Belated Synthesis Review - Sydney Opera House February 13, 2018

This review is very late, mostly because of an interstate move following hard on the heels of the concert, but also, as I discovered while writing it, sometimes it's hard to find the words to describe an amazing experience.

Rock bands teaming up with orchestras is nothing new. Even The Wiggles have done it, and I note Eskimo Joe is doing it later this year with the TSO, my new state orchestra. However, Evanescence has done something a bit different. Synthesis isn't a one-time collaboration with one orchestra, it is a Herculean tour where the band liaises with a new orchestra in every city it goes to. The organisers, and touring conductor Susie Seiter, probably deserve some sort of medal.

It's also more personal than the usual, ‘won't this sound good’ team-up. Amy Lee has revisited many of the band's songs and synthesised them with orchestral arrangements. The name of the album is more than apt, it is a literal description of itself. Old material in new ways, and new material with the old. That Lee was up for the challenge was evident; Evanescence has included string sections and choirs since its first album, and she has composed music for film in collaboration with Dave Eggar, who I'll talk more about in a moment.

Of course, every rock concert has a support act, and in this case its the respective orchestra, so before discussing Evanescence’s set I'll mention this. It was a smaller version of the SSO, with the addition of Sally Whitwell on piano and Dave Eggar on cello, and it was great to see them all having so much fun. The set opened with a little night music of Mozart’s, followed by some Moonlight by Beethoven. The latter was performed admirably by Sally Whitwell, with the orchestra, an unusual and novel treat for this most famous of piano sonatas. The arrangement was by Georgi Cherkin, a Bulgarian concert pianist I'll have to investigate further. It was also interesting to hear a version of Verdi’s Lacrymosa, from his Requiem, without a choir. The Lacrymosa is a clear influence on Amy Lee who references it in the front of her song of the same name. Indeed, the entire opening set was music Lee has mentioned as having an influence on her work, which added another personal dimension to the concert. The set concluded with Dave Eggar’s Rockstar cello performance of Bach in Black, which was as fun to watch as to listen too.

Once Lee walked onto the stage, in a stunning green gown, it was clear she had the presence to own the entire concert hall, but she never claimed it. This was a collaboration and her very demeanour allowed for the band and orchestra to share her spotlight. But when she sings, it’s a tricky thing not to be enamoured. Evanescence’s first album helped me through some dark times, and songs like Lithium from their second album did too. Part of the reason for that is the emotional integrity behind the music; Lee doesn’t sing of pain from some abstract idea or a desire to sound emo to be popular as a musician. Nor does her music whinge like some popular balladists seem to do these days. Her music is that of her soul, the pain is real, but she isn’t complaining, merely singing through the darkness, often finding light through the music. Hearing that, with orchestra, in person, was an experience I find difficult to describe. Perhaps that is why this review has taken so long to be written. And perhaps that’s why I have little more to say. In that concert hall with hundreds of other people, Amy Lee sang my darkness, and called to my light. Sounds ridiculous written like that, but it was a personal experience I can’t describe any other way.

To finish I’ll mention one other thing. It was great to see in this huge, rock meets classical event, three strong women in the key positions on the stage. Amy Lee, of course, Susie Seiter conducting the whole affair with aplomb, and Sally Whitwell, first as soloist in the orchestra’s set then playing piano in places where Lee usually does herself in performances without orchestra.

If a chance comes by to go to Synthesis, go – I realise that’s not likely any more. Give the album a whirl though. And go to live music events, there really is a difference to hearing recorded stuff. And keep exploring.

SYO - The Masterworks

Last week I had the good fortune to attend Sydney Youth Orchestra’s third and final concert of the year, entitled The Masterworks, in Sydney Town Hall. As with the last concert, it was opened by the SYO Philharmonic presenting an overture by Wagner, this time the Rienzi. This was followed by Dvorak’s Cello Concerto in B minor and Brahms’ Fourth Symphony.

On the face of things, the Rienzi Overture is a curious choice for a concert called The Masterworks, as it comes from an early opera that is much less thought of than Wagner’s ‘masterpieces’. However, it is an impressive piece of work and bears all the traits that, to my mind, are characteristically Wagnerian. My own knowledge of the overture is interesting to note here too. In my late teens I bought many classical CDs sold in those wire bins department stores have for discount CDs and the like, including two collections of works by Wagner, who I then held as a favourite (blame Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd). I expected to have some overlap, probably from the Ring Cycle or Tannhäuser, but no, the only piece on both albums was the Rienzi Overture. So, even if the opera itself doesn’t do as well as Wagner’s later works, the overture remains a popular one for orchestras, and in the SYO Phil’s hands it was easy to see why.

Wagner is known for his use of themes, and for being grandiose, and the Rienzi Overture, in that sense, is very Wagnerian. The thing to remember is, for the grand moments to work, they must be balanced with sufficient pathos in between, and in those moments I think Wagner produced some of his best themes and thematic presentations. Working them in performance puts an orchestra to its limits, it must rise in subliminal glory, then sink back to gentle, without losing continuity or that Wagnerian vitality. The SYO Phil traversed the thematic shifts with aplomb, leaving us entranced and awed all at the right times. I always enjoy seeing the triangle come out in the percussion section, and I’m putting its role in this overture as the best triangle moment of the SYO’s concert year. That sounds trite, the triangle being the butt of so many jokes, but that’s why I love seeing it and hearing the extra effect it gives, which comes across more clearly in live performance.

Now, I’ve mentioned my love for Dvorak before, so I won’t go on about that here. The Cello Concerto was one of the first pieces of his I really knew – besides his ninth symphony of course – and his music’s place in my heart owes a lot to this. It was another of those discount albums that introduced it to me, I found it at the back of a Woolies in Bathurst … I know, weird, but clearly meant to be. It’s a very Bohemian work, not in the coloured skirts and crocheted ponchos sense you’ll find on Pinterest, but the style of classical music from Bohemia in the late 19^th century sense. Like Smetana’s Ma Vlast (My Country), there is a strong evocation of the natural landscape of Bohemia; soaring mountains and dark forests, matched with fields and friendly villages abound in my listening to much ‘Bohemian’ music. There are passages in the Cello Concerto which also remind me of Dvorak’s symphonic poems which tell of dark and tragic Bohemian folk stories, with wild and malevolent beings ruining people’s lives, but in such beautiful folkloric ways.

This performance captured all of that. This was no doubt helped, not only by the skill and passion of the soloist, Umberto Clerici, but also his obvious rapport with the orchestra. Between solo passages Clerici not infrequently looked at and to members of the string section with encouraging nods and appreciative smiles. And the orchestra clearly responded, as, with Clerici, they evoked the fantastic forests and mountains within my imagination and thrilled me with the highs, and made me swoon with the slower passages.

As an encore, Umberto Clerici performed a piece by Giovanni Sollima, who I believe he said he is friends with. It was a shortened version of the piece ‘Alone’ and it was truly electric. I mean that in the way it was alive, and energetic, and liable to jump like lightning arcs in unexpected but utterly spectacular and completely natural ways. Clerici apparently recorded it for an album produced by ABC Classics, I’ll let you know more when I’ve tracked that down.

The final piece is one I can claim no prior knowledge of, which is a terrible oversight on my part. One thing it definitely is, is a great work to end The Masterworks on. Aside from one slow movement, it is all Allegro. It is energetic and full of passion – indeed the final movement is Allegro energico e passionata – and the orchestra rose to meet the demands of this thrilling score. It also features a number of solo moments that allowed members of the orchestra to shine and all who were called on to do so, did so with appropriate verve and skill. It was a fitting finale to both a great concert and a wonderful year for the SYO, I’m honoured to have witnessed the concerts. 

Ambition and Virtuosity

Ambition and Virtuosity was an apt name for SYO’s latest concert as the pieces selected were certainly ambitious and all require their own virtuosic performances.

The concert in Sydney Town Hall (August 5) was opened by the Sydney Youth Orchestra Philharmonic under the guidance of Brian Buggy OAM. If the SYO was the Australian XI, the SYO Philharmonic is Australia A, but there was little to tell them apart in quality. Brian Buggy, in his stylish velvet jacket, leaned into the performance, moving his body as much as the baton, as he guided the young musicians through the Act I Prelude to Wagner’s Mastersingers of Nuremberg.

Any Wagnerian work is monumental and this overture is no exception. It isn’t as dark perhaps as some of his more overtly emotional pieces, but his thematic phrasing and orchestration are as expertly rendered here as in any of his most celebrated compositions. And none of the epic sound or drama was lost in this performance, an impressive feat for such a young orchestra.

But the star turn was next, the SYO with Naoko Keatley performing Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto. Naoko stood out boldly against the orchestra, partly because of her bright blue dress against the black of the ensemble, but mostly because of her playing. It is a tricky work, full of the sort of romantic passion Tchaikovsky is famous for, and completely demanding of virtuosity, and Naoko did not falter. Her bow flew, her fingers were a blur, and we were all held in awe. When it was the orchestra’s turn and she had a chance to rest, you could see her in the music. She didn’t appear to be just listening and waiting for her turn, she was feeling it flow around and through her. Then when her turn came, it continued to flow through her and into us, the lucky audience.

None of which is to suggest that the orchestra was remotely lacking, quite the opposite. Like most great concertos, Tchaikovsky’s demands as much of the orchestra as the soloist, and only if they succeed can the soloist truly shine. The SYO met the challenge. The music weaved its magic seamlessly; there were none of the little wavers I noted in their last concert, and they showed that with diligence and enthusiasm, youth is no barrier to great orchestral performance.

This was even more evident in the final piece of the night Dvorak’s Seventh Symphony. This was an ideal selection for a youth orchestra as it gives every section, and many individuals, a chance to shine. It also capped off the night well, all three works come from the late Romantic period, but carry their composers’ distinctive styles, all of which pack a punch. Dvorak is a personal favourite of mine, so I went into this concert with excitement and trepidation at hearing one of his symphonies. I need not have been concerned.

The seventh has all of Dvorak’s range of moods, even if they don’t reach the extremes of the transcendent ninth (my all-time favourite symphony), and this is expressed through the instrumentation, which is what made it such a good showcase work for this talented orchestra. Full professional orchestras may provide more polish, but they don’t have school to attend.

Their ambition was high, but they had the virtuosity to reach their goal. Bravo SYO!

SYO - The Intrepid Voyagers

During my early teens my great aunt gave me a set of CDs from Reader’s Digest. Most of what was on them I barely listened to and I’ve forgotten much of the rest, but some tracks remain with me. One in particular lit my imagination ablaze, Mussorgsky’s ‘Great Gate of Kiev’ from his Pictures at an Exhibition, the power and expression in that piece blew my young mind. I was in my early 20s before I found a recording of the full work, this being in the days when you couldn’t stream any piece of music you wanted whenever you want. At about the same age I was first listening to the full work, the talented musicians of the Sydney Youth Orchestra have been learning to play it as one of the pieces for their Intrepid Voyagers concert tour. The tour began today with a sort of farewell performance at the Conservatorium of Music in Sydney, and will continue shortly with six performances in Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic and Germany.

Today’s concert opened with a new work by George Palmer that was commissioned for the SYO by the family of Timothy O’Brien who died last year at the far-too-early age of 20. When I saw the name of the piece, ‘In Paradisum’, I thought first of Faure’s Requiem, so I expected an ethereal work of great beauty and emotion. Instead, Palmer presented a work that moves through several moods without ever drifting into open lament or the mystical airiness of Faure’s ‘In Paradisum’. It’s a programmatic work, in that there is a story of sorts being told in the music, something explained in the program aptly enough. It is a beautiful piece, and it has what I thought of as a ‘cinematic gloss’, which is to say, there’s a filmic quality to the sound, with a vision always before and behind it, only it is for the listener to see it. What a wonderful way for Timothy to be remembered, and what a great new addition to the Australian repertoire.

Following this came Dvorak’s Symphonic Variations, a work I hadn’t heard before and was excited to discover. I’m happy to say it is signature Dvorak, with all the shifts in tempo and volume, the jaunty sections and dreamy passages reminiscent of the dark woods of eastern Europe, land of countless folktales and nightmares. But always the exuberance wins out and the work finishes on a stunning high. It’s a great piece for an orchestra, with the many variations giving them a true journey to undergo. I admit to taking an almost perverse pleasure in what I like to think of as a triangle solo. Seeing a percussionist standing there holding a triangle in readiness has too many comic connections for me not to enjoy it, but the truth is it was a vital part of the piece and rang through beautifully. And that’s one of the differences of hearing it live and seeing the performers, I noticed the instrumentation much more clearly than the blend of sound on a recording.

Finally, there was the masterwork, Pictures at an Exhibition. It’s hard to imagine a better show piece for a youth orchestra to take on tour. First, there’s its sheer power and range, from the haunting beauty of the Old Castle to the stark majesty of the Great Gate – not to forget the fun of Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks. Even better, Ravel’s orchestration covers the whole orchestra, giving every section and many individual instruments a chance to shine, there’s even a challenging tuba solo.

As for how these works were performed, I could not have asked for better. There were some blips, a slight strain or a wobble, but they were minor and few and far between. Most importantly, they never threw anyone off to create a domino effect, they happened and the music went on, as you would expect from musicians who are both talented and professional – as I expect many of them will be in the not-too-distant future. As they blazed into the final blasts of the Great Gate, I shut my eyes and let the music I’ve loved for so long wash over me, there was no mistaking the skill and passion behind the playing.

Well done SYO, I wish you every success for the tour and all the music to come.

Album review - Locatelli's Concerto Grossi Op 1, No 1-6

It's been a while since I posted and may be a while till I post again, it's a tough time at the moment. But I thought I would take this opportunity to post an review I wrote which I posted on Classicsonline. It''s for a Naxos recording of Locatelli's Concerto Grossi Op 1 No 1-6 performed by Capella Istropolitana conducted by Jaroslav Krcek.

Locatelli’s Concerto Grossi is a vivid collection of the moods of the violin that never loses the liveliness we can expect from a virtuosic player-composer. They’re not violin concertos of course, but they make heavy use of the string section and feature many violin solos and it’s these that really give the overall Opus its character and separate it from the better known Concerto Grossi of Handel and Corelli.

While they also make good use of the strings, Locatelli’s violin glides effortlessly over the whole and produces the feeling of each movement, from the lively opening of No 1 to the graceful beauty of No 5’s Largo where the violin works in concert with an organ.

The movements are constantly shifting as Locatelli paints a colourful abstract that never allows you to fall into complacency. The movement following the Largo of No 5 is a racing Allegro with the strings rolling along beside a harpsichord.
Even the structures of the individual concerto grosso are disparate so there’s no risk of falling into a formula. Most do start with a livelier movement, usually an Allegro – in fact, most movements are Allegros – but No 6 opens with an almost haunting Adagio before plunging into an Allegro where the strings are split into two refrains which work together at the end for a harmonious whole, underpinned along the way by the harpsichord.

This performance by Capella Istropolitana is smooth and fluid, ranging over the differing movements effortlessly so we can enjoy the journey and never feel jarred. It is a masterful display of some lesser known but very deserving Baroque.

Glinka Album Review

If you follow this for long it will soon become apparent that I'm a big fan of Russian classical music. The father of that tradition is considered to be Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (1804-1857) who brought Western classical ideas to traditional Russian music and greatly influenced later compatriot composers like Balakirev, Mussorgsky and eventually Tchaikovsky. How much so on each I don't know.

Despite that there's only one piece of his which gets much recognition these days, the overture to his second opera Ruslan and Lyudmilla. It is an exciting overture with an awesome timpani part, but I always figured there had to be some more great work. Then this album came up as a weekend special on classicsonline and I couldn't pass it up. It proves Glinka wrote quite a lot of wonderful music, definitely classical but also distinctly Russian, with shifting themes and moods that never leave you bored.

So I reviewed it and the following is what I submitted to classicsonline.

When the opening dramatic and brooding strings and horns of the Capriccio Brilliante give way to a lively fare with softer strings and floating winds, you know you’re in for something special. This album leaves us with no doubt why Mikhail Glinka is considered the father of Russian classical music, but it does raise the question of why we mostly only hear one overture of his when so much of his work is musically brilliant and, more importantly, such fun to listen to.

Every time you think the tune has settled into one mode, it will take a turn. Light strings in the Souvenir from Madrid are suddenly punctuated with stirring percussion, only to fall back to the strings before a brief almost plaintiff clarinet and a rousing combination of the three. Themes are established, intertwined and mixed with seeming ease, and the themes are undeniably Russian but wonderfully wrought into the Classical mode. There are foretellings of almost every Russian composer to follow in this music, but none more so than Tchaikovsky himself.

Vassily Sinaisky leads the BBC Philharmonic on this exploration of Glinka’s Russia and cuts a deft path through the shifts and changes. The drama is captured without overwhelming the quieter moments which ring with poignancy. This is hands-down a magnificent introduction to the music of a highly influential composer who has so much more to offer than the overture to Ruslan and Lyudmilla; although when it comes to that … well, it is a triumph no doubt.

Busy Busoni - A Review

The following is a review I just submitted to Classicsonline of Busoni orchestral works, featuring the Clarinet Concertino, by the Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma conducted by Francesco La Vecchia. It's on the NAXOS label and you can find it here.

Before seeing this album I only knew the name Busoni from a transcription of Bach on a James Rhodes album. I was lured in to this one however by the clarinet concertino – I collect clarinet concertos. I’m very glad I got it too, not just the one piece but the whole album.

Most of the pieces, like the Lustspielouverture and the Flute Divertimento, are lively classic fare with an infusion of something more modern than I’d expect. The whole album is very energetic, and captured beautifully in the recording which has clarity with all the instruments. There’s also a richness to the music and a constant sense of movement; it’s never boring.

It’s never more surprising though than the Rondo Arlecchinesco, which lives up to its zany namesake. Even after several listens the sudden entrance of the tenor is surprising.

And of course I have to talk about the Clarinet Concertino. What a delight! It’s not as robust and dramatic as the rest, allowing for a quieter moment which in itself is no bad thing, but the way the clarinet seems to drift over the other instruments as if they were the water and it the boat, is simply magic.