"Baroque Gems" - The Israel Chamber Orchestra in suave performance of vocal and instrumental works at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art



Maestro Ariel Zuckermann, players of the Israel Chamber Orchestra (Courtesy ICO)

 

 

Despite there being no audience present in the Recanati Auditorium of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art on July 15th 2020, concert-goers were able to enjoy the Israel Chamber Orchestra’s concert of “Baroque Gems” on live streaming. Performing under the ICO’s house conductor Ariel Zuckermann, soloists included countertenor Alon Harari, orchestra members and Zuckermann himself on the flute. Joining the players was harpsichordist Aviad Stier. 

 

The event opened with the Overture to George Frideric Handel’s “Rinaldo”, the first original Italian opera ever to be performed on the London stage and the work that was to gain the composer the widespread recognition that he would maintain throughout the rest of his musical career. Handel composed Rinaldo quickly, borrowing and adapting music from operas and other works that he composed during the four years spent in Italy. The Overture was taken from the 1708 cantata “Arresta il passo”.  Zuckermann led his players through its French overture structure in spirited, stylish playing, addressing careful attention to rhythmic and dynamic detail, enhanced by some masterful violin and oboe soloing. “The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba”, a sinfonia for two oboes and strings, heralding King Solomon’s eagerly awaited guest opens Act III of Handel’s “Solomon”, an oratorio today rarely performed in its entirety. Zuckermann’s reading of the piece was fresh and celebratory, with oboists’ Keshet Seedel and Lior Virot’s duetting meticulous and vivid.

 

Of the arias on the program, "Frondi tenere e belle, Ombra mai fu"  (Tender and Beautiful Fronds...Never Was There Shade), the opening aria from Handel’s light and elegant 1738 opera Serse (Xerxes), was presented by Alon Harari with smooth intensity and warmth of sound, his subtle embellishing woven naturally through the vocal line. With its lilting siciliano-like 12/8 time, “Erbarme dich” (Have mercy), from J.S.Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, was poignant and affecting, the obbligato violin (Elina Gurevich) evocatively introducing and mirroring the anguish expressed in the aria. From Act 1 of Handel’s “Orlando”, we heard Harari in fresh, vigorous and energizing singing of the bravura aria “Fammi combattere” (Let me fight against any monster); here, Orlando declares that he could never love anyone but Angelica and would do anything to prove it, including fighting off fierce monsters. One of the program’s highlights was "Sol da te mio dolce amore" (Solely through you, sweet love) from Vivaldi’s opera “Orlando furioso”. The aria is sung by Ruggiero on falling victim to the snares of the enchantress Alcina, the casting of her spell depicted by the bewitching and sweetly suggestive sounds of the flute (Zuckermann), as it alternates teasingly between Vivaldi’s seductive vocal melody and its underlying tensions. Partnering Harari’s wonderfully crafted, sensitive and melancholically intense vocal line, Zuckermann’s playing emerged as spontaneous, his brilliant technique giving rise to imaginative ornamentation of Vivaldi’s haunting flute melody, the latter role often considered one of the most challenging flute solos in Baroque repertoire. 

 

Ariel Zuckermann also soloed in C.P.E.Bach’s Concerto in D minor, H. 426 (1747), one of five flute concertos written by J.S.Bach’s second son C.P.E.Bach, who spent many years employed as court harpsichordist for King Frederick II (the Great), the latter an avid amateur flautist. Following the delightful arpeggiated dialogue between Zuckermann and his instrumentalists of the opening Allegro movement, the flautist gave a captivating, delicate and lyrical performance of the second movement, with its brief moments of drama. As to the fiery agenda of the finale, showcasing an instrument that has, since its invention, been noted for its brilliance and virtuosic capabilities, Zuckermann navigated the Allegro di molto with precision and aplomb, presenting Emanuel Bach’s striking individuality but never sacrificing the work’s musical content for show. Would Frederick have met the demands of this piece? Probably not. It may well have been performed by the renowned flute teacher, flute maker and composer at the Prussian court J.J.Quantz, who held the exclusive privilege of approving or disapproving of the King's playing by shouting or withholding a “bravo”!

 

Closing with Handel’s “Rinaldo”, we heard “Lascia ch’io pianga” (Let me weep over my cruel fate), in which Almarena, mourns her captivity in Jerusalem and the absence of her lover. Alon Harari gave a poignant, warm-timbred performance of the aria, adorning the repeat section with some imaginative and daring ornaments. 

 

Despite not being performed on historic instruments (apart from the harpsichord), the modest size of the ICO ensemble was well suited to the performance of this repertoire, the refinement and good taste associated with Baroque music addressed throughout the program.



Countertenor Alon Harari (Ofer Amir)

 


 

 

French Baroque music in a new light: Myrna Herzog and Giomar Sthel record harpsichord pieces of François Couperin on two viols

Cover design: Giomar Sthel

Born in Paris in 1668, François Couperin was a member of a musical dynasty, unique in France and only overshadowed in the history of music by the Bach family. Generations of Couperins held the post of organist at the church of Saint-Gervais in Paris from 1653 to 1826. Although their family origins were rustic (Couperin's great-grandfather was a farmer in Brie as well as a music teacher), the Couperins were time-honoured musicians at the court of Louis XIV, serving as organists of the Chambre du Roi and, in François' case, also teaching harpsichord to the dauphin and other children of the royal family.

 

Indeed, François Couperin’s musical life cannot be fully understood without relating to his strong connection to the lifestyle and mannerisms of the reign of the Sun King and, most importantly, to the art of dance. The elegance of dance, grace of movement, the art of gesture and fine deportment were major emphases in the general education of the French nobility. But there are additional characteristics to Couperin’s writing that set him apart from his contemporaries. Most Baroque keyboard composers furnished their scores with minimal ornamentation, phrasing marks, tempo markings and with some hints as to interpretation, then to depend on the "good taste" of the player to guarantee a high-quality performance. Not relying on keyboard players, indeed, incensed by poor performances of his music, Couperin took to providing his harpsichord scores with punctilious markings, challenging the player to decipher them and integrate them naturally into the weave of the music. His 1716 treatise “L'Art de Toucher le Clavecin” (The Art of Playing the Harpsichord) was and continues to be one of the most valuable instruction books for keyboard players.

 

Written Between 1713 and 1730, Couperin’s 27 suites, or " Ordres " as he called them, each consist of between four and 24 miniatures, their ornamentation prevailing as the core of the music, stimulating expressiveness and indicative of the gestures and mood of each piece, many of them "pièces de caractère". So unique is this repertoire that it somehow resists traditional analysis. The picturesque titles that Couperin, ever the individualist, gave the pieces have aroused much curiosity, their sketchy references, ambiguities and quizzical possibilities begging to be unravelled by players from the time they were penned.

 

So, what prompted Brazilian-born viola da gamba artists Myrna Herzog (today living in Israel) and Giomar Sthel (living in Germany) to embark on recording a number of these keyboard pieces on two viols? It was Sthel (also a keyboard player) who suggested adding three of them to a program the two artists were preparing for performance in Germany. The artists liked the pieces so much that they were motivated to put together a whole program comprising movements from the ordres. Indeed, in his preface to Book 3, Couperin encourages the playing of them on various instruments, even offering advice as to how to adapt them to specific instruments. He writes “Pieces of this kind, actually, will be suited to two flutes or oboes, to two violins or two viols, as well as to other unison instruments; it is evident that those who perform them will adapt them to their instruments.” Herzog and Sthel went ahead to perform complete programs of them in German churches and also in small venues in Israel, recording them a year later at St. Andrews Scots Memorial Church, Jerusalem (recording: Eliahu Feldman, mastering: David Feldman; Herzog herself edited out some street noise.) Apart from transposing some of the pieces and a changed octave here and there, the artists make no changes to the musical texts. On this recording, both play historic, 7-stringed viols.  Due to the more penetrating, treble-like timbre of the early 18th century German instrument she plays here (maker unknown), Herzog performs the upper line in all pieces except for on track 4, with Sthel taking the lower line on a 1744 Castagneri instrument, their choice of two different viols highlighting the beauty and distinctive timbres of two different schools of instrument-makers. 

 

Some of the pieces offer allusive, albeit seductive “portraits” of ladies at court; the manner in which each lady moves in the ballroom becomes almost visual in each vignette. “La Ménetou” refers to a truly gifted young woman - Françoise-Charlotte de Seneterre de Mennetoud (b.1680) - a child prodigy on the harpsichord; she composed music from the age of nine and is said to have performed for the king himself. Engaging freely in notes inégales and style luthé (lute style) or brisé (broken style, i.e. of never playing  the melody notes  and those of the bass or of the middle voices quite together) Herzog and Sthel’s reading of the piece, with its long, expressive melodic lines, suggests a lady of tranquil and mysterious independence, the middle section offering her the chance to show her prowess on the dance floor. It is thought that “La Chazé” is a description of Sister Liée Magdeleine of Sainte Elisabeth Bochart de Champigni; whether or not, Herzog and Sthel sweep her and the listener into a hearty, triple-time dance - perhaps a passepied, this dance introduced (now changed to a dance in triple time) to the court at the time of Louis XIV. Then there is “La Couperin” - François Couperin’s self-portrait. A thoughtful piece, coloured by chromatic moments, it is tinged with Couperin’s characteristic melancholy. The artists’ sympathetic, wistful rendition of it uses effective use of legato bowing as against amusing, non-legato textures, the latter perhaps evoking the composer himself pacing energetically through the opulent halls of the Palace of Versailles.

 

Some of the pieces reflect Couperin’s tender sympathy for everyday life and his understanding that the simple and the serious can easily coexist in one style. Such is “Le Carillon de Cythère”, describing the bell-ringing from a church on Kythera, an island located between the Greek mainland and Crete. Playing “Les Regrets”, appropriately set in the key of C minor, Herzog and Sthel invite the listener to be part of the crestfallen mood of the piece, as they pace it carefully in playing that is sincere, introspective and unmannered. Tragic and grand at the same time, “La Ténébreuse” (The Dark One), possibly written after the death of one of the French princes, is a dark, melancholic tombeau. Then there are the two rondeaus that make up “Le Dodo” ou “L'Amour au Berceau” (The Dodo, or Love in a Cradle), the lullaby, with its wavelike motion representing the rocking of a cradle, so soothing, almost mesmerising under the fingers of Herzog and Sthel. It is only in this piece that we hear Sthel on the upper part; in the opening phrase, a “tremblement” (trill) he plays produces an astounding dissonance, its minor-major mix sounding much like a cluster! And, being a rondeau, it recurs several times. Indeed, this effect emerges more boldly on bowed instruments than on the harpsichord.

 

With echoes from the commedia dell’arte, we hear Couperin’s “L’Arlequine” (The Harlequin’s Piece) a movement in a marked and stylized triple rhythm. Herzog and Sthel portray the comic servant character with empathy, allowing the piece’s quirky rhythmic surprises and hemiolas to give expression to the composer’s performance direction of “Grotesquement”. And, in keeping with Le Theatre Italien, a genre enjoying great popularity in the 1720s, there is Couperin’s “La Pantomime”, a colourful portrayal of actor Tiberio Florilli, also known as “Scaramouche”, the most famous actor of his time of the Commedia dell’Arte and a star in Paris of the Italian Troupe. The piece is performed here with “une grande precision”, some lighter textures punctuating its noble agenda. As to “La Lutine” (The Elf), a whimsical, carefree miniature perfect in construction but over in the blink of an eye, this represents the character of a goblin introduced into theatrical performances of the time to add an element of light-hearted entertainment. 

 

It is clear that Couperin’s descriptive pieces serve to fire the performing artist’s imagination. Herzog and Sthel’s effervescent and nuanced dialogue in “L’Anguille” (The Eel) evokes a vivid picture of the eel’s erratic movements and, perhaps, the stirring of the water as well. But it is those pieces bearing the more obscure titles that challenge players and listeners alike, transporting them into the world of boundless imagination. Take, for example, “Le Tic-Toc-Choc ou Les Maillotins”, published in 1722 in Book 3. The Maillot were a famous family of rope-dancers. According to Furetière’s Dictionnaire Universel, “Tic-toc” is an onomatopoeic term suggesting a “beating, a reiterated movement, a pulse that beats, a horse that walks, the pendulum of a clock or a hammer that knocks.” Herzog and Sthel give expression to this vivid perpetuum mobile, its unbridled energy and joy, at the same time, taking the listener through its harmonic development and melodic comments. “Les satires chèvre-pieds'' (ordre No.23) refers to goat-footed satyrs. Depicting the sylvan deity from Greek mythology that bears certain characteristics of a horse or goat and engages in Dionysian revelry, Herzog and Sthel set before the listener an image of this peculiar, grotesque figure in a clumsy, heavy, somewhat off-centre dance, their playing of the second half suggesting that the creature is not devoid of endearing qualities.

 

As performers and interpreters of French music, Myrna Herzog and Giomar Sthel display astounding musical rapport. They probe each of the Pièces de Clavecin here in depth, providing fascinating insight into the musical world of Couperin le Grand, its innate lyricism and elegance, its  intensity, its wit and charm, its nobility of sentiment, its theatre influences, its fantasy and into that elusive “esprit d'élégie” that so often pervades Couperin’s music. Enlisting the viola da gamba’s plethora of expressive, coloristic and textual possibilities, the artists' playing of these musical jewels offers an extraordinarily rich listening experience. Add to that the collection's true, high-quality recording sound. As yet, “François Couperin, Pièces de clavecin à deux violes” has not been issued as a CD, but it is available on all the current digital platforms. 

 

“Kühl, nicht lau” - Tami Krausz (8-keyed flute) and Shuann Chai (fortepiano) in a new recording of works by Beethoven and Kuhlau

“Kühl, nicht lau” (Cool, Not Lukewarm) might seem a somewhat enigmatic title for a disc, but this is actually the name of a small, whimsical canon that represents the connection between Friedrich Kuhlau and Ludwig van Beethoven, as presented here in works of both composers performed by flautist Tami Krausz and pianist Shuann Chai. Performing on period instruments, Shuann Chai plays a fortepiano by Johann Zahler, Brünn (Brno) c.1805, restored by Gijs Wilderom and on one by Michael Rosenberger, Vienna , c.1802, restored by Edwin Beunk; Tami Kraus plays on an eight-keyed flute made by Rudolf Tutz, Innsbruck, 2000, after Heinrich Grenser, Dresden c.1810.. 

 

It was in 1825 on a visit to Vienna that Kuhlau met Ludwig van Beethoven. In the disc’s liner notes, Chai and Krausz explain that the “inspiration to juxtapose the music of Beethoven and Kuhlau...came from the delightful account of their first and only personal encounter.” It seems the two composers got on rather well, judging by their exchange of compositional canons as souvenirs. German-born Kuhlau had emigrated to Denmark and introduced much of Beethoven’s music to audiences in that country.

 

The first work on the recording is Beethoven’s Serenade in D major for piano and flute (or violin) Op.41, a piece based on the composer’s Opus 25 for flute, violin and viola. Op. 25 (c.1801), published in 1802. Due to its popular appeal, an arrangement was made a year later for flute and piano by another composer (possibly Franz Xaver Kleinheinz), corrected and approved by Beethoven himself and published as Op. 41. Tami Krausz and Shuann Chai’s reading of the Serenade presents music of a young, carefree Beethoven (less familiar to listeners than the burdened person he was to become), here, a composer writing music possibly to entertain and delight guests attending a Viennese garden party. Light-hearted and recreational, this is, nevertheless, no background music in the hands of these two artists, who give rich expression to its jovial hide-and-seek banter, its naivety, its cantabile moments and almost folk-like dances, as well as to the many contrasts created by textures and piano timbres. Displaying fine teamwork, Chai and Krausz colour gestures with understated rhythmical flexing and some playful but florid and imaginative ornamenting, the latter sitting well with the eight-keyed flute and on the easeful action of the Zahler fortepiano. 

 

Considered the most important composer of flute music in the early 19th century, Friedrich Kuhlau has been referred to as “Beethoven of the flute”. Of his some-300 works, more than a quarter include the flute - the favoured instrument of gentlemen amateurs of the early 19th century - thus ensuring the composers of some nice profits. The Capriccio in D minor No.9 Op.10b (published 1810) is one of Kuhlau’s 12 Variations and Solos for solo flute, a collection of pieces based on familiar French and German folk melodies. Krausz’ performance of the Capriccio combines the piece’s rich agenda of expressive writing with opportunities for bravura performance, as she fashions and defines each motif and phrase with involvement, appealing capriciousness, articulacy and good articulation throughout the range of the instrument. Such writing suggests that Kuhlau must have been a virtuosic flautist. In 1814, however, the composer explained to his publisher Breitkopf & Härtel “I play this instrument only a little, but I know it exactly”. On matters of the instrument, he is known to have consulted with the flautist of the royal orchestra in Copenhagen.

 

In the late summer of 1826, Kuhlau moved to Lyngby, eight miles north of Copenhagen, where he spent his time composing and enjoying nature to the full in beautiful rural surroundings. One of the composer’s most substantial works for flute and piano, the Grande Sonate Concertante in A minor for piano and flute Op. 85 (1827), is a product of this period; it is the last of several sonatas composed for flute and piano. Krausz and Chai give vivid expression to Kuhlau’s free use of musical ideas, to the work’s grand gestures, its charm, changes of temperament and compelling textures, as in the opening movement (Allegro con passione), to the skipping, lilting, entertaining lightness of the Scherzo, to the tranquillity dictated by the Adagio and to the good-natured vivacity of the final movement (Rondo); in  the latter, Chai makes economical but hearty use of the Rosenberger piano’s drum-and-bell Janissary stop. In Krausz and Chai’s hands, Kuhlau’s rich harmonies, virtuosic writing and user-friendly melodiousness take on fluency, spontaneity, suave shaping and some lavish and elegant ornamentation. How alive this music emerges when performed on authentic instruments!

 

The title of Beethoven’s canon à 3 'Kühl, nicht lau' WoO 191 is a play on Kuhlau’s name. Written under the influence of a few glasses of champagne, the opening of the small canon’s somewhat strange course, floating in and out of tonality, is based on the B-A-C-H cryptogram (B-flat, A, C, B-natural) . On this disc we hear pianist/mathematician Joris Weimar’s reworking of the canon for three voices, piano and flute. The instrumentalists are joined by João Moreira (tenor), Matthijs van de Woerd (baritone) and Marc Pantus (bass baritone). Referring to Weimar’s arrangement of the canon, Chai and Krausz write: “We hope that it brings modern-day listeners closer to a time when extemporization and musical riddles were a regular part of musicians’ lives.” Recorded in The Netherlands in 2019 under exclusive license to Outhere Music, the disc’s lively, fresh and rich sound quality does justice to the artists’ informed, profound and dedicated musicianship.

 

 

 

Shuann Chai, Tami Krausz (Photo: Karni Arieli)

Music and wine in live streaming - the Tel Aviv Wind Quintet performs works from J.S.Bach to Nino Rota

Hagar Shahal,Yigal Kaminka,Itamar Leshem,Nadav Cohen,Danny Erdman (Courtesy TAWQ)

Happy hour took place at 14:00, a little earlier than usual, but any time of day is right for sipping a glass of wine while attending a live online concert. The initiative of  “Divas and Gentlemen”, a new organization set up by experienced young Israeli performers and producers to present online concerts during the coronavirus crisis, presented its pilot live streaming Wine Concert on May 22nd, 2020, offering people attending the Tel Aviv Wind Quintet’s concert the opportunity of listening to good music while enjoying imported wines from Premium Wine Ltd., and in the comfort of their own homes. In keeping with the project and its theme, the Keoss Recording Studio (Tel Aviv) was set up as a bar. Performers - Hagar Shahal-flute, Danny Erdman-clarinet, Yigal Kaminka-oboe, Itamar Leshem-French horn and Nadav Cohen-bassoon - offered a few words of explanation prior to each work. 

 

The concert opened with Mordechai Rechtman’s arrangement of Mozart’s Adagio for 2 clarinets and 3 basset horns in B flat major, K. 411. With Mozart by far the most notable composer writing for the basset horn, his inclusion of three of them in the Adagio would place it in the sound world of sonorous, velvety textures. This still emerged in the TAWQ’s performance of the small gem, as the members subtly played into the dissonances of Mozart’s lush harmonic language in a rich blending of timbres. So well suited to performance on three melodic instruments, J.S.Bach’s Trio sonata” in E minor BWV 528, transcribed by Rechtman from organ (two manuals and pedal), was performed by Hagar Shahal (flute), Danny Erdman (clarinet) and Nadav Cohen (bassoon). With much lively and expressive dialogue between flute and clarinet, the players were convincing in setting out the work’s trio construction, dynamic energy and elegance, its variety of moods and tonality changes. In the final movement, Un poco allegro, the bassoon joins the two “manuals” to engage in the imitative fugal process. 

 

Of Giachino Rossini’s six (major-key) string quartets, written in 1804, when the composer was twelve years of age, we heard Sonata No.4 in B flat major. Originally scored for two violins, ‘cello and double bass, it stands to reason that the wind setting, produced by a (forgotten) contemporary of the composer, should be for flute, clarinet, bassoon and horn. Listening to its fluency, interplay of instruments and moments of virtuosic writing, I was struck by the work’s wealth of catchy, bel canto-type melodies penned by the child who was to compose 39 entertaining operas as an adult. The players gave the work much Italian sparkle and joie-de-vivre, also, highlighting the pensive, expressive character of the Andante movement (profound writing for a 12-year-old). In later years, Rossini disparagingly referred to the string sonatas “‘six terrible sonatas that I wrote… in my earliest years... all composed and copied out in three days, and performed in a doggish manner and myself as 2nd violin – no less doggish than the others”. What a misjudgement! 

 

Providing interesting background information on Paul Hindemith’s “Kleine Kammermusik” (Small Chamber Music) Op.24, No.2, Yigal Kaminka spoke of Hindemith being affected by the Nazi Regime’s cultural policy (propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels denounced him as an “atonal noise maker”) and that the echoes of war are woven into the fabric of the work. The TAWQ’s playing of the five movements gave poignant expression to the work’s many layers - firstly, to Hindemith’s fine writing for winds, but also to its neo-Classical Stravinskian language in all its terse realism. The very opening of the first movement swiftly takes the listener into the pungent, cerebral sound world that pervades the work. The players also brought out its mix of wit and cynicism, as in the strange, joyless waltz (2nd movement). Reflective, haunting but also lyrical, the third movement was a vehicle for some fine, wistful solo- and duet-playing. Following the unique fourth movement, its 23-bar agenda of five tiny solos, punctuated by a feisty refrain of repetitive figures, the work bows out with a sophisticated, bracing literally off-beat dance. Whether one perceives the work as light and entertaining or as disturbing in its message (or perhaps both?), the TAWQ’s performance of it showed that music that is complex in its own terms can still be easily accessible to the ear.

 

Nino Rota is best known for his many film scores, but, time and time again, Rota demonstrated that he was a remarkable chameleon, capable of providing the full spectrum of musical forms, styles and instrumentation. Not to be ignored is his output of chamber- and orchestral music (including ballet music), choral music and opera. In recent years, his concert music has been emerging from obscurity. Rota’s “Piccola offerta musicale” (Small Musical Offering), paying homage to the genius of Johann Sebastian Bach, was written in the dark time of 1943.  Scored for wind quintet, the single-movement piece of some 3.5 minutes, swings between drawn-out, cantabile sections and a busy, devil-may-care musical joyride, to finally land on a major chord. The TAWQ’s articulacy, technical teamwork, finesse and richness of tone produced a congenial soupçon of pizzazz.  Rota once said, "I'd do everything I could to give everyone a moment of happiness. That's what's at the heart of my music." 

 

Providing the audience with just enough time to empty another glass, the quintet took leave with a hearty arrangement of the Drinking Song from Verdi’s “La Traviata”:

“Let’s drink, let’s drink from the joyous chalices

that beauty so truly enhances.
And may the brief moment be inebriated
with voluptuousness.

Let’s drink for the ecstatic feeling

that love arouses...”

 

Father, Son and the Godfather - Ashley Solomon (UK) performs unaccompanied flute works at a house concert in London

Photo: Jonas Sacks

On April 28th and May 5th and 12th 2020, British flautist and early music specialist Ashley Solomon performed three solo recitals in the conservatory of his London home. Tuning in on ZOOM, viewers from far and wide heard the artist perform and offer brief explanations on what he described as “almost all the unaccompanied solo works written for the transverse Baroque flute"  (traverso).  Prof. Solomon called his three concerts “Father, Son and the Godfather''. They included works of J.S.Bach, C.P.E.Bach and G.P.Telemann; the latter was godfather to Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach. 

 

In the first recital, we heard J.S.Bach’s Solo Partita in A minor BWV1013, referred to by Bach as “Solo pour la flûte traversière”;  Bach’s only known work for flute solo, it is, nevertheless, one of the undisputed gems of flute repertoire. When Bach was still working in Weimar, he met the French flautist Pierre Gabriel Buffardin on a visit to Dresden and it is very likely that he composed this partita as a result of hearing a true master of the transverse flute for the first time. Engaging in the different characters and  influences of its various dance styles, Solomon’s performance offered insight into the challenges Bach has set the flautist - rapid fingering changes, running 16th-notes, large leaps, minimal breath opportunities and its large range, from the instrument’s lowest  note to the sublime high ‘a” at the end of the Allemande.

 

The second program included C.P.E.Bach’s Solo Sonata in A minor Wq132. Interestingly, Johann Sebastian’s fifth child and second surviving son also chose the key of A minor for his only work for solo flute. With its three movements Poco Adagio, Allegro and Allegro, Carl Philipp Emanuel’s Sonata unequivocally belongs to the “empfindsam” style of the mid-18th century. It was composed in Berlin in 1747, the year the composer had taken a permanent position as chamber harpsichordist to King Friedrich II. The king was an accomplished flautist, his tutor no other than J.J.Quantz, but whether the work was actually written for- or played by Friedrich is not known. In keeping with Emanuel’s freedom of spirit, Solomon’s playing of the sonata invited the work’s agenda, with its improvisational, experimental, and dramatic characteristics, to suggest tempi, rubati and to engage in his palette of dynamics.

 

Despite his great love for the works of J.S.Bach, Ashley Solomon holds a special predilection for Telemann’s Twelve Fantasias for Solo Flute TWV 40:2-13, enjoying the constant discovery their invention and musical originality invite. Solomon recorded them for Channel Classics in 2017.  Arranged by key, progressing more or less in order from A major to G minor, leaving out (most of the) keys that do not sit comfortably on the instrument, the Flute Fantasias were published (curiously, or rather, erroneously) as “Fantasie per il Violino senza Basso” (Fantasias for Solo Violin) in Hamburg (1732–33).  A compendium of styles and genres of the period, they are concise, sharply profiled, individually crafted, well suited to flute idiom and of great artistic and didactic value to "connoisseurs and amateurs". However, considering Telemann was, himself, a virtuoso flautist, it is no wonder that this collection offers the soloist the opportunity to display to the full his and the instrument's potential for virtuosity, range of colours and expressive abilities. What was special about Solomon’s three recitals was hearing all twelve Fantasias, how they contrasts with each other and each within itself and how the movements stack up in the listener’s memory. Solomon’s playing displayed the rich kaleidoscope of diverse styles fashionable in Germany at the time, presenting courtly dances and songful, highly melodious pieces alongside folk-influenced movements. Enlisting the traverso’s timbral range, Solomon’s playing was at times infused with profound, pensive searching, at others, with vivacity and joie de vivre, with certain pieces delighting the listener with playfulness and humour. Solomon’s is the art of subtly recreating layers within a so-called "single melodic line" and of performing the miniature musical form, fashioning each pocket-sized piece into a complete whole, as he engaged in economical ornamenting and the heightening of key notes with just a hint of vibrato.

 

The artist offered interesting explanations on the various Baroque flutes he played. An extra treat was hearing pieces of Van Eyck and J.S.Bach performed on the recorder. Although attended by people in many locations, the intimacy of the artist’s private home made for a fitting venue for hearing musical repertoire of such a personal nature.

 

Combining a successful career across both theory and practice, Ashley Solomon is chair and head of Historical Performance at London's Royal College of Music, also holding masterclasses and lectures worldwide. As director of Florilegium, much of Solomon’s time is spent working and performing with the ensemble he co-founded in 1991. In 2002, Florilegium became involved with Bolivian Baroque and, since 2003, Prof. Solomon has been training vocalists and instrumentalists there, in 2008 becoming the first European to receive the prestigious Bolivian Hans Roth Prize. 

 

 

 

 

 

"Dowland" - a new disc of lute songs and lute pieces of John Dowland performed by Doron Schleifer-countertenor and Ori Harmelin-lute

“Dowland”, a recent recording by Doron Schleifer (countertenor) and Ori Harmelin (lute) presents a selection of lute songs and instrumental pieces of the great English Renaissance composer, virtuoso lutenist, and singer John Dowland (1562/3-1626), with just a few pieces by other composers. 

 

One could say that John Dowland is a composer renowned to have made a living out of being depressed. Feeding into his reputation as a great melancholic, he actually made a pun on his own name in a piece called “Semper Dowland, Semper Dolens” (Always Dowland, Always Doleful). He claimed his conversion to Catholicism had led to his not being offered a post at Elizabeth I’s Protestant court, that Britain had never appreciated him, leading him to spend much of his life looking for employment in France, Germany and Denmark. But, as to the mood reflected in much of his music, melancholy, at that time, was seen as the sign of a superior individual, of someone who was mature and capable of deep feeling and Dowland’s musical and creative brilliance give voice to what was considered an appropriate emotion.

 

In this disc, Schleifer and Harmelin offer a representative selection of Dowland’s songs, some throwing light on the various social circles in which Dowland moved and on the court of Elizabeth I, possibly voicing her mistreatment of courtiers in “If my complaints could passions move” and in the upbeat, lilting galliard (Elizabeth I’s favourite dance) of “Can she excuse my wrongs”. Hinting at court intrigues, the latter is associated with Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, who was later executed for treason. And how teasing is Schleifer and Harmelin’s stylish, nimble reading of the Almain “Say Love if ever thou didst find”, designed by Dowland to gain Elizabeth’s favour by flattering her as the “only queen of love and beauty”, their performance decidedly entertaining in its waggish play of single syllable sounds.

 

However, even in light of the Elizabethan penchant for dejection, the sombre John Dowland stands out as the high priest of melancholy, preoccupied with death and imbued with despair on all its levels. The artists’ rendering of “Sorrow stay” moves spontaneously, Schleifer’s plangent, bell-like timbre giving expression to the heart-rending, self-castigating text, with Harmelin engaging in the composer’s innovative idiomatic lute-writing, its harmonies and melodic motifs adding meaning. The disc includes a beguiling, fragile and intimate performance of “I saw my lady weep”, and the artists’ gently understated performance of Dowland’s signature song and most famous ayre “Flow my teares”, gives centre stage to the text’s wretchedness and despair. In Dowland’s time, sleep and death were understood to provide a longed-for release from earthly cares; the artists open each stanza of “Come heavy sleep” with the soothing serenity suggested by the tonality of G major, moving out of it to address the text’s more impassioned pleas, then to restore the sweetness of death (whether literal or in its erotic Elizabethan connotation) in the original mode.  As heard in the above songs, expression of human grief and a sense of hopelessness, together with optimism, the possibility of restoration and rebirth, are closely linked in art.and attitude of the time. But it is “In darkness let me dwell”, one of Dowland’s greatest masterpieces - a later, through-composed, declamatory song showing the influence of Italian monody - that takes the listener’s breath away, as Schleifer and Harmelin juxtapose the composer’s harmonic daring with prudent, unhurried timing in a spine-chilling performance; Schleifer gives a slight wavering of pitch to the word “hellish”, with the lute then abandoning the singer before the last word, an eerie, masterful effect on the part of Dowland..

 

“A shepherd in a shade” is certainly not melancholic, but it does offer a warning about love, referred to here as “a foolish thing”. As its double entendres merge with Dowland’s sudden chromatic shifts, the artists’ lightly-tripping, jaunty performance of the song is animated and whimsical.

 

Not only one of England's greatest song composers, John Dowland was also arguably its finest lute composer. His works are divided somewhat evenly between songs and solo lute compositions. In the course of the composer’s professional life, the lute, considered a "gentleman's instrument”, was continuously developing. Dowland would have started out on an instrument with only six courses but would have played a nine- or ten course lute in his maturity. With the tendency he had to revise his lute pieces, some can be found in as many as ten versions! As in his songs, interesting evidence of his connections with patrons and courtiers can be revealed by the dedications on many of the lute pieces. The King of Denmark’s Galliard, given a zesty, tastefully-ornamented reading by Ori Harmelin, is a reminder that Dowland was court lutenist to the Danish King Christian IV from 1598 to 1606. In the somewhat enigmatic “La Mia Barbara”, a pavin with divisions (which may or may not be those of Dowland) the artist takes the tempo at a relaxed pace to give space to a host of ornamental ideas. Harmelin also performs three of the composer’s 7 Fantasies (or Fancyes): merging expectation with the unexpected in the rich flow of ideas running through the toccata-like and Italianate Fancyes Nos. 5 and 6, Harmelin’s fertile imagination and melodic sense meet those of the composer in playing these small gems, reflecting Dowland’s expressive  personal, meditational world together with his range of compositional freedom. In the Forlorn Hope Fancy, also Italianate in style, one cannot but be captivated by the way the descending half-tone “tear” motif from “Flow My Teares” is woven seamlessly through the piece; Harmelin navigates its rich contrapuntal web and daring chromaticism with assurance, reminding the listener that Dowland was, indeed, a virtuosic player.

 

Other works on the disc appear in (son) Robert Dowland’s 1610 publication “A Musicall Banquet”. One of the many works inspired by- and based on Dowland’s “Lachrimae Antiquae” (instrumental pieces on “Flow my teares”) is “Mauritius’ Pavin” by Moritz, Landgrave of Hesse, who composed it “in honour of John Dowland, the English Orpheus” - its divisions possibly written by the honouree himself. Here, Caccini’s “Amarilli, mia bella” is given a spontaneous, fresh and flexed reading, with some splendid stylistic affects on the part of Schleifer. Also present is “Si le parler” by Pierre Guédron (c.1570-c.1620), one of the most renowned and influential composers of the early 17th century French court, an artist known for his writing of airs de cour (secular French pieces of that period) and for fuelling the phenomenal Parisian vogue for the genre. Schleifer addresses its agenda of courtly love (it also hints at undercurrents in Henri IV’s court) with pleasing French transparency and suaveness, the artists’ lilting performance evocative of the fact that dance was never far away from French court music. For the anonymous Spanish song “Vuestros ojos” (Your eyes contain I know not what of love), the artists adopt an urgency of pace as its speech rhythms cavort and break through bar lines, portraying the cruel message conveyed by the lady’s eyes.

 

Recorded in June 2017 for the SUISA label, the disc’s sound is uncluttered, endorsing the intimate nature of Dowland’s works. Doron Schleifer’s pure, easeful vocal timbre, his deep enquiry into texts and personal exegesis that steer well clear of the sameness of interpretation too often heard in performance of these songs, make for a rich listening experience. Playing on a 7-course Renaissance lute by Sebastian Núñez, Ori Harmelin’s delivery is poised, profound and intelligent, his polished, attentive performance served by consummate technical skill and integrated with invention and a diversity of ideas. The two Israeli-born artists, today residing in Basel and both members of the Profeti della Quinta ensemble, share their own “personal Dowland” (Harmelin's words) with exemplary teamwork. 

 

Doron Schleifer, Ori Harmelin (photo:Elam Rotem)

 

 

"Twilight People" - pianist Tamar Halperin and countertenor Andreas Scholl's recent recording of atmospheric songs of the 20th and 21st centuries, including folk song settings

“Twilight People”, a disc recorded by countertenor Andreas Scholl and pianist Tamar Halperin, is a collection of songs carefully selected by the artists - songs of composers from Austria, England, America, of one born in Egypt and one in Israel, as well as settings of folk songs. 

 

The disc features three songs from Alban Berg’s “Jugendlieder” (1901-1908), a substantial collection written when Berg was studying with Arnold Schoenberg and that traces the young composer's musical transition from the late Romantic love song to a more modern idiom. Performing Berg’s setting of the Heinrich Heine poem “Vielgeliebte schöne Frau” (Much-loved Beautiful Woman), Halperin and Scholl, with absolutely no affectation, evoke its mournful, bleak yet lush autumnal setting, with its pedal point in the bass moving down a half tone for one mystifying, staggering  beat, suddenly shedding light on the song’s chilling message. In “Ferne Lieder” (Distant Songs) to words of Friedrich Rückert, each mellifluous gesture is appraised by the artists, their reading of it emerging in lilting luxuriance and delicate flexing, endorsing Berg’s musical language that sees fit here to defy bar lines and conventional modulation,  Also lavish and tranquil in its melding of nature and the milieu of love is “Wo der Goldregen steht” (Where the Laburnum Stands), as Halperin and Scholl infuse it with a sense of spontaneity and well-being. 

 

Arrangements of folk songs form a major part of the disc. Benjamin Britten wrote 61 folk-song arrangements, many of them displaying extraordinarily imaginative piano accompaniments. His settings comprise songs of the British Isles, but also of some French melodies.  Halperin and Scholl’s performance of three settings was gently crestfallen and wistful: “The Salley Gardens”, an Irish tune with words by W.B. Yeats (a reconstruction of ‘an old song’ arranged in the early 1940s, as Yeats described it), with a deep sense of longing woven into its harmonies and a touch of word painting; the gloomy soundscape of “Greensleeves”, evoked by the piano's low strumming left hand (sounding very distant from the countertenor range) and its somewhat disturbing insistent single right hand note (mostly the 5th of the scale); and “The Ash Grove”, Britten’s first setting of a traditional Welsh tune, its opening accompaniment positive, light and buoyant, with the right-hand melody and its accompanying harmonies then moving away from the vocal line, as though distracted and  haunted by the poet's grief at  his beloved's death, to be followed by the return of a simpler harmonic language for the final two lines, restoring the song’s earlier feeling of reassurance. The richly flowing piano part of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ setting of “In the Spring” (My love is the maid), a Dorset folk-song as transcribed (in local dialect) by William Barnes, integrates the text’s profuse description of nature with the poet’s almost delirious love of a young woman;  Vaughan Williams adds his own comment in the form of a shadowy moment of reticence towards the end of the song. 

 

Aaron Copland’s two collections of Old American Songs (1950,1952), indeed, fine specimens of folk-song arrangements, are exquisitely presented on the disc. “The Little Horses” swings between the soothing caressing lullaby, accompanied by reposeful, seemingly random 5ths and sixths in the piano's upper register, and the expression of sheer childlike delight as inspired by the energetic rhythm of a trotting horse. “At the River”, a Methodist hymn by the Reverend Robert Lowry, dated 1865, begins pensively, gathering strength and spiritual conviction with calm simplicity as the accompaniment seems to evoke the steps of pilgrims making their way to the river.

 

Three songs of Ralph Vaughan Williams feature on the disc. From “The House of Life”, an early collection based on sonnets of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, “Silent Noon”, sensuous, rhapsodic and cushioned in opulent harmonies, interlinks passion and nature. On his score of “The Twilight People” (1925), from which this disc takes its title, the composer writes that this setting of Seamus O’Sullivan’s poem (1905) may be sung either unaccompanied (suggesting its folksong-type character) or with the composer’s piano accompaniment. Here, the artists choose to do both, initially with Scholl alone expounding its unique, meandering, at times, unpredictable melodic contour with alluring timbral beauty, then to repeat the song, this time joined by Halperin, who adds its sparse, mysterious high-register accompaniment. Both versions leave the listener deep in thought and ensconced in its otherworldly aura. From “Four Last Songs” (1958), written two years before Vaughan Williams’ death, his settings of poems of his wife and muse Ursula, a highly respected British poet and novelist, we hear “Tired”. Composed within one day, it is the only example of a work in which the composer wrote music with himself as the direct subject. The artists give tender expression to this love song, sensitively weaving into it the poet’s recollections as well as the sense of peaceful contentment when lying near one’s beloved, its gently rocking piano accompaniment soothing but also offering some subtle ambiguity as to tonality...an interesting touch.

 

The disc includes two contemporary works, opening with “The Rest”, from “wiping ceramic tiles”, a 5-part song cycle for countertenor and piano by Israeli-born American composer/librettist/producer Ari Frankel (b.1960).  Halperin and Scholl give expression to its almost luminous soundscape, with Scholl’s superb control of the largely static vocal line set against Halperin’s fragile, unhurried broken chords of poised single notes, the piece’s minor mode slowly becoming invaded by major associations, also a smattering of thought-provoking dissonances, to culminate in direct major-minor confrontation commenting on “I HOPE TO KNOW AND FEEL SAFE ONE DAY.” Twilight People ends with “Beauty is Life”, by London-based Australian oud player Joseph Tawadros (b. Egypt, 1983), who joins Halperin and Scholl in performance of the work. A breathing, palpable kaleidoscope of east meeting west, of set texts dovetailing with improvisation, of three outstanding artists who, taking their cue from the initial ideas expounded by the oud, join to produce a work of superb, instinctive, natural musicianship and gripping emotion.

 

“Twilight People”, recorded in 2019 for the MODERN Recordings label, is unique in atmosphere, moving beyond everyday experience into the somewhat inexplicable (at times, disturbing) regions of the human psyche, as plumbed by the poets represented here. Arranged in strategic order, the pieces, whether addressing man within the powerful forces of nature, recalling love or memories - frequently all - pass through the emotional prism of the artists, resulting in performance that mixes the objective with the subjective, in performance that is beguiling, rich in gestures, fine in detail, of rare sensitivity and superb teamwork. Tamar Halperin and Andreas Scholl invite the listener to take flight into the timeless depths of his own soul.