On paper
the juxtaposition of saxophone quartet with
solo viola may seem strange, even misguided.
Variety is the spice of life, though, and
in the end this was a highly enjoyable if
somewhat uneven event.
The
young Tempest Saxophone Quartet formed at
the Royal College of Music. And yes, it does
consist of four separate players, despite
Naomi Sullivan being listed twice in the booklet.
The ensemble began with a piece by each of
this year’s featured composers. John Casken’s
seven-minute Nearly Distant (2000)
examines how motives and ideas from an earlier
work (Distant Variations, for saxophone
quartet and wind orchestra) can have their
potentialities further realised. Described
as ‘a series of snapshots of the pre-existing
work’, there was certainly a virtuosic element
here within the frameworks of its explosion/stasis
juxtapositions (reflecting the title). Jazz
allusions (of course intimately related to
the socially-accepted view of the saxophone)
grow in insistence as the work progresses,
although it was the sheer beauty of the slow
sections that lodged in the memory.
Elena
Firsova is the other of the PLG’s featured
composers and her Far Away (note the
neat union of titles between Casken and Firsova!)
is most effective in its evocation of plaintive
loneliness (the actual source of inspiration
was that he composer was far from home). The
closing multiphonics (which on paper looked
more like a ‘trick’) actually sounded very
much as part of the piece, almost like a composed
disintegration.
The
saxophone quartet framed the concert, providing
the final two works also. Judith Bingham’s
Lacemaking (a world premiere) had a
distinctly ‘çool’ slant (the Tempest
Saxophone Quartet loved the fugal illusions
within this sound-world!) A confident compositional
hand was at work. Finally, a work that really
and truly came from the world of jazz - Stan
Sulzmann’s Keeping the Wolf. Up-front
and brightly coloured in the first and third
movements, distinctly Coplandish in the second,
titled ‘Figurine (for my mother)’, it was
the perfect showcase for the Tempest’s talents.
So to
the viola works. Belgian-born Dimitri Murrath
is a virtuoso who seemingly knows no fear.
Ligeti’s six-movement, twenty minute Solo
Viola Sonata (1991-94) poses huge problems
for the performer. By using a deliberately
folk-like manner (vibrato-free), the evocation
of Hungary was strong. With a warm sound and
inflected with a characteristic use of micro-tones,
it prepared the way for the rusticity of the
second movement, ‘Loop’, replete with double-stoppings.
Jaw-dropping virtuosity was the order of the
day for ‘Prestissimo con sordino’ (the fourth
movement) while the concluding ‘Chaconne chromatique’
was a strange mix of the yearning and the
almost courtly.
A low
on inspiration Wieglied by Jeremy Dale
Roberts held the attention purely because
of this violist’s advocacy; Anthony Payne’s
Amid the Winds of Evening was strangely
pointless, a lot of scrubbing but with no
underlying substance. Far, far ahead (the
leap into a different compositional league
was very obvious) was Salvatore Sciarrino’s
Tre Notturni Brillanti of 1975. All
three are written entirely in harmonics, but
each inhabits its own world: the first flighty
and insubstantial (in a positive sense); the
second featuring scratching explosions out
of ppp scurryings; the third comprising
elusive slitherings (including a technique
of brushing the strings with the hair of the
bow, thereby not producing a definite pitch).
The
Sciarrino and the Ligeti were the highlights
of a much-varied evening. Bravo to all concerned.
Colin
Clarke
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