Saturday, March 2, 2024

"Mendelsson's Birthday" - the Israel Chamber Orchestra in an all-Mendelssohn program in Tel Aviv. Conductor: Roberto Forés Veses. Guest pianists: Sivan Silver, Gil Garburg

Roberto Forés Veses (Courtesy ECO)

Gil Garburg, Sivan Silver (silvergarburg.com)

 

Seeing the Recanati Auditorium of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art packed to capacity on February 22nd 2024 was proof that the Israel Chamber Orchestra's all-Mendelssohn concert was of great appeal to the concert-going public and that "Mendelssohn's Birthday" (February 4th) was a celebration not to be missed. Conducting the ICO was Roberto Forés Veses (Spain-France). Guest artists were Sivan Silver and Gil Garburg (Israel-Germany, Silver-Garburg Piano Duo).

 

Felix Mendelssohn's one-act Singspiel "Heimkehr aus der Fremde" (1829) ("Son and Stranger" or "Return of the Roamer") might be considered "musica rara" by most audiences. The composer wrote the light opera (a comedy of mistaken identities) to be played at his parents' silver wedding anniversary celebration. The Tel Aviv concert opened with its Overture Op.89, the ICO's playing underscoring the piece's charm and wit with lush and expressive playing. Then, to more familiar repertoire.  In 1842, Mendelssohn was commissioned by the King of Prussia to provide incidental music for a production of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream". Mendelssohn seems to have had no trouble in creating music depicting the world of fairies and human lovers. In a letter, his sister Fanny had written: “We have really grown up together with the 'Midsummer Night’s Dream' and Felix, in particular, has made it his own." Forés Veses and the ICO players performed two of the eleven pieces: the Intermezzo (between Acts II and III) lively, featherweight and restless, depicting Hermia's agitation as she searches for her lover Lysander lost in the wood. The Nocturne, describing Puck’s magical control over the befuddled quartet of lovers as they sleep in the forest, features one of Mendelssohn’s finest and most poignant horn solos (here, with a couple of "clams"), the horn sound evoking the warm serenity of a summer night. I always enjoy the fine, glowing quality of the ICO's wind players. With winds cardinal in Mendelssohn's instrumental music, the players' rich timbres were prominent throughout the concert.  

 

Mendelssohn was thirteen when the family left Germany to spend two years in Switzerland. There, Felix produced four string symphonies, a violin sonata, a piano quintet, the early C Minor Symphony, a double concerto for violin and piano and the two concertos for two pianos, the latter probably written with his sister and himself in mind. The first private performance of the E Major Concerto took place at one of the Sunday concerts taking place at the Mendelssohn house in Berlin. Written at age 14, it was regarded as immature by the budding composer. Hence, it was set aside and not published. Remaining in manuscript until 1961, the Leipziger Ausgabe der Werke Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy issued a version substantially revised by Mendelssohn himself and edited by Karl-Heinz Köhler. At the ICO concert, Sivan Silver and Gil Garburg's handling of the piano roles - of the two pianos with each other and with the orchestra - highlighted Mendelssohn's astonishing creativity and flair, reminding the listener that the adolescent Mendelssohn was already the great melodist of the "Songs without Words", au courant with the German virtuoso piano school and on the verge of artistic maturity. In this sparkling, untroubled work, brimming with youthful vivacity, the composer skilfully weaves darker colours into the music to create contrasts, as heard in the delectable slow movement which was spelled out with warmth, elegance and grace. Altogether, Silver and Garburg engaged in spirited and imaginative interplay, the latter allowing for their individual personalities to shine through. They thrilled the audience with the dashing scales, arpeggios and fleet-footed figurations (albeit articulately enounced) in the final movement.  Add to these the ICO's sympathetic strings and delightful wind playing. For their encore, Silver and Garburg played the sprightly Scherzo from Mendelssohn’s own four-hand (one piano) transcription of the incidental music to "A Midsummer Night's Dream". 

 

In October 1830, Felix Mendelssohn travelled to Italy, remaining there for ten months. Impressions of the trip remain in a series of watercolours and sketches he produced, but also in Symphony No.4 in A major Op.90, "Italian". Apart from the final movement, the symphony is not Italian music as such; rather, it puts into sounds the composer's response to the congeniality of Mediterranean sunshine (Mendelssohn referred to the symphony as a “blue sky in A major”), to Italy's religious solemnity, monumental art and architecture and to the beauty of the Italian countryside. Roberto Forés Veses led the ICO instrumentalists through the work in all its luxuriance, grace and flavours, his uniquely definitive and elegant conducting language addressing the score's gestures and minutest details, summoning up the forthright joy and immediacy of the opening Allegro vivace, the wistful ambiance of the Andante con moto (recalling processions Mendelssohn had witnessed in Rome) and presenting a finely-shaped and supple reading of the Minuet (Con moto moderato). With the raucous Neapolitan saltarello as its basis, the final movement was a scene of joyful abandon, hurtling to a close with a minor-key reiteration of the first movement’s opening theme. 

 

Felix Mendelssohn died before reaching the age of 40. One can only speculate what musical riches were denied the world by so tragically early a demise. 

 



Sunday, February 25, 2024

Pianist Daniel Gortler's recent recording of Edvard Grieg's "Lyric Pieces"

 


Edvard Grieg's "Lyric Pieces" for piano were written between 1867 and 1901, the sixty-six pieces published in ten books. Somewhat suggestive of Robert Schumann's piano cycles (but without their feverish intensity) they reflect Grieg's rich world of fantasy, of empathy and also the folk music of his native Norway. Indeed, Grieg has imbued these Romantic miniatures with an aura and pianistic approach that are uniquely his. American-Israeli pianist Daniel Gortler recently recorded a selection of the pieces, the line-up of which being of his own choosing and not conforming to the order in which they were written.

 

Gortler addresses the melodic shaping, the ample realm of changing harmonies and the essence of each musical vignette with insight and conviction. Enlisting his signature sensitive pianistic touch and whistle-clean finger dexterity, the artist probes the many mood pieces - "Arietta" Op.12/3, "Berceuse" Op.38/1, for example; they emerge lyrical, introspective, wistful and highly personal in character. In his reading of "Vanished Days" Op.57/1, Gortler's playing is rich in textural and emotional content, nostalgic and so very touching. Then there are pieces evoking the world of nature - the vivid, effervescent, many-directional movement of water in "Brooklet" Op. 62/4, the descriptive fluttering of tiny wings in "Butterfly" Op.43/1 ending in the blink of any eye,  little hops of the endearing "Little Bird" Op.43/4, the piece's quirky ornaments produced with meticulous precision. In "To the Spring", Gortler conveys Grieg's sense of wonder and joy inspired by the arrival of spring. As to items describing the day's end, Notturno Op.54/4, with its chromatic moments, reflects some waves of unrest, compared to the composer's sense of peace, tranquillity and intimacy in "Summer's Eve" Op.71/2. We are reminded of Grieg's folk heritage, here and there in  glimpses, but more specifically in "Norwegian Dance" Op.47/4, its drone and modal melody evoking the character of the early fiddle, and in the appealing simplicity of the "Peasant's Song". The whimsical "March of the Dwarfs" (Trolls), conjures up the boisterous imaginary inhabitants of the Jotunheimen mountains. Bristling with mischief, precise fingerwork and the effects of strategic timing, Gortler's performance of "Puck" Op.71/3 reminds us that the fairy world is not all goodness and generosity. (In Scandinavia, Puck is portrayed as a Norse demon, indeed, sometimes associated with the devil.) Not only did Schumann write a piano piece entitled "Gade", his third piano trio was also dedicated to Niels Wilhelm Gade, a close family friend. Grieg, in the "Lyric Pieces" pays tribute to the same Danish composer/conductor, who had been a major influence on him in his early years. "Gade" Op.57/2 is a light-hearted, spirited piece.

 

A true master of the miniature, Daniel Gortler captures the moods and characterization, the Nordic flavour, the fairytale magic, the nature scenes and, above all, the refined emotions expressed in the "Lyric Pieces" heard in this recording. Offering rich and subtle expression to Grieg's poetic diary, his playing is delicate, polished and transparent, inviting the composer's character and personality to shine through the content of each small, finely-formed musical sketch. 

 

Grieg "Lyric Pieces" (Prospero Classical) was recorded (2021, 2022) at the Jerusalem Music Centre on a Steinway grand piano. Daniel Gortler is a Steinway artist.



Daniel Gortler (www.schubertiade.co.il)





 

 

Saturday, February 17, 2024

Tenor Daniel Johannsen in a new two-CD set of Schubert's "Die schöne Müllerin": CD1 with Christoph Hammer (fortepiano);CD2 in Tom Randle's setting for tenor and string quartet

 


 

At the beginning of the 19th century, the intelligentsia and the bourgeoisie of German-speaking countries were much occupied with their love of nature. Rising economic activity and growing wealth allowed for the leisure time necessary to enjoy their passion for the outdoors, for country walks and even for long journeys on foot. "Die schöne Müllerin" (The Fair Maid of the Mill) Op.2, D.795, Franz Schubert's setting of poems of Wilhelm Müller, celebrates the influence of nature on man's emotions, but with added dimensions of a storyline. The first of Schubert's two seminal song cycles (preceding the "Winterreise"), it is usually performed by a pianist and a solo singer, the vocal part falling within the range of the tenor (or soprano) voice. Transposed to a lower range, however, it can also be sung by other voices, a precedent established by Schubert himself.  Actually, Müller's first large-scale poem cycle originated from a literary parlour game taking place in 1816, where the poet joined friends at the home of a German privy councillor to create a "Liederspiel" (a narrative play told in poetry and song), the subject of which was the folk story of a false-hearted miller maiden moving between various suitors. Müller eventually completed the cycle of poems, combining the roles of gardener and miller into a single character and telling the entire story from the miller's point of view. Schubert came across the poems in late 1822. Wishing to create songs on a grand emotional scope, the composer was drawn to this cycle; it occupied him much in 1823. Publishing "Die schöne Müllerin" D.795 in Vienna in August 1824, Franz Schubert chose twenty of the poems, creating one of the first song cycles in music history. Sadly, Müller, who had claimed that his poems "lead but half a life, a paper existence of black-and-white, until music breathes life into them ..."  probably died unaware of the fact that Schubert had put this poem cycle to music.

 

In Schubert's time, the singer would have been joined by a fortepianist. In this 2-disc recording for the hänssler Classic label (2023), the first disc presents Austrian tenor Daniel Johannsen performing the song cycle with fortepianist Christoph Hammer (Germany). In the second disc, we hear Johannsen singing "Die schöne Müllerin" with the Alinde Quartett (2022) in a groundbreaking setting by renowned US-born composer/conductor/tenor Tom Randle 

 

With much focus on the music of Schubert, Johannsen and Hammer have collaborated frequently, both in live performance and in recordings. Their reading of "Die schöne Müllerin" addresses each and every aspect of the cycle as the narrative thread unfolds - the miller's naivety, expressed with artfully-stylised folksiness, outbursts of ecstatic exuberance of love, together with the deep tragedy of the events which unfold in their full intensity. The two artists conjointly highlight the sheer beauty of Schubert's melodic shaping, the composer's economic but striking use of dissonances and the constant duality reflected in rapid changes between major and minor. Nature, in all its splendour, emerges fresh and enticing as it reflects the miller's emotional state throughout. Hammer's playing is buoyant and articulate as he and Johannsen communicate hand-in-glove at each turn of phrase of the Müller text, with the murmuring brook and the turning of the mill wheel the most constant and symbolic backdrop elements to the diegesis. Playing on an original fortepiano by Conrad Graf, Hammer displays its warmth of sound, the delicacy and emotional and dramatic variety offered by this instrument and of his own musical palette. Instead of bowing to restraint (a quality so often attributed to the fortepiano), Hammer invites the instrument's capacity for expressive freedom and considerable carrying power to serve the music and words. With the direct action of the small hammers on the strings and the natural decay in the mechanism, there is space between the notes, rendering clarity of delivery. Johannsen, engaging his wonderfully distinct diction and meticulously-defined phrasing, unveils the gestures and meaning of each song, his richness and radiance of timbre, his fine vocal and interpretational skills giving expression to the emotions and meaning (camouflaged and otherwise) present in each song. The result of superb teamwork, Johannsen and Hammer's performance is precise in detail and subtle, indeed, a convincing, gripping and moving interpretation.

 

And to the Tom Randle setting. Remaining faithful to Schubert's text and concept, Randle underscores key words and creates fine contrasts between intimate, jubilant and vehement moments. Translating the fuller, more dramatic keyboard textures into the string quartet medium, Randle adds extra melodic lines, "comments" and some doubling. There is much delicacy and beauty both in the setting and in the Alinde Quartett's superbly eloquent, attentive playing. Daniel Johannsen relates- and reacts to the string players and to Randle's spectrum of references. The adaptation is profound and it is indeed very Schubert. I personally missed the fortepiano textures when it came to certain associations, especially those of the mechanical, pounding mill-wheels and the burbling brook, keyboard timbres so intrinsic and unique to the work. Still, Randle's transcription is refined, intelligent and aesthetically appealing. It asks to be listened to again and again.

 

Recorded in Grafrath (CD 1) and Ratingen (CD 2), Germany, the sound quality is lush and convincing.

Tom Randle@tomrandle






Christoph Hammer (kulturhaus.lu)

Friday, January 26, 2024

"Women in Music" - the Carmel Quartet (Israel) presents works by women composers and discusses three courageous women composers

 

Yoel Greenberg,Sarit Shley Zondiner,Tali Goldberg,Rachel Ringelstein,Tami Waterman (Courtesy Sarit Shley Zondiner)

Opening "Women in Music", Concert No.2 of the Carmel Quartet's 2023-2024 Strings and More series, Prof. Yoel Greenberg, the quartet's musical director and violist, spoke about brave women. The concert itself was dedicated to the memory of one such brave woman - Staff Sgt. Yam Glass, 20, an observation soldier in the Israeli Armed Forces, who was murdered on October 7 2023 at the outset of the current war. This writer attended the English-language presentation at the Jerusalem Music Centre, Mishkenot Shaananim, on January 17th, 2024.

 

The evening opened with much interesting information and the performance of works by three courageous women composers - composers of three different periods and from three different continents. The first movement of Maddalena Lombardini Sirman's Quartet Opus 3 No.2 was performed behind a screen, symbolizing the iron grate behind which the brilliant young women musicians of the Ospedale di San Lazzaro dei Mendicanti (one of four such music schools in Venice) were obliged to perform in the name of modesty. Lombardini (1745-1818), one of the school's most famous pupils, was a virtuoso violinist (a student of the great Tartini), a composer and, later on, a singer. She was the first woman to compose string quartets at a time when the genre was still extremely new and in its formal, experimental stage. Indeed, Prof. Greenberg referred to Lombardini Sirman as a "trailblazer for women". The Carmel Quartet's buoyant playing highlighted the slow–fast two-movement quartet's freshness, its geniality, variety of colours and richness of form.

 

It was only in the 1990s, when women musicians championed her work, that interest in American composer Amy Beach (1867-1944) led to a revisiting of her compositions and newfound respect for her achievements. A child prodigy, she became a virtuoso pianist, emerging as the most frequently performed composer of her generation and the first woman to succeed as a composer of large-scale symphonic music. Beach assumed many leadership positions, advancing the cause of American women composers and proving to be a stickler for authenticity in the quotation of folk themes. One instance of the latter is her Quartet in One Movement Op.89, through which are threaded three Eskimo (or Inuit) tunes. The Carmel players gave expression to the splendid writing of the tripartite piece, its beauty, lyricism and intensity and to the textures arising from its mix of dissonance, chromatics and irresolute tonality, presenting a fine example of American music of the time. 

 

And to a work of another go-ahead young woman composer. "Shira" for string quartet was written especially for this program by prominent Israeli composer Sarit Shley Zondiner (b.1984), today a faculty member of Haifa University. Shley Zondiner addresses the impact that background has on foreground, both musically and emotionally. "Shira" (Hebrew: song, singing), two movements written for string quartet and recorded electronic sound, takes the listener into a sound world of uncompromising timbres, otherworldly effects, engaging layering and intensity. Interesting music indeed, the melodic- and textural sentiments expressed in it certainly sounding indicative of these anguished times. The Carmel players' reading of this challenging piece was scholarly and detailed, but also decidedly insightful and compassionate. Of her music, the composer writes: " I create complex soundscapes, utilizing extended techniques and combining 'noise', rich harmonies and wide-ranging melodies."

 

The evening's subject matter - women's standing in music in the western world through the ages - was presented captivatingly by Prof. Greenberg (a native English speaker), with much interesting and amusing detail added (in fine English) by the three other Carmel Quartet members - Rachel Ringelstein and Tali Goldberg (violin) and 'cellist Tami Waterman. If "sexist" can be defined as "characterized by- or showing prejudice, stereotyping or discrimination, typically against women, on the basis of sex" one must assume that the world of western music has been dominated and impeded by this attitude for a very long time.

 

There was also talk of the concept of "masculine" and "feminine" types of music. Beethoven's music was considered "masculine". In 1927, French dramatist, novelist and mystic Romain Rolland proclaimed Beethoven's masculinity, rejecting the Romantics' association of the composer's music as having feminine qualities. The "Women in Music" event concluded with Ludwig Van Beethoven's Quartet Op.95 in F minor "Serioso" (1810). As to the quartet's opening, with the four instruments in unison pouring forth one of the composer's most violent statements, the first violin (Ringelstein) in wild octave leaps and the ensuing slashing scale passages, all these would suggest that the work reflects the composer's depth of despair at the time. The players' songful, questioning and reflective rendition of the ensuing Allegretto gave way to the strongly chiselled and propulsive Allegro, its intensity temporarily relieved by the hymn-like nature of the middle section. As to the final movement, following the tense, contemplative Larghetto opening, we meet Beethoven in a sudden surge of major-key good humour. Interestingly, Beethoven acknowledged the radical nature of the work when he wrote to Sir George Smart (a member of the Philharmonic Society, London) maintaining that the Op.95 Quartet had been "written for a small circle of connoisseurs and is never to be performed in public". This request may have been made due to the work's prematurely experimental nature…not, I am sure, due to its masculinity.

 

 

Sunday, January 7, 2024

The gala concert of the A-Cappella Jerusalem Vocal Ensemble draws a large audience. Conductor/music director: Judi Axelrod

Judi Axelrod (Rahel Sharon Jaskow)

 

Taking place on January 2nd 2024 in the Henry Crown auditorium of the Jerusalem Theatre, the gala concert of the A-Cappella Jerusalem Vocal Ensemble was a festive affair. The first thing one noticed was the choir's new, larger format. The concert was conducted by Judi Axelrod (conductor of the A-Cappella Singers as of 2003), who has been working with the newly-expanded ensemble for some nine months. A cooperative project of choral conductor Ms. Ronit Banit and Mr. Ofer Amsalem (CEO of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra), the singers were joined by a small ensemble of JSO players and by Netta Ladar (harpsichord/organ). There were also several vocal soloists.

 

The event opened with Antonio Vivaldi's Kyrie RV 587, a work scored for two choirs and two groups of stringed instruments in the Venetian antiphonal style of spatially divided musical groups. Despite the choral-instrumental groups not being placed separately, one was ever aware of the two groups' exchange of dialogue. The two forces progressed from agonizing painful clashes through the joyful duet to a masterful fugal finale, the JSO violinists offering a sparkling performance. In the second section of the Kyrie, soprano Yeela Avital and Rahel Jaskow (mezzo-soprano) were answered by the choir. 

 

Countertenor Alon Harari's performance of "Cum dederit" (Psalm 127, 2–3) from Vivaldi's "Nisi Dominus" emerged reverent and mellifluous as he gave expression to the aria's slow Siciliana style with its chromatically ascending lines, guiding the listener through the intense melodiousness of the movement.

 

Of particular interest was George Frideric Handel’s secular cantata "Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne" (HWV 74), scored for choir, orchestra and vocal soloists and featuring a significant obbligato role for the trumpet, here performed by Guy Sarig. The ode features a level of virtuosity for both soloists and instrumentalists and quite some complexity in the choral writing, the latter handled splendidly by the A-Cappella singers with clear English diction and by the JSO players' crisp instrumental playing in a performance articulate in its contrapuntal weave and contrasts. Soloists Alon Harari and Yeela Avital collaborated well, matching gestures and ornaments with precision.

 

Handel premiered his opera "Serse" on April 15th 1738 at the King’s Theatre, Haymarket in London. The composer had decided on a semi-historical plot involving the hot-blooded Persian tyrant Xerxes. The London audience, however, disliked it and the first production was a complete failure, the work becoming referred to as “one of the worst things Handel ever set to music.” As a result, it disappeared from the stage for almost two hundred years, to be revived only in 1924.The opera proper opens with a short- and rather strange aria “Ombra mai fù” (Never was a shade) a love song sung by Xerxes. The aria's rarefied atmosphere is meant ironically, as Xerxes sings of his profound, heartfelt love not for a woman, but for a tree!  Harari showed fine vocal control as he shaped the emotional and dynamic course of probably the most famous number from any of Handel's operas. 

 

Then to the choir's sensitive handling, superb choral colour and contemplative spirit in its performance of the unaccompanied devotional prayer "Yihyu lerazon" (Let the words of my mouth) from Ernest Bloch's "Avodath Hakodesh" (Sacred Service), the neo-Romantic work inviting the choir's subtle blend and ability for expressive phrasing. 

 

Another a-cappella piece heard at the concert, "Eshet Khayil'' (A Woman of Worth), by Israeli composer Mordecai Seter, is based on a Bratslav Hasidic melody for the Friday evening recitation (Proverbs 31). Judi Axelrod led her singers through a precise, articulate performance of it, the piece's clusters emerging in lush, shimmering textures. 

 

Naomi Shemer was hailed as the "first lady of Israeli song and poetry". "Giora” expresses the nation's shared grief at the loss of its children most persuasively as it remembers "B'khol Shanah Bastav Giora" (Every Year in Autumn, Giora) in this elegy to Giora Shoham, a young victim of the Yom Kippur War. The melody almost takes on the character of an art song, waxing and waning in plangent gestures, sounding unmistakably like a tender prayer. Axelrod's outstanding a-cappella arrangement of the song brims with musical elements in a rich arrangement of layers, giving the stage to the vocal expression and independent abilities of her singers.

 

Then, to a total shift of scene with a concert performance of Act 2 of Johann Strauss' "Die Fledermaus" (The Bat), the performance deftly reflecting the work's mid-European mentality with its irreverent humour and exciting music, its plot one of mistaken identities, scandalous love interests, absolute chaos and hysterical outcomes. On one side of the stage, we see and hear young promising singers Roi Witz, Eran Margalit and Dimitri Negrinovski; on the other, Yeela Avital (Rosalinde), Nadezhda Gaidukova and Tali Ketzef. Ketzef, always at home on stage, made for a coquettish, risqué Adele, with mezzo-soprano Nadezhda Gaidukova (en travesti) playing a cunning, whimsical Prince Orlofsky, her young voice powerful and of a unique, penetrating colour. Axelrod's direction of "Die Fledermaus" was savvy, as she gave the stage to the operetta's drollery, its vocal elements and its splendid music, the latter replete with numerous catchy waltz- and polka themes. 

 

Indeed, an impressive gala concert with interesting, well-balanced programming. Axelrod's careful approach to the singing voice was apparent throughout, making for fine-spun-, well-blended choral timbres. Following the evening of fine entertainment, we were reminded of the reality of these times with the orchestra and choir's subdued and moving performance of Judi Axelrod's re-arrangement of "Bring Him Home" ("Les Misérables"), the words here changed to "Bring them home" (in Hebrew and English), a fervent plea to bring the Israeli hostages back from Gaza.



Sunday, December 31, 2023

The 2023 Jerusalem International YMCA's Christmas concert features the Israel Camerata Jerusalem (conductor: Avner Biron). Soloists Rachel Frenkel (mezzo-soprano), Muki Zohar (oboe)


 

Greeting guests to the Jerusalem International YMCA on December 24th 2023 were the many lights illuminating the impressive historic building and the large, brightly lit Christmas tree, always a focal feature of Jerusalem's King David St. during the festive season. Ringing out into the crisp evening air were the festive sounds of Christmas carols played on the YMCA's bell carillon, the only instrument of its kind in the entire Middle East. Jerusalem residents, guests and tourists filled the auditorium to celebrate Christmas eve with a concert performed by the Israel Camerata Jerusalem conducted by its musical director Prof. Avner Biron. Soloists were Rachel Frenkel (mezzo-soprano) and Muki Zohar (oboe.)

 

Welcoming the audience, Mr. Fadi Suidan, CEO of the Jerusalem International YMCA, spoke of the YMCA as a beacon of unity and peace, of its purpose and mission, its message of hope and as a place bringing together people of different backgrounds.

 

The evening's program opened with Concerto Grosso in G minor, Op. 6, No. 8 by Arcangelo Corelli. Published posthumously in 1714, one of Corelli's 12 Concerti Grossi Op. 6, it bears the inscription "Fatto per la notte di Natale" (made for the night of Christmas.)  The Camerata performance unveiled the work's subtlety and cantabile expressiveness, as the players leaned into the dissonances of the noble, reflective slower movements, setting them against the buoyancy and joy of the faster sections, the final Allegro segueing into the graceful Pastorale so gently evocative of the flocks near Bethlehem in the Christmas scene. From J.S.Bach’s Orchestral Suite No.3 BWV 1068, composed for his patron Prince Leopold of Anhalt, comes the much-loved Air on the G string. It was thus titled after violinist August Wilhelm's late 19th century arrangement of the Air for violin and piano. (Transposing the key from its original D major to C major and taking the melody down an octave, Wilhelm was able to play the piece on only one string of his violin, the G string.) Maestro Biron and the Camerata players gave a beautifully poised reading of the piece reflecting how elegantly Bach's density of material is lodged in the finespun interweave of inner lines over a walking bass line. One could not object to listeners at the YMCA event gently humming along with the melody of possibly one of the most famous single movements in Bach’s output!

 

An enigmatic item on the program, however, was "Three Pieces in the Old Style'' by eminent Polish composer Krysztof Penderecki (1933-2020), a composer whose works from the 1960s placed him firmly in the avant-garde scene, with music of sheer emotive power using new notation methods, aggressive glissandi, massive tonal clusters and innovative vocal and instrumental techniques. On the podium, Penderecki was an imposing figure who conducted with sweeping gestures befitting his herculean music. His "Three Pieces in the Old Style'' for string orchestra were commissioned for the soundtrack for "The Saragossa Manuscript" (director: Wojciech Jerzy), where they accompany scenes of a Baroque- or even Rococo-like atmosphere. At the Christmas concert, the beautiful, yet sad Aria (Lento) and two charming Minuets (all pieces unexpectedly pleasing to the most conservative of audiences) were given a performance that was refined, understated and unmannered. I imagine Penderecki's "Three Pieces in the Old Style '' must have shocked listeners when they first appeared in 1963. They certainly took the YMCA audience by surprise! It is a fact that the composer only released them for publication in 1989.

 

One of the principal Italian composers of comic operas Domenico Cimarosa (1749-1801) did not write an oboe concerto: It was Australian-born composer Arthur Benjamin who adapted four of the thirty-two keyboard sonatas Cimarosa wrote after the style of Domenico Scarlatti, scoring them for oboe and string orchestra, retaining most of the melody in the solo voice. First oboe of the Israel Camerata Jerusalem Muki Zohar (b. 1973 Tel Aviv) soloed in a pleasing, effortless performance of this much-loved work, giving expression to its warm melodiousness, grace and plangent moments, also bringing attention to its playful and good-naturedly cheeky elements, the latter making reference to the exuberance and wit present in many of Cimarosa’s operas. Orchestra and soloist discoursed splendidly, making for a sparkling performance.

 

Israeli-born mezzo-soprano Rachel Frenkel enjoys an international career on both opera- and concert stages. The Christmas program included Frenkel's performance of three of the most prominent Baroque arias. Her stable, resonant and substantial voice endorsed the soaring curve of the “Et exultavit spiritus meus” (And my spirit rejoices) from J.S.Bach's "Magnificat", as she carried the jubilation through the entire movement. Singing "Erbarme dich, mein Gott" (Have mercy Lord, My God, for the sake of my tears) from Bach's St. Matthew Passion, she gave expression to the aria's aching beauty and profound sadness, the lamenting solo violin obligato expressively interwoven by Camerata concertmaster Matan Dagan. And finally, Frenkel's communicative performance of the virtuosic aria, “But who may abide/For He is like a refiner’s fire” from Handel's Messiah, its two contrasting sections addressed skilfully and meaningfully, as in her treatment of the bravura runs and also in the dramatic expression given to the ominous passages that precede them. 

 

Concluding the evening of high-quality musical performance and true enjoyment, the Jerusalem YMCA's 2023 Christmas concert presented Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" in a suave, stylish rendition of Nemanja Marković's arrangement for string orchestra. 



Sunday, September 10, 2023

The opening concert of the 2023 Jerusalem International Chamber Music Festival features works of Brahms, Mahler and Mieczyslaw Weinberg

Elena Bashkirova (Courtesy JICMF)

 

Established in 1998 by pianist Elena Bashkirova and Adv. Yehezkel Beinisch, the annual Jerusalem International Chamber Music Festival features renowned musicians together with outstanding upcoming younger artists performing in diverse combinations of instruments. This writer attended the 2023 festival’s opening event on September 5th at the Jerusalem International YMCA. With each festival choosing a theme, that of the 2023 event (September 5th to 10th) focused on migrant composers. The displacement of composers in the 20th century, prompted by such constraints as antisemitism or political persecution, with other composers seeking work or financial security, has given rise to new styles in the language of musical repertoire. 

 

Following words of welcome from Yehezkel Beinisch (chairman, JICMF board), the festival took off on a stellar start with Gustav Mahler's Piano Quartet in A minor, the work comprising only the first movement of an abandoned piano quartet written by Mahler when a student at the Vienna Conservatory, this piece ending up as the composer's sole surviving instrumental chamber work. The artists (violinist Clara-Jumi Kang, violist Adrien La Marca, 'cellist Tim Park, pianist Yulianna Avdeeva) gave insight into the creative processes of the 16-year-old Mahler, as they wholeheartedly addressed his early encounter with matters of musical form and texture. They probed the work's lush, singing beauty, its uneven phrases, complex dissonances and mood changes, inviting its ominous and foreboding moments and passionately rhapsodic character to dictate tempo flexibility. Kang led masterfully and expressively, with Avdeeva subtly endorsing the piece’s dramatic intensity and disquiet via the piano's lower harmonies. In 1907, Mahler migrated to America, hopeful of a new phase in his career, attracted by a lighter conducting schedule, more time to compose and lavish monetary earnings. 

 

In 1850, Johannes Brahms met the Hungarian violinist Ede Reményi, then to accompany him in a number of recitals over the next few years. This was the composer’s introduction to gypsy-style music, which was later to inspire his most lucrative and popular compositions - the two sets of "Hungarian Dances" (pub.1869, 1880). Playing a selection of Book 1 WoO1, a true festival treat was provided by French-born Nathalia Milstein and Russian-born Yulianna Avdeeva. Performing the pieces in their original setting (4 hands, 1 piano) the young artists captured the spontaneity and passion of Hungarian gypsy music in playing that was clean, fresh, nuanced, at times majestic, at others, poignant, with much dancelike joy and a touch of whimsy. Their playing took on board the timbral variety and rich "orchestration" of the 4-hand piano genre, as they contrasted intimate, pared-down moments with exhilarating tutti, to the enjoyment of the audience.

 

And to the very different “mise en scene” of Violin Sonata No.4, Op.39, by Polish-born Jewish composer/pianist Mieczysław Weinberg (1919–96). Weinberg’s flight from Nazi-occupied Europe was rather different from the customary exile to the West. His move to the Soviet Union in 1939 meant a second period of threat and discrimination under Stalin. He was to live out the rest of his days in Russia, first unjustly neglected but eventually enjoying considerable success as one of his adopted country’s most celebrated and frequently performed composers, especially during the 1960s and 1970s. At the Jerusalem concert, Weinberg's Violin Sonata No.4 (1947) was played by German-born Clara-Jumi Kang and Nathalia Milstein. Alternately sombre and hectic, Weinberg's musical idiom stylistically mixes traditional- and contemporary forms, combining a freely tonal, individual language (inspired by Shostakovich) with ethnic (Jewish, Polish, Moldovan) influences and a unique sense of form, harmony and colour. Performing with unstinting discipline and dedication, Kang's playing produced pure, unforced sounds at all levels of dynamics, with breathtaking virtuosity in the fast perpetuum mobile section of the central movement. Milstein proved to be the ideal partner, both in approach and ability. Their performance of Weinberg’s slow-fast-slow structure gave a transparent reading of the composer’s ideas, highlighting the substantial solo sections for each instrument.

 

Mahler's 1901-2 settings of five poems of Romantic German poet Friedrich Rückert, composed in one of the happiest periods of the composer's life, do not constitute a song cycle. In fact, deciding the order they are to be performed is left to the artists. At the Jerusalem concert, we heard the songs sung by German soprano Dorothea Röschmann, with Elena Bashkirova at the piano. The artists' mutual engagement, their focus on the texts and on the distinctively otherworldly atmosphere permeating the "Rückert-Lieder" emerged via the transparency, fragility, understatement and the sensitive pacing of each song. As they conjured up sensations of love, scents, night ponderings, indeed, "the feeling that fills us right up to our lips but does not pass them” (in Mahler's own words) Röschmann used the sounds and shapes of words to endorse their meaning.

 

In the 1880s, when in his mid-fifties, Brahms retired from composing, believing he had exhausted his creative powers. However, it was hearing performances of clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld (1856-1907) in the Meiningen Court Orchestra that inspired him to resume composing. The Clarinet Quintet in B minor, Op.115, written in the twilight of his career, concluded the 2023 Jerusalem International Chamber Music Festival's opening concert, the performance bringing together five artists from different corners of Europe: clarinettist Pablo Barragán, violinists Rainer Honeck and Maria Ioudenitch, violist Adrien La Marca and 'cellist Ivan Karizna. Drawing attention to its dark tonal hues, lush textures and sweeping, cantabile vocal lines, the virtuosic "gypsy" section (2nd movement) and to the brilliant variations of the fourth movement, the artists gave expression to the quintet's poetic beauty, deep introspection, yearning, and melancholy as well as to Brahms' consummate writing for the clarinet and chamber ensemble medium. Young Pablo Barragán's playing underscored the piece's underlying depth of sadness, also celebrating its moments of rhapsodic, wild gestures and flickering textures.

 

This was an evening of excellent programming, matched by outstanding performance!