Comment: + Mihaela Ursuleasa (1978-2012)

I just learned of the unexpected and untimely death of the young Romanian pianist Mihaela Ursuleasa. Her recordings of the Ginastera sonata and Enescu's Third Violin Sonata (with Patricia Kopatchinskaja) are brimming with life and mystery and have given me a lot of pleasure. This rendering of Rachmaninov's Elegy in E flat minor (from Five Pieces Op. 3, R's first published piano work at age 19) captures her sensitive and passionate musicianship very well. May Mihaela rest in peace. She leaves behind a six year old daughter, Stefanie. 

Golijov: The Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind

I haven't been in a hurry to jump on the Golijov bandwagon, but browsing through the iTunes store I discovered this intriguing Nonesuch release with an early work (1994) for string quartet and clarinet for just a few euros. I think my suspicion about the hype was warranted. Despite the metaphysical gobbledygook this is an insubstantial composition that recycles klezmer tropes and not much more. Won't be spending much more time with this one.

Adams: On the Transmigration of Souls

On the Transmigration of Souls is Adams' response to the cataclysmic events at 9/11. He wrote it in 2002 in response to a commission of the New York PO and the Lincoln Center. Up to now I have studiously avoided this piece, for several reasons. First, because it is tied up with an event that is revolting and ambiguous in so many ways. There is the sheer vileness of the attack. But there is also the ensuing, manipulative abuse of the event by media and 'leaders' of all sorts. Furthermore, the oppressive weigthiness of the occasion seemed to sit uneasily with Adams' posture (from my perspective) as postmodern magpie and tongue-in-cheeck iconoclast.

Finally, it seems to me that music has very little to 'say' about these kinds of events. Sure, composers have been writing occasional pieces for ages and sometimes to splendid effect (take Britten's War Requiem or Shostakovich's Babi Yar as examples). But that doesn't mean that the music is in any way able to communicate about or help us to come to terms with trauma. Personally I don't believe in the all too commonplace conception of music as an expressive language. Music, for me, is architecture unfolding in time. These are 'tönend bewegte Formen' (Hanslick) that trigger our capacity for pattern recognition and for dealing with complexity in general. In their physical manifestation and physiological and psychological effects these forms may have a therapeutic effect (I'm the last to deny it) but we don't need metaphysics to talk about that.

Anyway, obviously, for me, Adams was skating on very thin ice with a piece like this. But I can't deny to also being to an extent curious about what this composer had made of the challenge. So now that I have been, for a while, dipping in and out of minimalist waters it looked like a good occasion to take the plunge and listen to the Transmigration.

At first I was disconcerted to see that the piece was at 25 minutes duration relatively short. The bombastic title had hinted at something more monumental. And also the fact that a full Nonesuch CD was devoted to the original recording with Maazel and the NYPO led me to expect a more substantial work. Rather pompous to confine this work on its own to a full CD, isn't it? Anyway the recording can now be purchased at mid price. 

I didn't have access to the Maazel version so I listened to the Telarc recording with the Atlanta SO and Chorus led by Robert Spano which is in my father's collection. My gut reaction after a first audition was: "too Spielbergian". Adams had myriads of choices to make when he started to find his way into the thicket of this major composition: understated or grandiose? abstract or programmatic? with or without text? canonic or vernacular words? Along all of these axes he seemed to have taken the easy way: a grandiose 'story' based on (recorded) words and ambient sounds of cinematographic simplicity. Macrostructurally the piece seemed to comply with a very simple template: an slow, silent introduction, a cathartic middle section followed by a return to the opening music (incidentally akin to Hartmann's Adagio (his Symphony nr. 2), a work in a somewhat similar vein).

I gave it a second try. Then read Adams' view on the piece from an interview on his earbox.com website. That was interesting. I learned that Adams had only 6 months to write the work. Hence the relatively short duration. Adams also makes clear that he didn't want to write a piece to 'remember' or 'heal'. His intention was rather to evoke a very basic, pre-cognitive experience similar to when one enters under the huge vault of a cathedral. It plays out at two levels: space and of history. The cathedral is experienced as a 'memory space'. And this is how Adams conceived his work. Adams: "It’s a place where you can go and be alone with your thoughts and emotions." The idea of a piece of music opening up a very basic (psychological and, why not, 'real') space fits my musical aesthetics better than the mindless mumbo jumbo of 'expression' that dominates contemporary discourse. It reminds me of Libeskind's design for the Jewish Museum in Berlin. What about the title then? Adams:

'Transmigration' means 'the movement from one place to another' or 'the transition from one state of being to another.' It could apply to populations of people, to migrations of species, to changes of chemical compositon, or to the passage of cells through a membrane. But in this case I mean it to imply the movement of the soul from one state to another. And I don’t just mean the transition from living to dead, but also the change that takes place within the souls of those that stay behind, of those who suffer pain and loss and then themselves come away from that experience transformed.

Again there is the spatial metaphor. Obviously there is also some sort of narrative here that goes beyond the mere opening up of a memory space despite Adams' claim that he had no desire to create a musical description of any sorts. I guess it's almost impossible to do without. But, personally I would have opted for a much more discreet title that would steer free from all kinds of programmatic and metaphysical entanglements.

The music is what it is, of course, but this background information did predispose me more favourably towards the piece. And I became even more positive when I heard the 2003 live recording on Dutch Radio 4's Concerthuis with the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra led by Edo de Waart. More so than the Spano rendering this had this static monumental quality that interpretatively seems to be more in line with Adams' conception. In this performance orchestra and choir blend into a (shockingly) beautiful and hypnotic symphonic tapestry.

What remains is the apprehension about the smoothness of the musical conception. Shouldn't there be nothing jarring about it? No barbs? I don't know. Whether this piece will stand the test of time remains to be seen. But for me it all in all confirmed Adams' artistic integrity.

Glass: Violin Concerto nr. 1 - Rorem: Violin Concerto - Adams: Violin Concerto - Bernstein: Serenade

My run of American violin concertos is petering out. I didn't look particularly forward to listening to Philip Glass' first Violin Concerto (1987) and the experience left me cold indeed. It's a genuine mystery how someone is able to sustain a 40-year long, incredibly prolific compositional career on such a narrow basis. All the pieces I've heard (not very many: his early film scores, early solo piano work, the Low Symphony, Itaipu, The Canyon, ...) fit in exactly the same mould. Truth be told I haven't listened to any of his innumerable operas. By now Glass is at his Ninth Symphony and judging by the audio fragments on Presto Classical this recent work does not go in any way beyond the structural, thematic and textural parameters we have been familiar with for decades. Anyway, I listened to two recordings of this concerto but neither Gidon Kremer (supported by the Vienna Philharmonic and Christoph von Dohnanyi, on DGG) nor Robert McDuffie (with the Houston Symphony under Eschenbach, on Telarc) were able to convince me of the work's allure.

The Telarc disc also contains a recording of John Adams' Violin Concerto which I revisited with considerable pleasure just a few weeks ago. I still prefer the Nonesuch recording where Kremer puts in a more imaginative performance.

Ned Rorem's Violin Concerto (1985) is the most attractive work on the DGG disc (which also contains the Bernstein Serenade). It's a six movement, symmetrically constructed, dusk-to-dawn piece that features some resourceful, mildly modernistic writing. Particularly the head and tail movements reconnect to the rugged feel of the Schuman concerto. The Romance without Words (third movement) makes an inevitable (it seems) reference to Coplandian pastoralism. The ensuing nocturne (Midnight), awash in floating, spectral chords transports us back to Vaughan Williams' most mystical and elated inspirations (Pastoral and Fifth Symphonies, for example). All in all this comes across as a product of good craftsmanship and I may pick up the competing Naxos recording if it ever crosses my path.

The Bernstein Serenade (1954) is a work that I yet have to discover. The composer's own recording with the Israel PO and Kremer as a soloist did not make a lasting impression. A few months ago I heard it in passing on Arte TV in a performance with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Patricia Kopatchinskaja (recording sadly no longer available) that I recall as more swinging and engaging.

Barber: Violin Concerto - Korngold: Violin Concerto

Proceeding with my collection of (American) violin concertos. This incidentally is a disc from my father's collection. The Barber concerto is not one of my favourite pieces. As almost everything I know from this composer it sounds almost too groomed and studied. Everything is so well proportioned, fits so nicely in the traditional forms, complies so diligently with the demands of good taste that despite its impassionate gesturing an impression of sterility is hard to avoid. Furthermore, in contrast with the Schuman, Rochberg and Adams pieces - which are thinkers' concertos, or symphonies with a solo voice - this is a concerto in the traditional mould. I've never been particularly interested in these vehicles for showing off lyricism and virtuosity. In addition to the version with Gil Shaham and the LSO conducted by André Previn I also listened to a performance with Elmar Oliveira as a soloist and the Saint Louis SO led by Leonard Slatkin. I thought both had something going for them.

On the DGG disc, the Barber is coupled with the Korngold Violin Concerto. This was new to me. In fact, I don't think I have listened to anything by Erich Wolfgang Korngold before, undoubtedly dissuaded by his reputation as a Hollywood composer. Korngold wrote the work in 1945, when he was moving away from the white screen and turned to the concert hall again. By then his rich, late-romantic style had been superseded by the sinewy neoclassicism of Bartok and Stravinsky. Nevertheless, I find this marginally more interesting than the Barber concerto. There is a certain harmonic and textural adventurousness that I'm missing from the latter piece. It's more carefree, and tinged with a tongue-in-cheek kind of humour it seems to me. Maybe the fact that Korngold put it together by cannibalising his earlier film scores lends it an air of refreshing dilettantism. In any case, from this piece it is very obvious how influential Korngold's legacy has been for contemporary film composers. It seems people like Horner, Zimmer and Williams haver never ventured beyond the perimeter set out by their predecessor. The concerto is likely to strike contemporary ears as pretty familiar. Again, the performance by Shaham and the LSO/Previn combo sounded pretty convincing. I have an LP somewhere with Heifetz (who premiered the work). I'll dig it up soon.

Meyer: Violin Concerto

Squeezing in yet another American violin concerto. This one dates from 1999 and was written by Edgar Meyer for Hilary Hahn. Meyer (born 1960) is best known as a bassist who likes to straddle different genres. The piece is not in the same league as the other American concertos I listened to in the past few days. It's contemporary music at its most approachable: tonal through and through, hardly any counterpoint. There is absolutely nothing to discourage the least adventurous of music lovers. Its pastoral-elegiac bent and amiable folksiness inevitably puts it in the slipstream of Copland's Appalachian Spring. And that is maybe not so surprising given that Meyer has grown up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, just a few tens of miles west from Knoxville and the Blue Smoky Mountains. (Incidentally, Oak Ridge is also known as 'the secret city' or 'atomic city' as it was an early production site for the Manhattan project, which casts a somewhat awkward light on this nostalgic bliss). Anyway, the work is eminently listenable. I wouldn't think of putting the Rochberg concerto on whilst savouring my Sunday morning croissant, but the Meyer piece would likely be welcome to extend and deepen the mood of quiet reflection. The work falls into two parts (again!): a first movement that is built around an alternation between a brooding ostinato motif in the strings and a series of lyrically-introspective interludes. The long second part starts with a dawn-like section, with murmuring clarinets, bassoons and strings and a fragile violin line on top. About halfway the music shifts into a more celebratory gear. Momentarily it returns to the reflective mood of the movement's start. The final section is given to a jubilant accelerando. Hahn clearly believes in the piece and gives it her best. I am sure a lesser soloist would kill it.

Adams: Violin Concerto

Interesting to notice that I haven't listened to any work by John Adams since I started this listening diary. I generally admire this composer. It's his protean personality, his inspired mashing and hacking of genres and conventions that makes it worthwhile to keep tabs on his ever growing catalogue of works.

With his Violon Concerto (1993) Adams starts from the conventional tripartite structure of a concerto but he avoids the traditional opposition between soloist and orchestra. There is no genuine sense of development and no conflict. I'd characterise it rather as some sort of meditation or 'reverie'. In that sense the work, despite its classical garb, seems to betray Adams' minimalist roots.

The opening movement - crotchet = 76 - starts in medias res with the orchestra and violin enmeshed in a relentless, uncomfortable gyrating motion. It sounds like some stern disciplinary exercise. The weird harmonies remind us of whirling dervishes. Amazingly, Adams does not depart from this basic configuration as the movement unfolds. The pulse does not change and the violin leads the dance without ever for a second letting up. However, within these rather stringent limits the soloist deploys a startling sequence of increasingly adventurous and frenzied variations. The movement ends in a stupor of exhaustion, with the shortest of cadenzas. This leads into the second movement, suggestively titled Body through which the dream flows after a poem by Robert Hass. Adams at one point suggested that this image applied to the concerto as a whole: "The orchestra [is treated] as the organized, delicately articulated mass of blood, tissues and bones; the violin as the dream that flows through it." It is a rapt 'space music', in the form of a loose chaconne. The violin sings thoughtfully above a dark orchestral fabric, artfully embroidered with discreet synthesiser lines, woodwind filigree and suggestive percussive details. It's a most delicate mood study, recasting the pastoral bliss of, say, Appalachian Spring into a more exotic and cosmopolitan idiom. The third and final movement is a tongue-in-cheeck departure from the otherworldly atmosphere that held us in thrall. It's a kinetic, brash toccata that connects directly to Adams' fondness for classic Americana and Hollywood enchantments.

Adams' piece strikes a very different posture from the narrative, epic Schuman and Rochberg concertos. Continuity and connection rather than contrast and conflict are the watch words. The omnipresent solo voice gives the piece a very particular, almost prophetic cachet. It's a very significant and distinctive piece. Altogether these three concertos form an impressive American tryptich.

The Nonesuch recording I've listened to is very good. In terms of sound quality, Nonesuch is always on the dry side. So here as elsewhere I'm wishing for more bloom and somewhat more vigorous dynamics. The performance by Gidon Kremer backed up by Nagano and the LSO can be recommended on all accounts. It's superb.

Here's Robert Hass' poem:

You count up everything you have
or have let go.
What’s left is the lost and the possible.
To the lost, the irretrievable
or just out of reach, you say:
light loved the pier, the seedy
string quartet of the sun going down over water
that gilds ants and beach fleas
ecstatic and communal on the stiffened body
of a dead grebe washed ashore
by last night’s storm. Idiot sorrow,
an irregular splendor, is the half sister
of these considerations.
To the possible you say nothing.
October on the planet.
Huge moon, bright stars.