Robert LeMay – Works for Brass and Piano
Yoko Hirota; Brian Roberts; Iris Krizmanic; Cathy Stone; Jennifer Stephen
Navona Records nv6807 (navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6807)
Recordings such as AERIS ET SPIRITUS, featuring the music of the Sudbury-based composer Robert Lemay performed by an ensemble of solo piano with trumpet, trombone, tuba or French horn, demonstrate not only how musically satisfying unorthodox instrumental settings can be, but how much creativity and possibility there remains within the genre of new Canadian classical music.
The album, translated as “Cooper and Breath” features four original Lemay compositions that are all conversational in tone, highlighting beautifully performed and recorded exchanges between various brass instruments and the excellent piano work of Yoko Hirota. As articulated in the album’s accompanying notes, Lemay as composer was striving for duets with this collection (hence the aforementioned conversation analogy) rather than a work of brass with piano accompaniment. And although that difference may be subtle, this intention comes through on Breakpoint, for example, where Hirota’s piano chords and Brian Roberts’ high register trumpet work coalesce together not in the subservient relationship of soloist and accompanist, but rather uniting as a singular voice to collectively form a cohesive musical statement.
In Deep Down, a series of four short musical sketches for piano and Jennifer Stephen’s stentorian tuba, a third sound of the human voice is subtly introduced into the musical conversation. Perhaps this is the breath referenced in the album’s title? Perhaps these are the improvisatory sounds of a focussed performance? Whatever the case may be, this inclusion brings further levity, and more musicality and intrigue to an already excellent collection out now on Navona Records.
