"Pure Romanticism": Yaniv Dinur conducts the Israel Camerata Jerusalem in works of Gilad Hochman, Dvořák and Brahms. Roi Dayan - solo mandolin

 

Maestro Yaniv Dinur (nbsymphony.org)

Roi Dayan (Michael Pavia)

Conducting "Beyond Notes - Pure Romanticism", Concert No.6 of the Israel Camerata Jerusalem's 42nd season, was Yaniv Dinur (Israel-USA), with soloist Roi Dayan (Israel) on mandolin. This writer attended the concert at the Jerusalem International YMCA on February 26th, 2026.

 

The program opened with "Nedudim" (Wanderings), Fantasia Concertante for Mandolin and String Orchestra (2014), by Gilad Hochman (Israel-Germany). Written for- and dedicated to mandolinist Alon Sariel, the work combines both fantasia- and concerto genres. Setting the scene, the violins enter against a dark, dissonant, otherworldly screen of sound. Engaging in oriental modality, Hochman creates a work taking place within the desert scenery of the country of his birth, the soundscape timeless, austere, at times, disturbing. From the Fantasia's hushed, reflective moments to its intense, gripping tutti, Roi Dayan's playing drew one's attention into each gesture and new section. His performance was finely detailed, articulate, virtuosic and, above all, wonderfully shaped and eloquent. Dayan's personal approach to the work created a direct connection to that very element of Hochman's musical language. In an interview with Maureen Buja for "Interlude" (March 30th, 2018), Hochman said: "In Nedudim I have related to a personal and cultural field, with specific musical implications, and to the non-musical theme of wanderings." Maestro Dinur's direction made for an illuminating and moving performance of "Nedudim".

 

Then to the two Romantic works of the program, the first being Antonín Dvořák's String Quartet No.12 in F major Op. 96 "American", performed in a transcription for string orchestra by Turkish/Armenian conductor Nurhan Arman. Stemming from Dvořák's time in New York (1892-1895), where he served as artistic director/professor of composition at the National Conservatory of Music of America, the quartet was composed in the summer of 1893 in Spillville, Iowa, where the composer was vacationing. His delight at meeting up with the colony of fellow Bohemians there and with his wife and children, who had come from Prague for the summer, gave rise to this exceptionally joyful piece of music. Sketched within a mere 72 hours and completed in twelve days, Op.96 has emerged as the most popular of Dvořák’s fourteen quartets. The work has occasionally been criticised for a "lack of erudition and sophistication". With its marked homophonic style and directness, Dvořák, however, conveyed his aim as being “to write something really melodious and simple.” Adding a double bass line to the score, Nurhan Arman's setting makes few changes. With its pedals or drones and permeating pentatonic themes serving to transmit the rural flavour Dvořák wished to create, Maestro Dinur and the Camerata string players gave lush, fresh and vivid expression to Dvořák’s immediacy of expression and to the flow of effortless-sounding unifying- and thematic procedures. A violist himself, Dvořák gives the viola the opening pentatonic theme. As to the nostalgic, introspective Lento movement, unfolding in a broad arch building up to an exquisite climax, it ended with one last wistful utterance of the melody by the 'cello, here not played by the 'cello section, but by solo 'cello (Marina Katz). Whether or not Dvořák's American compositions show native American influences has long been debated. Making reference, however, to Iowa's natural surroundings, the Molto vivace movement imitates the rhapsodic warbling of an American bird, the Scarlet Tanager, its call played over and over and over again in various guises and at different tempi.

 

For his Serenade no. 2 Op.16 (1858–60), Johannes Brahms' score calls for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns and for strings, but with no violins, thereby giving the main focus of the piece to the winds and to a darker timbral colour than usual. From the warm, gently-flowing lines initiated by the woodwinds in the opening movement, to the exuberant, fun-loving, folk-dance spirit of the second, to the strangely-titled Quasi menuetto (fourth movement) with its irregular phrases and the somewhat eerie moments of its Trio, to the carefree, bold, bucolic Rondo Allegro, in which  the piccolo makes its first entrance, the pulse and flow, the lushness of sound, the gracious melodies and invigorating cross rhythms made for the pleasurable listening associated with the serenade genre. That being said, the A minor Adagio non troppo, the third and central movement of the work, stood out, as it moved into spacious, mysterious and transcendent "non-serenade" territory, its expression pensive and profound. There was much to enjoy in this performance, with many beautiful solos on the part of the Camerata's splendid wind players.

 

A fine choice of repertoire matched by excellent performance!

 

Gilad Hochman (Stefan Maria Rother)