MUSICWEBLOG
July-August 2005
Reviewer:
Robert Hugill
Friday 15th July
Just signing
off a compilation disc entitled Life
is Beautiful ordinarily such things are rather doubtful,
just an excuse for companies to recycle existing recordings
that you’ve already heard. But in this instance the recordings
all come from ABC, the Australian Broadcasting Company,
so I was able to get to know a number of fine artists that
I’d not come across before, along with a striking new piece
by Ross Edwards, called Dawn Mantras, written to
be performed on the sails of Sydney Opera House – now that
would have been something.
One track, by
Saffir – The Australian Guitar Quartet, entitled Rumba
Flamenca, had me wanting to wave my arms and dance along
to the music, rather a difficult feat when riding a bicycle
through Central London. Most of my review listening is done
on my bicycle. Though stopping to make notes does rather
impede progress when late for work, you can’t beat cycling
through Battersea Park on a sunny day with something fine
on the headphones as a sound track. Once the ABC disc is
signed off, I’m moving on to pastures new; the first of
a batch of discs of Jewish music from Naxos’s Milken Archive
project.
Monday 18th
July
The first Milken
Archive disc, a selection of concert pieces dating
from between the wars; a period when cantors made tours
of the USA and expanded their activities by adding secular
concerts to sacred duties; much of the repertoire is sacred,
Psalms etc. But, because they were for concert venues rather
than synagogues, the pieces are accompanied by orchestra.
Rather disappointingly the disc does not use original orchestrations
but modern ones. Effective as they are, I did wonder whether
the originals would have been so richly romantic. This issue
of returning to original material is something that bothers
me, probably in a way which would not bother the originators
of the material. But in our poly-stylistical times, I think
it is important to know that what we are listening to is
true to its own style; something that really affects me
when listening to modern recordings of Broadway shows.
Wednesday 20th
July
A little niggle
that keeps bothering me; increasingly disc booklets do not
carry a full track listing, you have to keep referring to
the back of the jewel case for this. So you end up juggling
jewel case, booklet and portable CD player. I know it’s
just a matter of economy, but I long for the days when you
could look on the inside front cover of a booklet and get
full track details and credits. Whilst on the subject of
CD packaging, is it only me who has trouble opening compact
double CDs, where the 2nd CD is stored behind
the first and accessed by cunningly hinging CD support out;
I’m invariably befuddled by such things.
Friday 22nd
July
Just started
Mayr’s Sisara
telling the biblical story of Jael and Sisara, where she
liberated the Israelites by pretending to seduce Sisara
and killing him with a tent peg. Mayr wrote it in Venice
for the Ospedale dei Mendicanti, so it is written for female
voices. The plot is quite similar to the gruesome tale of
Judith and Holofernes (except Judith chops off Holofernes’s
head) set by Vivaldi for the Ospedale dei Pieta. It seems
curiously strange that these young women were encouraged
to enact such gruesome tales; perhaps it was felt that the
strong female subject matter made it particularly suitable
for all female performance and that the moral of the tale
would be suitably uplifting for the girls. Mayr’s version
for the dreadful deed is quite understated, no big dramatic
killing to get the girls going, so that’s OK then!
Mayr was born
just 7 years after Mozart. He settled in Italy and lived
long enough to teach Donizetti and become known as the founder
of Italian opera. One of those wonderfully ‘what if?’
stories where we start fantasizing about what Mozart might
have done and who he might have taught if he’d lived until
1838 (Mayr died in 1845).
Tuesday 26th
July
A real change
of tone, Gavin Bryars’s Laude,
contemporary works written for early music specialist, soprano
Anna Maria Friman, which seek to convert the shape and feel
of the 14th century Italian Laude into
the contemporary world. I love the shape and feel of these
pieces, partly because they chime in with my own composing
concerns, recreating old forms and mixing the old and the
new; much of my own works involves writing in existing forms
(masses, motets) and I find that I am constantly inspired
by the shape of old melodic forms like plainchant. Where
Bryars’ work is astonishing is the simplicity of it, some
of the Laude are written for unaccompanied soprano
or just for soprano and tenor; this is really composing
without a safety net. Bryars, of course, manages it brilliantly.
My next aim is to hear some of these works live and a couple
of them have given me ideas for possible future concert
plans for my own consort.
Tuesday 2nd
August
Plans to review
a disc of Gregorian chant over the weekend were scuppered
by the limited liner notes. Though the disc includes a substantial
general essay on chant, there is little detail about the
individual chants. More annoyingly in the track listing
they are referred to by type (Introit, Gradual, Alleluia
etc.) rather than giving the actual title or even any text.
So I must retrieve my Roman Gradual from church; the review
is on hold until I am able to do so.
So as a complete
change, a disc of Artur
Schnabel playing Beethoven; it never fails to amaze
me how technology can help reveal so much of the original
personality of the pianist. Mark Obert-Thorn has removed
much of the surface noise and what is left is quite acceptable;
I was repeatedly struck by the detail and immediacy of the
playing. Schnabel’s is a very free technique, you feel that
he simply went into the studio and recorded the item off
straight. And this helps to maintain the illusion that you
are listening to him in the next room. Will succeeding generations
feel the same about our highly engineered studio productions
today?
Thursday 4th
August
And now for
something completely different, a disc of Mantovani
recordings from the 1940s and 1950s; it is on Guild, a label
which I have previously associated mainly with choral music,
which just shows how much attention I been paying.
For those of
us over a certain age, Mantovani is forever linked to Sunday
afternoon radio programmes and the sound of cascading strings.
In fact, this distinctive sound was created by the composer-arranger
Ronald Binge in 1951.
Mantovani’s
father was a violinist at La Scala, but seems to have toured
England with Italian opera companies and the family settled
here in 1912. Mantovani was talented young, playing the
Bruch violin concerto at 16 and going on to make a career
in light music. Like many itinerant musicians he took work
with small palm court ensembles, working in restaurants,
hotels and theatres.
In the late
1970s I played in the Edinburgh Light Orchestra and one
of the old guys playing there had made his career in palm
court ensembles. This meant that he could turn his hand
to playing a number of instruments, but on the violin (his
first instrument) his technique was remarkable, he utilised
portamento to a high degree and coated everything with a
strong, wide vibrato - a distinctive sound, but one that
integrated into an orchestral string section only with difficulty.
Thursday 11th
August
I’ve now moved
on to the Oxford Camerata’s Tallis disc from Naxos, with
their fine performance of Spem in Alium. My appetite was
whetted by listening to David Wulstan’s recording of the
work with the Clerkes of Oxenford. This astonishing version,
transposed up so that the sopranos are perpetually hovering
above the stave, is beautiful but not one which can be compared
to other, more recent ones. According to a singer friend,
Wulstan was only able to get the light, transparent high
soprano sound by using a succession of 15 and 16 year old
girls, older singers were unable to sustain the high lines.
When it comes
to modern recordings, its more a question of what sort of
‘Spem in Alium’ do you want, something that tries to approach
clarity or a glorious acoustic mess. This latter approach
is inevitable with some of the older, choral recordings
but the advantage is that they give you a firmly balanced
wall of choral sound. Other recordings use 40 solo voices
and much depends on the recording venue and acoustic; it
is perfectly possible for 40 solo voices to produce an acoustic
wash of sound if you use a suitable resonant acoustic. I
am still waiting for a recording which reduces the reverb
to a minimum and gives us 40 closely recorded lines; it
would be fascinating, but probably not something to live
with as your regular recording.
Wednesday 17th
August
If you dislike
a particular recording then this can often make for good
copy, similarly if you enjoy a recording; the problem for
me is when I am indifferent, I can find nothing concrete
to say. These thoughts occurred whilst reviewing a Vienna
Boys Choir disc from the Naxos Milken Archive, with performances
of pieces by Sholom Kalib and Abraham Kaplan. The pieces
are both quasi-liturgical, one sets the Psalms in Hebrew
the other excerpts from the Sabbath services. Liturgical
music can transcend its origin to become simply great music,
just think of Bloch’s Sacred Service or Frank Martin’s Mass.
But quite often sacred music can only aspire to be useful,
to aptly fulfil its function within the liturgy; composers
must write within the confines of the liturgical requirements
and the limitations of performers. Not everyone can be like
Rachmaninov and fulfil detailed liturgical requirements
whilst producing music of genius.
Which raises
the interesting question, should an Anglican reviewer, who
sings regularly at the Roman Catholic Latin mass, be reviewing
Jewish music. My view tends to be that if a disc is issued
by a mainstream label then it should be capable of being
appreciated by the non-specialist so my review is perfectly
valid. Of course, if you reverse the situation then you
get some interesting conundrums. What would a Jewish reviewer
make of music by one of the dimmer scions of Anglican church
music such as Charles Wood? Could an observant non-Christian
find anything within the Anglican tradition of Psalm singing?
Friday 20th
August
I’m finishing
the week by listening to the new Hilliard disc of music
by Stephen
Hartke then I’m off for a few days holiday next
week. But I hope to make a start on the BIS complete ‘Peer
Gynt’ which integrates the Grieg music with extracts from
Ibsen’s text. I just love the sound of the Norwegian language
so can’t wait. When not working, I never get much reviewing
done as I am such a butterfly listener when at home; there
are too many other distractions. I need the discipline of
the concert hall, opera house or the bicycle journey to
concentrate my mind.
Robert
Hugill
