I have to confess that the name of Páll Pampichler Pálsson
was unfamiliar to me before I was sent this Lotus Classics album for review.
The style is modern and often dark and abrasive. It needs some commitment
from the listener who will be rewarded with more and more revelations on
repeated hearings.
Pálsson is certainly a powerful and individual voice. He has an impressive
command of orchestral colour and the players are no doubt grateful for the
virtuoso parts he writes for all sections of the orchestra.
Lend Me Wings is a collection of six songs: two with settings by authors
from Iceland, the remaining four being of German origin. In the opening title
song, the singer watches the flight of grey geese wishing she could fly to
exotic lands with them. The mood is of desperation turning to despair as
the birds
disappear from view. The music almost becomes hysterical in the singer's
yearning's and longings for escape. The raising and spreading of wings, then
the beginnings of birds' flight, is cunningly evoked at the beginning using,
I guess, triangles and gently brushed cymbals. There is some impressive writing
for brass choirs and Bragadóttir, who has a pure yet strong voice
that projects over Pálsson's large orchestra, thoroughly convinces
in communicating the sense of Hulda's verses. Spring Sun is lighter
in mood welcoming the sun and warmth of Spring with some fine writing for
the woodwinds to evoke the sounds of nature; yet, again, the mood darkens
as though the poet senses the transience of Spring's beauty. Indeed it ends
with a deep, mournful bell toll leading straight into and setting the mood
for A Young Widow Sings to Herself, the third song, which drones through
its course as grief wastes away the life of the widow. There is no relief
to her anguish and Pálsson creates a most unusual sound like a
never-ending plague of thousands of insects relentlessly hovering and buzzing.
Bragadóttir sings of this bottomless pit of despair most movingly.
Folk Song, about a loved one lying dead on some distant battle field,
is a mournful elegy with effective writing for just brass, harp and percussion.
In The East is another nightmare poem of death and destruction, rape
and pillage with the orchestra in more assertive mood with angry timpani
and brass fanfares before the music develops and moves into a bleak landscape
with eerie ghostly string figures. Once more this mood sets the scene for
the longest song based on Hermann Hesse's Glass Bead Game, The Last Glass
Bead Game Player. An old man sits playing the game surrounded by the
desolation of a war-ravaged landscape. This atmosphere is skilfully drawn
including a masterly glass-bead sound using harp, vibraphone and
marimbaphone.
The Clarinet Concerto begins in a serious reflective mood with strings
and timpani playing a slow heavy theme which is soon interrupted by a restless
almost eerie staccato from the clarinet. At length the mood lightens and
the music becomes a contest between the plaintive and tragic-comic and the
heavily antagonistic forces which constantly threaten to crush any humanity
in their path. The second movement is calmer, more peaceful but with a certain
nervous edginess and the third movement, the most interesting, begins with
a virtuoso orchestral passage which opposes a Gregorian chorale rising from
the background. This chorale becomes a major theme and there is much use
of bells.
The Concerto Di Giubileo still lurks in dark places - rather too much
one might think for a work with such a title. Again there is virtuoso writing
for every member of the orchestra but it treads too heavily for this reviewer.
If you experience difficulty in obtaining this disc try the
Lotus web site or e-mail
htautscher@lotusrecord.co.at
Reviewer
Ian Lace
This disc was private purchase and not offe../graphics/red for review
Rannveig Frída
Bragadóttir (mezzo-soprano), Sigurdur Snorrason (Clarinet), Iceland
Symphony Orchestra conducted by Petri Sakari
