Sonic balm:
Albany Symphony releases offer some relief from live-music pause.
New CDS from the Albany Symphony Orchestra seem to be arriving at a steady and reliable pace lately. The repertoire, of course, is always contemporary and yet the discs are starting to feel like mementos of special concerts attended during better times.
Let’s hope that misty aura of nostalgia isn’t permanent. Audio recordings, like streaming concerts, are no substitute for live performances.
Berlin and Spiridopoulos go on record
Two anchors of the ASO’S brass section have teamed up to produce “Along the Continuum” (MSR Classics), a lively collection of duos for trumpet and trombone. Principal trumpet Eric Berlin and principal trombone Greg Spiridopoulos are both longtime ASO members as well as professors at Umass Amherst, where the recording was made in 2017.
I’d considered using the word “duets” to describe the six works on this recording. Yet that terms suggests a certain intimacy and there’s nothing intimate about this recording. Also, there’s a third musician involved.
Pianist Ludmila Krasin plays piano reductions of the accompaniments originally scored for orchestra or wind ensemble. Unfortunately, she can hardly be heard, partly due to the engineering mix, which also gives the piano a tinny sound.
Really though, how could she not get lost with Berlin and Spiridopoulos playing full out and with gusto. Throughout a raft of music, the gentleman maintain a trademark clean and radiant sound. It’s quite a ride.
Their program consists of six works presented in reverse chronological order. The newest is Jeffrey Holmes’ “Continuum” (2012), a fast and enjoyable journey through a range of styles or what the composer describes as “world seasonings.” The piece was written specifically for Berlin and Spiridopoulos.
The final and oldest piece on the disc is “Cousins” (1904) by Herbert L. Clarke, a cornetist, bandmaster and associate of John Philip Sousa. According to Berlin’s notes, Clarke’s influence on brass pedagogy continues to this day. “Cousins” speaks of its time, snappy but dignified, quaint and nostalgic and played with obvious affection.
The disc also features substantial concertos by Eric Ewazen, Anthony Plog and Jacques Casterede,
plus a cute “Fandango” by Joseph Turrin. It’s a meaty program that reflects the seriousness of the artists and their encyclopedic knowledge of the literature. For most of us though, it’s too many fanfares and too much velocity for one sitting.
“Ellen West” returns on disc
I probably didn’t make any friends last summer when I described the opera “Ellen West” as “surreal and disturbing.” The one-act with music by Ricky Ian Gordon and poetry by Frank Bidart received its world premiere at Opera Saratoga. The scenario is dark and bitter: Ellen is morbidly anorexic and we hear her streams of consciousness framed by clinical reports from her physician. For good measure, director Emma Griffin added some sickening pantomimes of binging during a musical interlude.
Learning of a forthcoming recording, I thought it might be good to encounter “Ellen” again without any visuals and be alert for any possible rays of light in Gordon’s score. After a thorough listening, I can report that it’s still a grim opera from start to finish. The music, while well crafted, is laced with melancholy and a slight nausea.
The recording, issued by a label called Bright Shiny Things, is of a live performance during January of this year at the Prototype Festival under the aegis of Beth Morrison Projects, which co-commissioned the piece with Opera Saratoga. Soprano Jennifer Zetlan returns in the title role, singing with a detached urgency while baritone Nathan Gunn brings a heavy authority as the doctor. The cast and an ensemble of piano and five strings is conducted by Lidiya Yankovskaya.
Theofanidis abundance
As already noted in the Times
Union, the ASO’S latest title on Albany Records features two concertos by Christopher Theofanidis, who’s become one of music director David Alan Miller’s favorites.
The first ASO performance of Theofanidis’ music was in 2005 with “Rainbow Body,” a luminous 13-minute tone poem that’s been taken up by dozens of other American orchestras over the last 20 years. Theofanidis works have been heard here frequently in the last few years, and he has even joined the ASO team, serving as a mentor to the young composers who are in residence during the annual American Music Festival.
The new CD shows why Theofanidis’ music is becoming so widely embraced. Again and again, it brought to mind the work of Samuel Barber. There’s an overarching sense of romanticism and grand expression that’s tinged with the struggles of contemporary life. All this comes through in the Violin Concerto, which was written in 2008 for Sarah Chang. The piece was subsequently revised and is exquisitely performed here by soloist Chee-yun in 2017.
Midway through the vigorous opening movement comes a captivating passage that begins with the string playing swooping and swaying lines. Somehow it feels rather Asian and as if the music is trying to smile and tease. Against these patterns, the violin is more argumentative and makes wide leaps across the instrument’s range. This is one of many captivating moments in the robust first two movements. Theofanidis wraps up his concerto with a finale that’s short, fast and declarative, as did Barber.
Even without knowing that the Viola Concerto of Theofanidis was inspired by Navajo poetry, it’s hard to miss the feeling of tribal ceremony, an energetic summoning of power that continues almost unflagging for eight minutes. Richard O’neill is the fine soloist in the piece that was written for Kim Kashkashian in 2002. O’neil is particularly strong and expressive in the daringly still and deep second movement titled “In the Questioning.” The music is even more personal and internal in “The Center of the Sky,” a reflection of the tragedy of 9/11 that took place while the work was being composed.
The Violin Concerto was recorded at EMPAC and the Viola Concerto in the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall. The sonics on both are superb. Hats off to engineer Silas Brown and Doron Schachter. The ASO has hit its stride in recordings, but concerts are what drive the product. May they resume soon!