Royal Conservatory plays for the underdog
Julius Röntgen gets rare program Acclaim for both composer, group
There’s something consistent about Top 10 lists: similar movies, the same people and comparable types of music repeatedly turn up. Maybe that’s why there’s always a champion for the underdog, valiantly trying to get attention for something different or new. Some of these people may be taking heart from the sentiments expressed by 18th- century Scottish philosopher David Hume, who once wrote, “to bring light from obscurity, by whatever labour, must needs be delightful and rejoicing.” One man who clearly delights in his role as musical champion is Scottish- born classical guitarist Simon Wynberg, better known in these parts as the artistic director of the Artists of the Royal Conservatory.
This group, made up of faculty from Toronto’s famous independent music school, opens its season with a program dedicated to the 150th birthday anniversary of German-Dutch composer Julius Röntgen ( he died in 1932).
“ Julius Who?” — printed prominently on the program cover — is a natural reaction in North America, where Röntgen’s music is rarely performed. But this composer left behind a huge output of some 650 works, including 25 symphonies, that Wynberg feels are deserving of fresh ears.
“ Röntgen’s excellence and his near oblivion present an interesting anomaly, for he is a composer whose works do deserve regular outings, and not just on the occasion of an anniversary year,” Wynberg writes in the exceptionally thorough notes in the printed booklet that accompanies tonight’s concert at the Glenn Gould Studio. Over an informal interview late last week, Wynberg suggests that Röntgen’s obscurity can be attributed to “avantgarde orthodoxy.” The music itself, which Wynberg describes in print as having echoes of Schumann, Brahms, Reger and Grieg, was no longer fashionable in the 12- tone world promoted by the likes of Arnold Schoenberg at the dawn of the 20th century. But that makes it no less well-written, or less pleasurable to perform and listen to.
Tonight’s audience will get to hear five substantial Röntgen chamber pieces: A 1905 Sonata for Cello and Piano
( with cellist David Hetherington and pianist Diane Werner); a 1931 string Sextet (violinists Erika Raum and Marie Bérard, Steven Dann and Carolyn Blackwell on viola, and cellists Peter Cosbey and Hetherington); a 1924 Sonata for Viola and Piano
( Dann and Werner); an unusual work from 1921, the Trio for Clarinet, Viola and Piano
( Joaquin Valdepeñas on clarinet, David Louie at the piano and Dann); and a 1927 Quintet for Piano and Strings (Louie, Raum, Bérard, Dann and Hetherington). Wynberg says he has a dream job in his artistic directorship, since he puts the program together and then presents it to the musicians. Other schools’ faculty concerts are based on individual artists’ preferences.
“ They’ve invested me with a certain amount of trust,” says Wynberg.
This trust has paid off in critical acclaim for tours the Associates have completed in New York, London and Stockholm since the group’s founding three years ago. The careful thought on Wynberg’s part and this wonderful line- up of some of the city’s best musicians can only widen the Associates’ appeal. And win over some converts to the musical world of Julius Röntgen. Maybe it’ll even be delightful and rejoicing. Just the facts What: Music of Julius Röntgen, as performed by the Artists of the Royal Conservatory Where: Glenn Gould Studio, 250 Front St. W. When: Tonight @ 8 Tickets: $10-$20 @ 416-205-5555