the victim of a gang attack in New York City in January 2005. The Caprice Habañera is a short virtuosic solo encore piece with some innovative technical challenges.

The three works were all recorded on different dates, and the two concertos with different partners: the London Serenata under Krzysztof Chorzelski accompanies the Concierto Latino, and Neil Thomson conducts the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra in the Hemingway-inspired work, recorded this past January.

The conductor Marin Alsop, who is also a fine violinist, founded the ensemble String Fever with a group of top New York instrumental friends in 1981, partly to try to break down some of the classical boundaries, and partly just to have some fun as string players. Naxos has issued It Don’t Mean A Thing, an album of tracks recorded in 1983 and 1997 that shows just what they got up to when they weren’t on their “serious” gigs (8.572834).

It’s an odd offering from several aspects. For a start, it’s not clear if the group is even still in existence: in the sparse booklet notes Alsop refers to the group in the past tense, thanking those “who played in String Fever over the years” and citing the “many adventures over our 20 year career together,” all of which suggests that the ensemble ceased performing about 11 years ago. Secondly, despite the cavalcade of great standards from the likes of Duke Ellington, Cole Porter, Harold Arlen, Dave Brubeck, Benny Goodman, Harry Warren and Richard Rodgers, the album really falls between two stools. There’s much more of an attempt at originality here than in the Angèle Dubeau CD of movie hits last month, but it’s less of a success precisely because of that fact. The heart and soul of jazz is improvisation, but however good the players are you can’t really have a number of first violins all improvising at the same time. The answer? Jazz-style “arrangements” that are written out and fully notated. The problem? The moment the notes are written down, they lose all sense of spontaneity and hence aren’t either straight renditions or true jazz performances. Classically-trained players are always going to maintain respect for the written note, but in jazz and swing music it’s not how it’s written, but how it’s played that is the crucial element. If you have any trouble appreciating this, then just listen to the numerous albums Stephane Grappelli made with Yehudi Menuhin, where Grappelli, with his inimitable invention allied to his impeccable technique, plays Menuhin – with his written-out parts – out of the studio, down the road, around the corner and completely out of sight.

There are some decent arrangements here, and some really good playing, but even with the addition of a trap drum set and also an electric bass on some tracks, the overwhelming impression is of classical players having fun, but also having problems really letting loose.

I’m not sure what market Naxos has in mind for this release, or for the subsequent volume of original material from 1991, Fever Pitch (8.5722835); they categorize it as “contemporary jazz” in their catalogue, but with the most recent tracks already 15 years old it’s not really either.

And, of course, when today’s players like Judy Kang can shred electric violin with Lady Gaga’s Monster Ball tour, cross-over playing is not such a ground-breaking concept any more.

Strings Attached continues at thewholenote.com with works for baroque guitar performed by David Russell, violin and piano by Stravinsky performed by Carolyn Huebl and Mark Wait, early violin concertos of Vieuxtemps featuring Chloë Hanslip, Cuban-inspired concertos composed and performed by Israeli violinist Ittai Shapira and some jazzy offerings from Marin Alsop’s all-star ensemble String Fever.

Ruggles – The Complete Music of Carl Ruggles
Buffalo Philharmonic;
Michael Tilson Thomas
Other Minds OM 1020/21-2

Long out of print, this double CD re-issue of the 1980 Columbia vinyl LPs of the complete music of the American iconoclast Carl Ruggles (1876–1971) makes a welcome return to the fold thanks to the efforts of the San Francisco Symphony’s Other Minds project. Michael Tilson Thomas, long-time conductor of that admirable ensemble, was also music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic from 1971–79, continuing a golden age for contemporary music in Buffalo dating back to the tenure of his predecessor, the composer-conductor Lukas Foss (1963–71).

Ruggles struggled mightily with his compositions, publishing only a dozen complete works from 1918 to 1944, amounting to a mere 90 minutes of music. Strident, granitic and densely chromatic, Ruggles’ powerful music attracted the attention of the avant-garde of the time who greatly admired his uncompromising vision. Edgard Varèse (none too prolific himself) was a major enthusiast, and used his influence to arrange high-profile performances and solicit new commissions for him. Alas, the cantankerous Ruggles was more fascinated with the process of composition than its termination and left the majority of his projects unfinished. His colleague Henry Cowell recalled overhearing Ruggles pounding out the same crystalline sonority relentlessly for hours on end, and when he gently questioned him about it Ruggles bellowed, “I’m giving it the test of time!”

Ruggles’ distinctive music has indeed passed that test with flying colours, and 32 years after their initial release these performances remain compelling despite the comparatively dated sonics. The voicing of the glowing, closely-packed harmonies in the isolated moments of quiet repose are expertly balanced and the orchestra projects the stentorian passages with chilling conviction. Excellent documentation is included. This is a landmark collection that should not be missed.

Schulhoff – Piano Works 1
Caroline Weichert
Grand Piano GP604

Weinberg – Complete Piano Works 1
Allison Brewster Franzetti
Grand Piano GP603

Music of Erwin Schulhoff (1894–1942) and Miecyslaw Weinberg (1919–1996) raises consideration of totalitarianism’s effects. Jewish composers escaping the Nazi terror transformed and elevated our western musical world, but what about the ones who looked eastward? New discs enhance our awareness of these wonderful artists. Born in Prague, Erwin Schulhoff developed early as a significant pianist and composer. Attempted emigration to the Soviet Union was overtaken in 1939 by Germany’s occupation of Czechoslovakia and his arrest; he died in a concentration camp. Weinberg grew up between the wars in Poland, barely escaping the Nazi invasion while the rest of his family perished in the Holocaust. He settled successively in Minsk, Tashkent and Moscow in 1943, adapting as best he could to the Soviet regime.

Schulhoff has received considerable attention in recent years; his piano works show a tasteful master integrating musical influences into original and deeply felt works. The affecting Variations and Fugue on an Original Dorian Theme (1913) reveals an already-mature composer commanding compositional forms and devices towards his expressive ends. Carolyn Weichert brilliantly captures the idioms of both modernism and jazz in Partita (1922) where 1920s dances replace Bach-era ones. Transcending clichés of decadent Weimar Germany, the depth and seriousness of its jazz scene during the 1920s and ‘30s are evident; I love the charm, quirky humour, fleeting pensive moments and glimpses beyond the ordinary in the Tango-Rag. Schulhoff’s harmony is never just “bi-tonal” or “wrong-note.” Weichert balances chords and brings out subtle voice-leadings in music evocative of the era and more. The Third Suite for the left hand is a work of pianistic genius. Weichert’s fingers crawl “multi-legged” over the keyboard; as her thumb sings out one of Schulhoff’s exquisite long melodies in the Air, fingers carry on a canonic invention below! After the harmonically-adventurous Improvisazione, she delivers the mixed-metres perpetual-motion Finale with flair but without bombast.

Miecyslaw Weinberg’s major piano works are ably performed by Allison Brewster Franzetti, some in premiere recordings. Weinberg was an excellent pianist whose creative leanings showed in his Lullaby composed at 16, which carries the genre to remarkable heights. Nazi totalitarianism threw him towards the Soviet sphere and he was strongly affected upon hearing Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5. His First Sonata (1940) retains adventurous musical possibilities: bi-tonal passages, extreme registers, stark and dissonant sonorities. Franzetti’s performance of the magical close of the Andantino is touching, seemingly wandering into the distance before the fearsome Finale emerges. Official pressure against Shostakovich’s experimentalism forced him towards the Symphony No.5’s more “positive” idiom; comparing Weinberg’s Second Sonata (1942) to the first shows similar movement. Harmony is organized around familiar scales, the music lilts and sings. Franzetti builds perfectly towards the slow movement’s climax, and the quiet return of the opening mood is breathtaking. Again in 1948 Stalinism reared up, demanding folk-like themes and simple forms. In the Sonatina (1951) Weinberg incorporated some of these changes; unsatisfied, he revised it in 1978 as Sonata Op.49A. The effects of totalitarianism can be long-lasting.

Overheard – Music for Oboe and English Horn
Michele Fiala; William Averill;
Martin Schuring; Donald Speer
MSR Classics MS 1403
www.msrcd.com

Overheard is a refreshing disc of contemporary music for oboe and English horn, by composers born between 1952 and 1986. A professor of oboe at Ohio University who has performed internationally, Michele Fiala’s playing on this, her second recording, is certainly “world class,” in both display of solid technical facility and musical expression, with equally able piano accompaniment provided by William Averill and Donald Speer; but congratulations are also in order on the choice of repertoire which covers a gamut of styles from jazz to the incorporation of electronics.

One of three commissioned works on this disc is by Toronto composer Beverly Lewis — her Fundy Temperaments for English horn and piano is a dramatic work evoking the landscape of the Bay of Fundy, including a foghorn depicted through the use of multiphonics. Another commission, Peaches at Midnight, is a delightful work by Theresa Martin evoking the playfulness of childhood. Sheer technical brilliance is displayed in Gilles Silvestrini’s Three Duos for Two Oboes, in which Fiala is joined by Martin Schuring; the movements are named for works by French impressionist painters.

The concluding work on the disc is a personal favourite — Mark Phillips’ Elegy and Honk for English horn and electroacoustic music uses only processed English horn sounds for the background soundtrack of the slow and moody first segment, while Honk employs manipulated sounds of geese, ducks and a bicycle horn as a rhythmic backdrop to the live instrument. I found myself chuckling along with this last track on what is a thoroughly enjoyable and important contribution to the recorded repertoire for oboe and English horn.

After You, Mr. Gershwin
André Moisan; Jean Saulnier
ATMA ACD2 2517

I used to like jazz. Then something happened. Perhaps I’ve heard too many similar versions of the standards. Maybe I just realized that none of it was necessary after Monk. I also used to enjoy clarinet music but now too often I just curl up from over-exposure.

Nevertheless, there is hope for others, and it comes in the form of this wildly impressive collection of jazz-influenced repertoire performed by the estimable clarinettist André Moisan together with his frequent collaborator Jean Saulnier. Good lord these two can play, and have fun while at it too!

Odd that the disc opens with a recital encore, one of Béla Kovác’s Homages series. It is of course the title track, but in its sparkling brevity it delivers what might be the final word for the whole compilation. The next cut is the highly effective Cape Cod Files, a sonata by Paquito D’Rivera, the most substantial selection. For the first while my jaded ear was persuaded to attend, especially during the beautiful unaccompanied third movement. The conventional finale suggests the composer wanted to get on with other things.

The rest of the material ranges from heart-on-the-sleeve sentimentality (Daniel Mercure’s Pour mon ami Leon) to the clear and incisive Time Pieces by Robert Muczynski. This one is probably the least overtly jazz-inspired, but it’s got that crazy syncopated rhythm goin’ on. Joseph Horowitz’ Sonatina starts off sounding like watery British recital literature until the flashy third movement makes its argument for inclusion.

The playing is fine to fantastic. On occasion Moisan allows his tone to get thin and reedy, edging sharp in the higher range, but generally his sound is lovely, warm and expressive when it needs to be, and fluid and free for the assured passage work. I was glad to hear the clicking of his keys on some of the tracks, an effect as charming as close-miked guitar.

Terrestre
Claire Chase
Focus Recordings, FCR 122 DDD

Despite the cover image — Claire Chase, flute on her shoulder, staring directly into the camera — this CD is not all about Chase. It is an exhilarating ride through the music of five “modernist” composers; it is all about the music, which the high-voltage interpretations of Chase and her five equally capable collaborators render incandescent.

The title track, Terrrestre by Kaija Saariaho, moves from twitchy virtuosic bird songs in the opening movement, L’oiseau dansant, to luminous dreaminess in the second, Oiseau, un satellite infime. In both, the contribution of percussionist Nathan Davis must be mentioned.

Franco Donatoni’s Fili (Threads) and Elliott Carter’s Esprit Rude; Esprit Doux are both series of rhythmically erratic conversations, the first between the flute and the piano, played by Jacob Greenberg, the second between flute and clarinet, played by Joshua Rubin, with effortless ease and rhythmic agility equal to Chase’s.

Chase and Greenberg navigate Pierre Boulez’s now classic (ground-breaking at the time — 1946) Sonatine Op.1 with aplomb: it sounds as new as if it had been composed yesterday.

Kai Fujikara’s Glacier for bass flute concludes the CD. Chase plays the bass with exceptional fluidity and a lovely shakuhachi-like sound. The ending, a haunting figure repeated more and more quietly until it disappears, is exquisite.

The superb technique of the performers and their commitment to the “modernist” musical genre give us the opportunity to hear this very difficult music as (I imagine) the composers would want it to sound.

Kagel – Das Konzert; Phantasiestück; Pan
Michael Faust; Sinfonia Finlandia;
Patrick Gallois
Naxos 8.572635

Throughout his life the Argentinean-German composer Mauricio Kagel (1931–2008) explored every aspect of the evolving musical language of his time, including free improvisation, open form, electronic music, music theatre and purely instrumental music. He taught and organized forums for new music and was a masterful conductor of his own works. He also held an exceptional interest in broadcast media, completing several thought-provoking films in the 1960s for German television and producing radio programs of new music. His appearances in Toronto with New Music Concerts are fondly remembered by all who experienced them.

In his later years Kagel’s music took on an aspect one might call “post-modern,” freely incorporating the extended instrumental techniques of the 20th century in a frequently ironic dialogue with traditional musical conventions. These shadows of the hallowed past occur frequently in the late period works on this disc. Kagel’s 1988 Phantasiestück, a quasi-Schumannesque work that devolves from an atonal to a purely diatonic realm, appears in two versions, one for flute and piano with pianist Paulo Alvares and an expanded version with string quartet and two clarinets performed by Michael Faust’s own Ensemble Contrasts conducted by Robert HP Platz. The brief and delightful Pan for piccolo and string quartet (1985) is a pastiche on Papageno’s pan-flute solo from Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte. Das Konzert is a theatrical work that was written at the request of Michael Faust and premiered by the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in 2003 with a dozen performances in Duisburg and Düsseldorf. It is a schizophrenic “anti-concerto” for flute and chamber orchestra expertly performed here by the Sinfonia Finlandia Jyväsklä, sympathetically led by fellow flutist turned conductor Patrick Gallois. This is an entertaining yet thought-provoking disc that repays repeated listening.

Editor’s Note: As a long standing friend of the composer, Canadian flutist Robert Aitken was invited to share the soloist’s role in the creation of Kagel’s Das Konzert, alternating the first performances with Michael Faust and giving the Düsseldorf premiere. Aitken went on to give the world premiere performance of the concert version of the work with Esprit Orchestra in Toronto in January 2004.

Saariaho – Works for Orchestra
Various Orchestras
Ondine ODE1113-2Q

There must be something in the water in Helsinki. For a country of just over five million people, Finland seems to produce a disproportionate amount of musical talents — instrumentalists, vocalists, conductors and composers. Kaija Saariaho is no stranger to Toronto audiences: the COC produced the hauntingly beautiful L’amour de loin this season, along with notable performances by the TSO and Soundstreams.

In a sparsely populated Nordic country, an artist feels connected to nature and light (or the lack thereof). Many of the works on this compilation — Lichtbogen, Solar, Orion, Notes on Light — look to the cosmos, and Saariaho’s writing is starkly beautiful. Her use of electronics is meticulously intertwined and delicately masterful — undoubtedly the result of her time at IRCAM in Paris, and the influence of spectralism pioneers Tristan Murail and Gérard Grisey. But it is the diptych Du cristal and … à la fumée that confirms this composer’s inimitability: as in a crystal, macroscopically the structure seems complete, but upon closer inspection, we see not only detail, but growth. Her polymorphic textures progress like an ethereal sublimation.

Saariaho’s connection to the voice is mesmerizing: she integrates text into her orchestrations in a strikingly unique way. Cinq reflets de “L’amour de loin” revisits the music from the opera, but in her process, she has created a completely new work. Grammaire des rêves sets poems of French Surrealist Paul Éluard (not to be confused with her other great vocal work, From the Grammar of Dreams). The voice is treated as instrument, and the ensemble as voices in a texture that rivals (and perhaps surpasses) the great vocal works of Berio. Of all the fantastic singing, I would be remiss not to mention Mirage, featuring the powerful lyric soprano Karita Mattila, whose luminous sound is more often heard in the world’s leading opera houses.

For me, the highlight of the set is undoubtedly cellist Anssi Karttunen, who lends his acrobatic and nuanced virtuosity to four substantial works. But it is difficult to single out a star player on this Finnish powerhouse team that includes conductors Esa-Pekka Salonen (with the Los Angeles Philharmonic), Jukka-Pekka Saraste (with the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra) and Hannu Lintu (leading the superb Avanti! Chamber Orchestra).

I could say that Saariaho’s orchestral writing fuses the stark grandeur of compatriot Sibelius, with the stratified texture of Stravinsky, with the slowness of process heard in Ligeti — but it would not do her music justice. Over 20 years of music on four discs reveals a distinguished voice in contemporary orchestral writing; I look forward to hearing the next 20. And she is welcome back to Toronto anytime.

Espresso Manifesto –
The Songs of Paolo Conte
Daniela Nardi
Independent MIN004
www.espressomanifesto.com

Paolo Conte is an iconic Italian singer-songwriter whose work epitomizes a certain style and era in European pop culture. Daniela Nardi is a Toronto-based singer who, when searching for a way to pay musical homage to her Italian roots, landed on putting together a collection of Conte’s songs. Covering work by a singer with such a strong male presence as Conte — he’s a little like the Leonard Cohen of Italy — is a challenge for a female singer and Nardi rises to that challenge by finding the universal themes of longing and loss (and gelato!) in his songs. Also, Nardi travelled to Umbria to record the disc with a handful of Italian musicians, which lends an authentic feel. Espresso Manifesto opens with the most well-known of Conte’s tunes Via Con Me (Come Away with Me), a light-hearted plea about giving oneself over to adventure, then moves through a charming but sometimes dark exploration of life and love.

Like the drink manifested here, Nardi’s voice is deep and earthy and singing in Italian brings out her expressiveness. Lyrics and liner notes explaining the songs for the non-Italian speakers are not included with the CD but available on danielanardi.com. So you can read up on each song to understand what it’s all about or you can just let the album wash over you like a seductive Mediterranean wave.

All the Way
Susie Arioli
Spectra Musique SPECD7832
www.susiearioli.com

Susie Arioli and her partner guitarist Jordan Officer have put out another fine collection of songs true to their easy swinging style. Although All The Way opens sombrely with a soulful, slowed down My Funny Valentine it ramps up a bit from there with an ironic, sax-laden Here’s to the Losers and a nod to Ol’ Blue Eyes with the title track and then the subtle emotional roller-coaster continues with the melancholic Forgetful and There’s a Lull in My Life.

Arioli has an understated delivery that’s a refreshing change from the showboating singing we hear so much of. Yet she still convincingly conveys the sentiment of the song and leaves the listener able to focus on the lyrics rather than on how awesome her voice is, or whatever. With the majority of the songs from the 50s and 60s the record is imbued with a Mad Men-esque mood that makes All the Way the ideal soundtrack for the end of a day filled with two-martini meetings, a pack-and-a-half of smokes and bitter disappointment.

One Sunday
Ken Aldcroft; William Parker
Trio Records and Productions
TRP-DS01-014
www.kenaldcroft.com

The performances of prolific Toronto improviser/guitarist/composer Ken Aldcroft and New York City’s double bass great William Parker here leave me speechless. The two improvisers weave a sonic journey through rhythm, colour, melody and ideas that just gets better with each listening.

Both performers utilize their strong jazz roots to foray into spirited uncharted territories. Sweet Beverley, one of two 20 something minute offerings, is a doll of a piece. Its laid back nature sets the mood for a musical conversation on diverse topics. The phrasing is clear and subtle, allowing each intricate idea, whether long or short, to grasp one’s attention. There is a sound surprise around every corner. Also outstanding is the shorter track Zum Schneide, where Parker plays a trombonium [an instrument shaped like a baritone horn including its three valves, but with the bore and tube length dimensions of a tenor trombone]. The opening passage cleverly refers to a classical music fanfare, and then abruptly changes course to slides, runs and garage band noise. It is a fine example of where free improvised music is headed. Parker also performs on shakuhachi on this five track release.

For listeners unaccustomed to the more atonal sense of free improvisation, the music here might be a stretch to understand but worth the patience to experience. Aldcroft and Parker are brilliant masters of their art form — one may not be able to whistle along with the “tunes” but it is the collective sounds of their “in the moment” music creations that resonate so impeccably.

Cut a Caper
Ig Henneman Sextet
Wig 19
www.stichtingwig.com

Negotiating the boundary between noted and improvised music, Europe and Canada, is the all-star sextet of Dutch violist Ig Henneman which can be heard in concert at the Music Gallery June 24. The ten limpid pieces by Henneman which make up this disc are interpreted by a drum-less ensemble whose particularized arrangements and advanced technical requirements suggest contemporary new music. But when Berlin-based trumpeter Axel Dörner gargles altissimo air through his horn or when the violist lets loose with airborne spiccato snatches, the formalism is left aside. As well, there may be canon-like voicing on Moot, but Charles Mingus-like echoes appear on Toe and Heel, while the title tune adds marching band hops to other sound tropes.

Part of this CD’s textural freedom must be ascribed to the alternately metronomic hammering or sly soundboard stretches from Toronto pianist Marilyn Lerner. Upping the CanCon quota is Montreal clarinet and bass clarinettist Lori Freedman, although pinpointing which bracing chalumeau snorts or altissimo split tone squeals arise from her horns rather than the clarinet of Amsterdam’s Ab Baars, who also exposes liquid tenor saxophone runs and narrowed shakuhachi puffs, is nearly impossible. Fellow Netherlander Wilbert De Joode holds the disparate sections together with steel-fingered string slaps that at points expand the polyphony with braced sul tasto or col legno slides.

Beside Cut a Caper, where Lerner’s percussive echoes could as easily fit a performance of Morton Feldman as Mingus, another stand-out track is Narration. With a post-modern novel’s nonlinear form, this narration meanders among sections that highlight glottal echoes from the trumpeter, knife-sharp plucks from the violist, horns harmonized until their tones splinter into tongue slaps or intense trilling plus the bassist’s assured pedal-point ostinato.

With A Meadow in December (www.larasolnicki.com) Toronto singer Lara Solnicki has crafted an unusually compelling debut, avoiding all of the usual pitfalls. Solnicki isn’t an aggressive improviser — there’s no scatting here and she doesn’t take great liberties with melodies. What she does do is focus on lyric, sound and rhythmic insinuation, investing 11 jewels from the Great American Songbook with her own personality. Her classical training is immediately evident and she has a poet’s ear for nuance. She’s fine at up-tempos, but it’s the ballads that are most memorable, as Solnicki tackles challenging fare like Lazy Afternoon, creating a dream-like state with subtle shifts in pitch, all aided by the haze of Michael Davidson’s vibraphone and Ted Quinlan’s guitar. The concluding Softly as in a Morning Sunrise is almost as good — it may be the first time I ever noticed the lyrics. Solnicki is aided throughout by a stellar cast, including Pat LaBarbera, a tenor saxophonist of great lyricism.

Montreal-based saxophonist Joel Miller doesn’t over-record. After a flurry of CDs early in his career, Swim (Origin 82613) is just his second recording as leader since 2004’s superb Mandala. It’s well worth the wait, for Miller is an outstanding tenor player, gracing the modern mainstream with a light touch, fleetly evanescent lines, and a shimmering, metallic sound that can hint at Stan Getz, John Coltrane or Charles Lloyd. That playing is strongly foregrounded here, with Miller backed by the sturdy rhythm team of bassist Fraser Hollins and drummer Greg Ritchie. Geoffrey Keezer, though, provides far more than solid support. He’s an explosive, virtuoso pianist — his solos sometimes burst into two-handed inventions — who matches Miller’s playful precision at very fast tempos, as on the brief Step into My Office.

Another Montreal reed player, Jean Derome is best known for more experimental projects, but his explorations of jazz traditions are imbued with both passion and joy. Trio Derome Guilbeault Tanguay with bassist Normand Guilbeault and drummer Pierre Tanguay is a stripped-down machine for maximum propulsion. On Danse a l’Anvers (Ambience Magnétiques AM 205 CD) they mix Derome originals with a series of tunes by iconic jazz figures — among them Duke Ellington and Roland Kirk. Derome is fluently brilliant everywhere here, whether he’s playing funky baritone saxophone on his own Half-way House, flying brilliantly on flute and alto respectively on Eric Dolphy’s demanding 17 West and Straight Up and Down, or singing enthusiastically on Billy Strayhorn’s I’m Checkin’ Out, Goom-Bye. Veterans of this minimalist format, Guilbeault and Tanguay are forceful, inventive presences, creating waves of energy as well as distinguished solos.

Recently emerging on the vigorous Latin jazz scene in Toronto’s West-end, Roland Hunter is a guitarist of taste and rhythmic acumen. On Toronteros (www.rolandhunter.com) he immediately invokes the great Jim Hall, with whom he’s studied, showing something of the same warm sound, harmonic insight and melodic reserve. It’s a spare style that dances readily over Latin rhythms. You catch the effect especially in the truncated phrases and use of harmonics on the title track, while Hunter’s melodic invention shines on Wayne Shorter’s Infant Eyes. Pianist Ali Berkok is a consistent complement, soloing as well with aplomb, while bassist Paco Luviano, drummer Mario Allende and conguero Jalidan Ruiz create a dense polyrhythmic foundation. While it’s often a relief to hear a CD that settles for the old 40-minute LP length, Toronteros presses the virtue of brevity, coming in at a shade under 30 minutes.

Guitarist Avi Granite, originally from Toronto, has been resident in New York since 2009, becoming a significant member of the intensely creative current Brooklyn scene. His group Avi Granite’s Verse is heard to fine effect on Snow Umbrellas (Pet Mantis Records PMR008), with Granite’s compositions ranging from song-like effusion to knotty kernels of possibility. The group — trumpeter Ralph Alessi, bassist Jerry Devore and drummer Owen Howard — has a distinct personality, a transparency in which bass and drums are as prominent in the mix as guitar and trumpet, and there’s a sense of group dialogue around rhythm, a constant weave of ricocheting short phrases. It’s a genuinely contemporary sound, moving from pensive introspection to moments of wonder, whether it’s Granite’s glassy, sparkling lines bubbling up through the mix or Alessi’s sudden spears of sonic colour.

Ottawa trumpeter Craig Pedersen openly acknowledges the inspirations for his quartet, mentioning John Zorn, the AACM, Ornette Coleman and Duke Ellington. Listening to Days Like Today (www.craig­pedersen.com), I’d opt for the original Coleman group, Pedersen’s band of trumpet, alto saxophone, bass and drums favouring expressive intensity and strong rhythms. The parallel is clearest on pieces like Little Bird, which sways to a Tex-Mex rhythm, but there’s more to Pedersen than just influences. The Baron (an allusion to Charles Mingus?) has a muted trumpet sound that harkens all the way back to the 1920s, while Points from Centre is a blast of overblown trumpet and drum thrashing that dramatically pushes the envelope. They’re all part of Pedersen’s methodological spectrum. The group empathy and first-rate performances by saxophonist Linsey Wellman, bassist Joel Kerr and drummer Mike Essoudry testify to the quality of the Ottawa free-jazz community.