Yarilo and Erato offer rare musical treats
Given the wealth of major activities in Vancouver’s classical music scene, it’s all too easy to overlook smaller groups catering to various niche audiences. This is really too bad, as two excellent projects at the end of this month ( both in the Orpheum Annex) amply demonstrate. Erato Ensemble offers an instalment of its informal Ayre — Early Music Remixed series, while Yarilo Music presents an extraordinary program focused on Steve Reich’s minimalist masterwork Tehillim.
Both initiatives are spearheaded by driven enthusiasts: singer Will George, who’s completing his term as artistic director at Erato, and pianist/musicologist Anna Levy, artistic director of Yarilo. Both translate passion into action, and the scene is very much richer for both, thank you. I spoke with them briefly last week.
The Yarilo organization takes its name from one of the late Nikolai Korndorf ’s few piano compositions.
“I met composer Korndorf in Moscow, in the late 1980s,” explained Levy.
“Yarilo is the title of a wonderful piano piece, which took me 10 years to get the courage to perform.” (You can hear Levy play it on YouTube.)
Composer and performer crossed paths again here on the West Coast. “I played the piece for him shortly before his death. It’s like Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring or Les Noces, something that really reflects him spiritually.”
When Levy and fellow pianist Jane Hayes began to perform together, Levy wished to remember Korndorf in the name of her nascent organization.
“When we formed our group in 2011, I decided to dedicate it to him.”
Project Tehillim is, for a small organization, a real extravaganza. (“I think I may have over-extended myself for this concert,” confided Levy). It is music in the service of a meaningful cause, a series of concerts dedicated to the 75th anniversary of the salvation of the Bulgarian Jews during the Second World War.
A selection of appropriate music by modern and contemporary figures is anchored by Reich’s 1981 settings of psalms, Tehillim.
“I have been passionate about the piece ever since I first heard it,” Levy said.
“Soprano Heather Pawsey found the conductor, Les Dala, and told me he had conducted it last year in Toronto. Our finances came from the City of Vancouver and the Jewish Fund, plus my first-ever GoFundIt campaign.”
Erato, founded in 2006 by singers Will George and Catherine Laub, is the only ensemble in town devoted to chamber music using voice.
Saturday’s performance will be George’s last show as artistic director; composer Michael Parks takes over administrative duties next season.
This is instalment two of the Ayre series, a mash-up of contemporary and historical music. With Erato’s strong interest in contemporary music and Canadian composers, the idea of a remix seemed irresistible.
“I thought it would be a really neat idea to do it by mirroring,” explained George. “Doing the original pieces in the first half, and then let the contemporary composers rework them in the second half.”
In Ayre I composers were tasked with reharmonizing or restructuring their materials, but keeping the original melody intact.
“This time round, some of the composers have really torn pieces apart and put them back together again,” said George.
Ayre II features source music from Hildegard to Handel reconsidered by seven composers, including a contest-winning creation by Elizabeth Knudson.
This time round, some of the composers have really torn pieces apart and put them back together again.