"It's our MySpace concert," Jonathan Parrish joked, explaining that
the Spring Wind Quintet of Chamber Music Hawaii used social networking
to find three of the four pieces on their program — all composed within
the past 20 years: "We're bringing you some of that old 20th-century
music."
In classical music concerts, contemporary works are
usually rationed, carefully sandwiched between familiar masterworks —
presumably to make the medicine go down more easily.
Instead, the
Spring Wind Quintet jettisoned the concept and presented an entire
program by living composers: Angel Pena (born 1921), Adrienne Albert
(1941), and Greg Bartholomew and Miguel del Aguila (both 1957).
Not
long ago, such a program would have been risky, but fortunately no
longer: to a piece, the music was engaging, hilarious, charming, moving
— everything good music of any age is supposed to be.
In many
ways, the works signal a return to Mozart's ideal, music that appeals
to both Kenner und Liebhaber (connoisseurs and amateurs), as all four
of these works did.
The Spring Wind Quintet — Claire Starz Butin
(flute), Scott Janusch (oboe), James Moffitt (clarinet), and Marsha
Schweitzer (bassoon), in addition to Parrish (horn) — delivered a
finely crafted performance that placed the focus on the new works.
The
evening began with what seemed a joke — musicians sneaking in from all
sides, announcing themselves with animal calls, to form an assemblage
of quirky musical animals that slid from individual calls into
organized music as they settled into chairs.
The piece was
Albert's "Animology," a sectional rollicking ride that included hints
of musical quotes, as when a phrase echoing "Somewhere Over the
Rainbow" slipped off the rainbow up into the stratosphere.
That
was followed by a more serious work, "Movements for Wind Quintet" by
Angel Pena who played string bass for the Honolulu Symphony for 28
years before returning to his native Philippines. Composed in 1993, the
three "Movements" languished for 17 years before this concert's world
premiere.
To present the Hawai'i premiere of Bartholomew's Second
Suite from "Razumov," his chamber opera, the Spring Wind Quintet joined
online with 20 wind quintets from around the world to participate in a
group commission. Second Suite is undergoing rolling premieres,
starting with its world premiere in November 2008 by the Aeolian Winds
of Pittsburgh.
Bartholomew's writing has a feeling of film style
to it, sprinkled with eclectic hints that never quite materialize into
firm influences. Was that a Spanish flair, a ballad, folksong or a
dance rhythm? Was that harmonic minor meant to be Arabian? His music
has a lilting grace that makes listeners want to join in, dancing or
playing along.
The Spring Wind Quintet dedicated the entire
second half of the concert to Aguila's Wind Quintet No. 2, consisting
of four descriptive movements, like vivid vignettes from a disjointed
tale.
In 1995, Aguila won a Kennedy Center Friedheim Award for this Quintet, a fact that surprised not at all upon hearing it.
The
first movement, "Back in Time," began with solos accompanied by humming
and had an early American feel, with Stephen Foster-ish melodies. For
"In Heaven," Aguila created a lightly rhythmic sound mosaic with a
faintly Caribbean feel, the whole laced with dancing that became
increasingly intoxicated.
The third movement, "Under the Earth,"
was as unsettling as one could imagine, its dark, cloudy chords and
hollow blackness leaving no doubt as to the title's meaning. From off
stage, the oboe overlaid a dreary funeral march while the wailing flute
sent ghostly phrases floating through. It was music to raise hackles.
The
closing, "Far Away" sketched a picturesque Arabian travelogue, with
drones, modal melodies, and swirling scales punctuated by trills,
closing the evening with a flourish.
Skeptics of contemporary
music owe it to themselves to hear this program, for if there is a way
to keep classical music alive, it is with programs like these — music
to surprise and delight, neither preachy nor pablum, just thoroughly
enjoyable.
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