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| Alon Goldstein (photo courtesy AICF) |
Under the auspices of
the Felicja Blumental Music Center, the Tel Aviv Wind Quintet’s recent concert
commemorated 250 years of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven. Hosting pianist
Alon Goldstein (Israel-USA), the event, in memory of Annette Celine, took place
in the Zucker Hall of Heichal Hatarbut, Tel Aviv, on February 22nd, 2020. TAWQ
members performing were Roy Amotz-flute, Danny Erdman-clarinet, Itamar
Leshem-horn and Nadav Cohen-bassoon. Due to illness of the quintet’s oboist
Yigal Kaminka, Dudu Carmel, principal oboist of the Israel
Philharmonic Orchestra and a founding member of the Israel Woodwind Quintet, stepped in to fill in for Kaminka,
offering outstanding performance throughout the evening. The Tel Aviv Wind
Quintet was established in 2009. The ensemble performs a wide repertoire,
including several works of Israeli composers and will record its third disc in
September 2020 in Chicago.
The event opened with
Beethoven’s Quintet for piano and winds Op.16 in E-flat major, written when
the composer was 26 years of age. With Beethoven having
become all the rage among the gentry for his dazzling displays of
improvisational skill and keyboard virtuosity, the work, premiered in 1797, catered to the
taste of the Viennese aristocratic audience, to
be played at soirées in their elegant city palaces. Although the
work shows the strong
influence of Mozart and Haydn, its writing is
still very much a product of its creator and time. Early on in the
work, the
piano announces its intention to be primus inter pares, but there are plenty of
opportunities to hear personal expression from individual wind instruments. The
TAWQ's
performance placed strong emphasis on both the piece's hearty melodiousness and its
poignancy, excelling in judicious shaping of phrases and subtle sonorities.
Endorsed by his signature fragility of touch, Goldstein wove the virtuosity of
the piano part, with its ornamentation and transitions, through the texture’s
elegant fabric, with the Op.16 Quintet’s writing still a product of the joyful,
optimistic composer, whose youthful buoyancy would, within a half-dozen
years, change with his growing deafness and the unprecedented deepening of his
art.
Introducing
Beethoven’s Piano Sonata (“Moonlight”) in C sharp minor, Op.27, no.2 (Sonata
quasi una Fantasia), Alon Goldstein referred to the composer’s new approach to
matters of form and structure in the piano sonata and to the choice of the
somewhat “otherworldly” key of C-sharp minor. He reminded the audience that the
“Moonlight” subtitle was neither given by- nor known to Beethoven and that the
composer had specified that the opening movement should be played throughout
“with the greatest delicacy and without dampers” (i.e. with the sustaining
pedal held down!) Of course, the action of Beethoven’s piano was
different to that of the modern concert grand. In playing a far cry from the
too-frequently-heard sugar-coated concept of this piece, Goldstein’s rendition
took the listener into the mysterious soundscape of the opening Adagio
movement, his playing of the gently-arpeggiated texture agile and sotto voce,
its soprano utterances emerging crystal clear despite his liberal use of the
sustaining pedal. In the ensuing unrushed Allegretto, there remained some of
the pensive aura of the first movement, swiftly to disappear into thin air with
the final Presto agitato’s urgency and virtuosity,
as the pianist gave focus to moments of melodiousness, also to intimacy of expression, the movement's
outbursts never sounding aggressive or rough-edged.
A work well-suited to the Tel Aviv Wind Quartet’s
members is Luciano Berio’s “Opus Number Zoo”, a musical theatre piece written
in 1951 for wind quintet and narrator, the 1971 revised version allocating
recital of Rhoda Levine’s four poems to the players. Described by Berio as an
“occasional piece written for young people”, the texts are quasi-Aesopian
animal tales, their underlying dark message, however, echoing the horrors of
human violence, the desire to possess what belongs to others and referring to
those who “blast all that is lively, proud and gentle” clear to adults.
With stage direction by Ari Teperberg, and using Elisha Shefi (and the
players’) effective Hebrew translation, the artists’ presentation was polished
and confrontational, but also entertaining with touches of whimsy,
nevertheless justifying the work’s subtitle of “Children’s Play”. Theatre it
was, indeed, but not to be ignored was the instrumentalists’ adept treatment of
Berio’s succinct and vibrant Neo-Classical writing, its bold rhythms, pungent
harmonies and deft counterpoint, as they manipulated the music and poetry by means of the
dramatized voice and physical movements.
Leonard
Bernstein’s operetta “Candide”, based on the 1759 novella of the same name by
Voltaire, was first performed in 1956 with a libretto by Lillian Hellman; in
Bernstein’s brilliant score, European dance forms like the gavotte, waltz and
polka intertwine seamlessly with bel canto arias, Gilbert and Sullivan-style
comedy, grand opera and Bernstein's own "Jewish tango”. Following the Overture's first
concert performance by the New York Philharmonic under the composer's baton in
1957,
its content mirroring the wit, passion and sophistication of the operetta, it was quick to earn a place in the orchestra repertoire. Don Stewart made a
transcription of it for wind quintet. With Roy Amotz alternating between flute
and piccolo, the TAWQ members gave fresh and vibrant expression to the piece’s
jazzy, bustling collage of motifs and jocularity as well as to the lyricism of
vocal melodies quoted from the operetta. The “Candide” Overture remains a
splendid concert piece.
First
performed on March 20, 1956, American composer Samuel Barber composed “Summer
Music” with the players of the New York Wind Quintet in mind and utilizing their
“favourite effects”. The germ of the
work, both in its melodic and rhythmic essence, is to be found in the
first bars, as they then give rise to a rhapsodic, quiet, contemplative,
pastoral mood; Barber displays masterful handling of each instrumental voice,
exploiting the unique timbres and colouristic possibilities of the individual
instruments, resulting in writing that is most demanding in terms of sonority
and virtuosity. At the Tel Aviv concert, the work’s solos came over most
effectively, with the lion’s share going to nostalgic, beautifully crafted oboe
melodies (Dudu Carmel); and how connotative the horn (Itamar Leshem) and
bassoon (Nadav Cohen) are when describing the languid listlessness of summer!
Taking on board Barber’s shifts between lyrical, dramatic and motoric passages,
the TAWQ players produced a finely compatible, evocative canvas infused with
Barber’s individual and unmistakable deep feeling fort Neo-Romantic poeticism, yet inviting the listener probe his
own associations, experience, and mood. It was Barber himself who, with a touch
of irony, referred to the work as “supposed to be evocative of summer – summer
meaning languid, not killing mosquitoes.”
Despite
contact with Francis Poulenc and the “Groupe des Six” and his liking for French
Impressionism and the Stravinsky’s Neoclassicism, French composer Jean Françaix never felt
committed to any particular musical ideology, claiming that the only goal of
his composing was
to "give pleasure". He chose to write in a style that was tonal, melodically
elegant and rhythmically incisive. His instrumental music includes chamber music and
concerti, showing keen interest in writing for wind instruments. He was also successful
as a concert pianist and toured extensively throughout Europe and the United
States. Scored for wind quintet and piano, “L'heure du berger” (“Shepherd’s
Hour”, roughly translated as “Happy Hour”) and subtitled “Musique de
Brasserie”, was
composed as background music for a noted Parisian restaurant, with each of the
small movements depicting clientele in a restaurant scene. The TAWQ players
brought each tableau to life: “Les Vieux Beaux” (“The Old Dandies”) is
jolly in its piano part but the winds add a dimension of nostalgia. With the
piano silent and the clarinet soloing in “Pin-Up Girls”, Danny Erdman’s playing
was polished, whimsical and suitably teasing, the other winds making their own
bumptious statement, with the movement ending on a droll flourish. As to the
final movement, also concluding an evening of fine performance and variety, the
players gave precise expression to its good-natured energy and dash, to its web
of melodic lines propelling against each other in offbeat, dazzling movement
and to its suggestions of such dances as the Charleston.
Alon
Goldstein (b.Israel, 1970) is considered one of the most original and sensitive
pianists of his generation; he is admired for his musical intelligence, dynamic
personality, artistic vision and innovative programming. He performs worldwide
as a soloist and in chamber music, records and has premiered several
works. Mr. Goldstein graduated from the Peabody Conservatory, where he
studied with Leon Fleisher, then serving as his assistant..
