Tag Archives: rachmaninov

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Pianist Alexandre Dossin Shines in Russian “Winter Nights”

Alexandre Dossin, pianist

Why is it that sometimes the best classical pianists are less heralded than ones whose playing should be wonderful but isn’t?

Recently I heard a performance by a very well-known pianist on a prestigious concert series, whose playing was less than stellar. He had apparently not practiced enough, his program was not as well chosen as it should have been, and I was truly disappointed in the result.

Sunday afternoon, I went to hear Brazilian pianist Alexandre Dossin, performing on the Russian Chamber Music Foundation’s “Winter Nights” program at Nordstrom Recital Hall. (Their Russian Piano Festival returns June 1 and 2 this year.)

I had reviewed some of Dossin’s recordings for the now defunct magazine Clavier [Clavier and Keyboard Companion merged three years ago to form Clavier Companion — ed.], and expected good things. It was more than good. I was bowled over by the technique, the musicianship, the beauty of his interpretations and the way he made himself invisible, allowing the composers’ intentions to come through.

It was, naturally, a program of Russian music. Dossin, who won the First and Special Prizes in the 2003 Martha Argerich Competition in Buenos Aires (and was later invited to play with her), played three parts of Tchaikovsky’s The Seasons, five Rachmaninoff preludes, and six selections from Prokofiev’s Visions Fugitives as well as his Toccata, Op. 11.

From the start, Dossin drew the listener into the emotions of the music. For example, in the three Tchaikovsky excerpts: for May, one felt the season of opening; for August, the lively robustness of harvest plenty; and for October — remember, this is all in the north of the country — there was a distinct sense of things closing down, a certain sadness.

All of this Dossin portrayed, with pauses for the music to breathe, with dynamic and shading.

His Rachmaninoff demonstrated his technique by being completely unobtrusive, no matter how busy his fingers, how thunderous the chords. Here, one heard the majesty and solemnity, the quirks or romance, the tension or lack of it, all in the way he put his artistry at the service of the music.

His Prokofiev made a fine contrast. Visions Fugitives in this context means Fleeting Vignettes; they are very brief, often spare, exquisite miniatures, with all their different voices and aspects clearly delineated from a jack-in-a-box style to music of the spheres, the virtuosity taken for granted. Lastly, the great Toccata, a piece that Prokofiev, a fine pianist himself, said he couldn’t really play, received a performance in which Dossin never showed himself off, just the music in a performance as superb as it was musical.

He gave a Liszt transcription as encore, of Alyabiev’s The Nightingale, elucidating Liszt’s sometimes tortuous thinking into something perfectly clear. The whole performance was a delight.

After intermission, pianist Natalya Ageyeva, violinist Kwan Bin Park, and cellist Kevin Krentz gave a fine performance of Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No, 2, and followed it as encore with just one movement from a Borodin Trio — as they said, “something sweet to end with.”

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Cappella Romana Sings a “Divine Liturgy” at West Seattle’s Holy Rosary

Hear Cappella Romana in a preview of Rachmaninoff's Vespers.

This Saturday, January 12, one of best vocal groups you’ve never heard of, Cappella Romana, is performing Sergei Rachmaninoff’s The Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (1910) at Holy Rosary Church in West Seattle. It’s their only Seattle appearance, and their performances of last season’s Vespers (also by Rachmaninoff) sold out, so you may want tickets ($27-$41) in advance.

Though it’s sung in Church Slavonic — Тебе поем means “We praise thee” — Orthodox Church authorities were not impressed.

Rachmaninoff’s music for the Orthodox Eucharist was too “modernist,” they felt, and they refused it permission to be performed as a church service. (Music in Russian churches is still a fraught issue today.) Things got even more modern with the coming of the 1917 Russian Revolution, which did nothing to improve the chances of church music, even by Rachmaninoff, being performed.

The “Divine Liturgy” languished for most of the twentieth century, only getting a revival in the late 1980s. Cappella Romana will present its twenty movements over two hours, with the declamations of both deacon (sung by Adam Steele) and priest (sung by John Michael Boyer). There are three solo passages and two for double choir (the Lord’s Prayer and the Beatitudes).

“It could hardly be called a performance,” wrote reviewer Philippa Kiraly of the group’s performance of Rachmaninoff’s Vespers. “It’s a devout religious experience for the singers, who when it was originally sung were always monks. Yet today, it takes profound scholarly knowledge to be able to sing it, which Cappella Romana has.” Expect a similar transport at this Saturday’s concert.

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Catching a Stellar “Trout” at the Summer Chamber Music Festival

Jon Kimura Parker

The piano has always been a part of Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Summer Festival (through July 29; tickets) and in both Monday and Tuesday’s programs this week, every work has included it. This may be in part because two well-known Canadian pianists are performing, Marc-André Hamelin and Jon Kimura Parker. Hamelin is a newcomer to the festival. Parker is returning after an absence of several years.

The piano line up this week also includes Jeewon Park, here with her husband, cellist Edward Arron, and the two gave the pre-concert recital of Rachmaninov’s Sonata in G Minor. Composed in 1900, Arron described it as a romantic refutation of those who had decided all melody had already been written and were heading in different musical directions.

Romantic it certainly is, and in Arron’s hands it was almost a love letter to his wife, his playing was so expressive, so warm, so rich, so tender. Throughout the work his cello sang and soared perfectly together and in balance with the piano part. Park for her part stayed easily on top of the busy piano role, with long lyrical phrases and many beautiful moments, though when the music required fast fortes, her hands seemed to lose their flexibility and became more rigid, detracting from the phrase-shaping.

The same happened in the first work of the concert itself, Mozart’s Sonata in A Major, K. 305, for violin and piano which she performed with violinist Andrew Wan. This was rather heavy-handed Mozart. I’d have liked it lighter with more elegant restraint. Wan plays a 1744 Bergonzi instrument from a couple of decades before the sonata was written, but he didn’t allow the instrument to sing, constraining its sound rather than releasing it to bloom.

Fauré’s Piano Quartet No. 2 in G Minor departs from his often subtle style, being forceful, almost violent at times except for the calmly beautiful adagio. Played by violinist and Society artistic director James Ehnes, violist David Harding, cellist Arron, and pianist Hamelin, it could be wondered if in 1921 Fauré is writing a response to his thoughts on the first World War. The players gave it intense energy and a full sound, Hamelin nearly overwhelming the strings several times with the power of his part. Fauré gives the viola many opening phrases so that Harding’s fine tone could be heard easily. The swirling tempest that is the last movement turns into a fast flow of inexorable forward motion with eddies, to which the musicians gave full rein.

Given the importance of the double bass in Schubert’s Quintet for Piano and Strings, the “Trout,” it’s surprising how few chamber works include it. It anchors the entire work’s carefree lightness, a state which embodied the performance given by violinist Augustin Hadelich, violist Erin Keefe, cellist Bion Tsang, bass Jordan Anderson, and pianist Parker. It’s impossible to be bored with this entrancing and familiar piece of music, which contains a profusion of inspired moments one after another. The five performers kept the joy, exuberance and vitality to the fore without ever allowing the music to bog down in weight. It was a stellar performance, enthusiastically appreciated by the capacity audience at Nordstrom Recital Hall.

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Stephen Hough “Shines” in Rach 3 with Seattle Symphony

Stephen Hough, pianist

If notes were steps, Stephen Hough would have run—and won—a full marathon playing Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with the Seattle Symphony at Benaroya Hall Thursday night. He’ll do it again three more times this weekend. From the look of Thursday evening’s almost-full hall, tickets are selling briskly.

Made even more famous than it was already by its use in the movie Shine (about the Australian pianist David Helfgott), this concerto is an Everest for performers, loaded with notes to be played at warp speed. Where Hough is unusual is in his ability to add phrasing even when his hands are a blur on the keys.

In the few slower moments, including the lovely theme at the start, he gave an expressive nuance hardly possible the rest of the time. Hough’s playing is extraordinarily clean for such a work, with never a misplaced note, and while his playing is decisive, he never bangs on the keyboard.  In the few moments when he was not playing he mopped the sweat from his brow and wiped the keys with his black handkerchief.

The orchestra under Ludovic Morlot kept pace with him, with fine solos from principals Seth Krimsky, bassoon, and Ben Hausmann, oboe.

Exciting as this performance was, the highlight of the concert came earlier with a superb performance by the orchestra and Morlot of Charles Ives’ Symphony No. 2. We are so used to thinking of Ives as an iconoclast whose music is quirky to a degree, fascinating and challenging to play and to hear, that this symphony written in his mid-to-late 20s comes as a surprise. It is in straightforward symphonic mode, showing the composer’s thorough grasp of European compositional style and of inspired orchestration.

Yes, there are many instances where he has incorporated snatches of popular songs, most familiarly Camptown Races and Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean, but this is a time-honored choice of many composers. Only at the very last does Ives present us with a sudden surprise, departing from conventional harmonies to end on a clashingly dissonant chord.

The orchestra played it with freshness and verve under Morlot’s firm but easy guiding hand, bringing out a myriad little details and with notable solos from the horns and principal cello Efe Baltacigil.

The concert began with another, quintessentially American work, Leonard Bernstein’s Overture to Candide. Quite short, it received a vibrant, scintillating performance from Morlot and the orchestra, the conductor almost dancing on the podium and conveying his exuberance to the musicians.

Before the concert bagan, three musicians were honored on their departure from the orchestra. Violinist Jun Liang Du, in the orchestra since 1986, has already left, but second violinist Virginia Hunt Luce, who has played in the orchestra 46 years, received a warm tribute from colleague Sande Gillette, and cellist Susan Williams with 35 years under her belt, was lauded by violist Vincent Comer.

 

Arts & Entertainment, Music

Vigil or Vespers, Rachmaninov’s Work Gets Serene Treatment from Seattle Choral Company

Seattle Choral Company (Photo: SCC)

No, Rachmaninov’s All-Night Vigil (last performance June 9, 8 p.m., at St. Marks) does not last all night. You aren’t sitting there until the dawn comes up listening to glorious music (though it’s so lovely you might want it never to end).

It was so named when Eastern Orthodox churches put together groups of their liturgical offices to read and sing together, including this one for different offices from dusk to early morning. It actually lasts about an hour.

Rachmaninov composed this supremely serene setting for the vigil in the midst of World War I, not long before the Russian Revolution. It has become well loved outside its church environs, but it felt particularly appropriate to be hearing it as sung by Seattle Choral Company within the walls of St. Mark’s Cathedral Friday night.

The performance began with three other brief works of Orthodox sacred music. Mircea Diaconescu’s Lumina Lina immediately took the listener into the feel of old Orthodox music, albeit with some modern harmonies, and was followed by John Tavener’s Eonia (Eternity) and two prayers from Drei Geistliche Gesänge set by Alfred Schnittke.

A choir of some fifty-plus singers under founding conductor and artistic director Freddie Coleman, SCC has sung the Vigil (also knows as the Vespers) before, most recently eight years ago. From the start, its performance Friday (repeated tonight, Saturday) invoked a sense of gentle peacefulness. Throughout its fifteen sections, Coleman kept the tempi flowing, mostly unhurried and steady but with occasional faster parts. Rachmaninov, not a particularly religious man, nevertheless understood and knew the traditional music of the Church and much of what he wrote for the Vigil lies closely in that vein.

Phrasing and shaping were beautifully subtle, with moments of hushed reverence and others of joyful excitement, while Coleman’s pacing made sure that all the voices, singing unaccompanied for the entire concert, sounded as fresh and warm at the end as at the beginning. There was never any forcing or pushing. Occasional brief solo moments were taken by choir members, notably some pure high tenor singing from Justin Ferris.

Orthodox music is not emotional in a sense of having drama in it, nor much dynamic range. It’s more a cumulative hypnotic effect drawing you further and further into the music and the words which of course are the reason for the music.

SCC sang so clearly that it was quite easy to keep place in the program with the words, and the program itself was a model of how a work like this, sung in a language with which we don’t even share an alphabet, can be brought home to the listeners. A short description preceded the words of each section, and these were in three columns, first the Russian in Cyrillic, then phonetic Russian in our Roman alphabet, lastly the translation.

I hope we don’t have to wait another eight years before Seattle Choral Company sings this again.