Elena Kats-Chernin: A first look

Okay the year is getting on and things haven't been going to plan, so I may shrink the Australian Composer Survey for now, but it will be an ongoing thing I suspect. But I do want to do one more now, which may also become an ongoing thing since the composer in question is alive and kicking, not to mention quite prolific. Of current Australian composers I think she is my favourite. She has written a hauntingly beautiful ballet, works for string quartet, reimaginings of Bach and much more. She is of course Elena Kats-Chernin.

In a switch from Glanville-Hicks, Elena was born in Tashkent and moved to Australia; but like Peggy she also studied music in Europe. And just as Peggy appears to be popular in Germany, Elena has written music for German/French projects namely some silent film soundtracks.

Probably her most famous piece is Eliza's Aria from the ballet Wild Swans. There are numerous versions of this on YouTube and it's readily available one various ABC albums and others. Originally a wordless aria, she has arranged it for solo piano (performed here by the composer herself) and piano and violin too. It's a remarkable piece with its lilting ups and downs, which I imagine are a considerable challenge to sing. Despite its somewhat staccato nature it flows smoothly, I picture it like a gentle river with ripples. The first movement of her second piano concerto works in a similar fashion - I found it by accident while looking for Clocks, her first major composition but it didn't appear.

To finish for now and to give you an idea of her versatility I'll just mention these two videos. The first is a Bucharian Melody, which reminds me a little of Ippolitov-Ivanov, probably from similar geographic origins I imagine but I'd need to investigate more. It definitely has the feel of Eastern Europe, to me anyway. The second is her Russian Rag, one of her ragtime pieces, played here on a delightful array of instruments I'm not even going to try to guess what they all are.

More Recordings Please - Peggy Glanville-Hicks

One of the first composers I learnt was Australian was Glanville-Hicks, a name I knew because one of her pieces was on the first of the Swoon CDs the ABC put out in the 90s and I played a lot. But it was only really this year that I found out anything about her, even the fact that her first name was Peggy. The fact that this is her centenary year is a nice bit of serendipity I guess.

For an Australian composer however, Peggy only just counts. She was born here and she died here, and she left a wonderful legacy for Australian composition with a Trust, but most of her training and career took place overseas. Sadly that's probably to be expected for the time.

Unfortunately too, it's not that easy to lay your hands on her music. Bits an pieces yes but compared to even some of the more obscure French composers I looked at earlier she is a veritable needle in a haystack. For instance, one of her most famous works - and the one represented on Swoon - is the Sinfonia da Pacifica, and it is on YouTube but only performed by the Community Women's Orchestra performing in a church hall in Oakland California. They do a good job but there's no mistaking they are a community orchestra. Where are the bigger recordings? The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra has made some but a quick search on the ABC Shop online shows they're not readily available - in that they don't even come up under a search.

Christopher Lawrence had Glanville-Hicks as his composer on the pedestal for the last week of Australian Music month. Several of the recordings were private. One of them was the celebrated inaugural recording of her opera Sappho which only happened this year and another was of another opera The Transposed Heads.

Classics Online has a few recordings of her in the NAXOS Archives section, one of which is unavailable in Australia, one is The Transposed Heads and the other has her Three Gymnopedies between two other works by composers I don't know at all. From the samples these are beautiful orchestral snippets. I think the TSO has done them too and I would love to find a copy.

Interestingly, the other YouTube video I have for her is of a Sonatina for Recorder - a delightful exploration of the instrument - performed by a German. This is interesting because the only other album I've found so far with a piece of her music on it is on a German label. So aside from what the TSO has done, it seems she has more of a name in Germany and the States than in her own country. This despite her generous legacy which supports middle career composers. Come on people.