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My name is Ben Hogwood, editor of the Arcana music site (arcana.fm)

On record – Matthew Schellhorn plays Howells: Piano Music Vol.1 (Naxos)

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Matthew Schellhorn (piano) Herbert Howells Phantasy (1917) Harlequin Dancing (1918) My Lord Harewood’s Galliard (1949) Finzi: His Rest (1956) Summer Idyls (1911) Siciliana (1958) Pavane and Galliard (1964) Petrus Suite (1967-73) Naxos 8.571382 [65’52”] Producers Rachel Smith< Engineer Ben Connellan Recorded 19-21 August 2019 at The Menuhin Hall, Stoke D’Abernon Written by Richard Whitehouse What’s the story? Naxos continues its coverage of Herbert Howells with this initial instalment (presumably one more to follow) of his piano music, all pieces being previously unrecorded and authoritatively rendered by Matthew Schellhorn in what is a notable addition to the composer’s discography. What’s the music like? Long before his death (at the age of 90), Howells’s reputation rested firmly on his output of choral and organ works. Only quite recently has his considerable earlier output of orchestral and chamber music received serious re-evaluation, so revealing one whose distinct change of outlook in his early forties came about as much through cultural as personal reasons. Modest in scope and dimension, his piano music features no extended or career-defining works, yet its technical poise and always idiomatic feel for this instrument makes for a rewarding listen. The present selection interleaves miniatures and cyclical works in chronological order. As to the former, Phantasy finds the recently graduated composer assured in his handling of those impressionist aspects derived from Debussy and Ravel, while Harlequin Dreaming inhabits a world of Satie-esque whimsy and nonchalance as a reminder that Howells was then close friends with Bliss. Moving on to the Renaissance-inspired piano pieces of his later years, My Lord Harewood’s Galliard fuses its recherche manner with engaging harmonic astringency, whereas Finzi: His Rest is a pensively ambivalent in-memoriam to a younger colleague. The Siciliana is a languorous if non-indulgent take on the characteristic dance rhythm, while the Pavane and Galliard juxtaposes the confessional and combative with stark emotional acuity. The suites come from either end of Howells’s career, with all that implies for a half-century timespan. Summer Idyls [sic] formed a part of his portfolio for the Royal College of Music; its stylistic indebtedness to the mid- and late Romantics – not least Rachmaninov – would soon be left behind, but the appeal in these evocations of rural environs no doubt familiar from his childhood endures. Pick of the seven is the wistful rumination of ‘Near Midnight’, with the central ‘Minuet Sine Nomine’ similarly dominating the Petrus Suite in its limpid refinement. Otherwise, the seven pieces evince a sinewy counterpoint and tensile linearity    as are audibly a product of Howells’s late style, yet the origin of several in sketches made decades before confirms an overriding consistency of approach heightened by experience. Does it all work? Yes, allowing that Howells never sought to suffuse this music with the degree of emotional intensity reserved, at least in his maturity, for the larger choral works. Yet his quintessential expression is arguably to be found in those many shorter choral or organ pieces intended for liturgical purpose; in which case, the expressive focus and restraint of what is recorded here is its own justification. It could hardly have a more persuasive advocate than Schellhorn, who credits the late Stephen Cleobury for introducing him to the extent of Howells’s piano music. Is it recommended? Indeed. The closely unduly defined sound is ideal for piano music of this kind, and Jonathan Clinch’s annotations (along with a reminiscence by the pianist) are succinct and informative. The follow-up volume, mainly of better-known music, will doubtless prove just as rewarding. Listen & Buy
You can listen to clips from the recording and purchase, either in physical or digital form, at the Naxos website

On record – Christopher Lyndon-Gee conducts Silvestrov: Symphony no.7 (Naxos)

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Inna Galatenko (soprano); Oleg Bezborodko (piano); Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra / Christopher Lyndon-Gee

Valentin Silvestrov

Ode to a Nightingale (1983)
Cantata no.4 (2014)
Concertino for Piano and Small Orchestra (2015)
Moments of Poetry and Music (2003)
Symphony No. 7 (2003)

Naxos 8.574123 [73’06”]

Producers / Engineers  Vilius Keras, Aleksandra Keriené

Recorded 18-24 January 2019 at Lithuanian National Cultural Centre Recording Studio, Vilnius

Written by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Naxos makes a notable addition to the Valentin Silvestrov discography with this release of mainly recent works, mostly in first recordings, and all idiomatically realized by Lithuanian artists under the direction of conductor (and sometime composer) Christopher Lyndon-Gee.

What’s the music like?

Much the earliest piece, Ode to a Nightingale includes all the verses of Keats’s poem. A series of motifs constantly recurs and recombines such that this text is not so much set as projected via a rhetorical while flexible vocal line, heard against an instrumental texture dominated by a carillon that evokes the eponymous bird. Previously encountered in a chamber version, this is the first recording of the recently premiered orchestral original, and if larger forces extend rather than intensify its expressive scope, this is hardly to the detriment of the music overall.

Two decades on, and Cantata no.4 is an assembly of verse by Ukrainian poets (including the national author Taras Schevchenko), set in a manner that evidently recalls the salon intimacy of mid-19th century Russian songwriters. Most appealing is its Pastorale second movement, which duly re-emerges in expanded form as the corresponding movement in the Concertino written soon afterwards. Nominally more abstract, this latter piece charts a wider emotional terrain – the wryly ingratiating Pastorale framed by a Preliudium whose majesty rapidly dissipates, then a Serenade of wistful poise; none of these movements quite anticipates the Postliudium which brings about a closure of decidedly ominous ambivalence – a reminder that the seeming repose of Silvestrov’s later music is permeated by an introspective anxiety.

This is no less audible in Moments of Poetry and Music, a brief yet telling juxtaposition of verse by Paul Celan – to piano accompaniment – with a longer paraphrase where piano and orchestra open-out those salient motifs to a degree the more affecting for its understatement.

Which just leaves the Seventh Symphony – at barely 18 minutes, the shortest of Silvestrov’s maturity while eschewing both the underlying integration of the Fifth and plangent contrasts of the Sixth. Nor is it any less characteristic, unfolding as an unbroken span where episodes of relative tension and release interleave on the way to a coda of rapt evanescence. A pivotal cadenza from piano (rendered by Marija Grikevičiūté) is but the most significant appearance by an instrument whose concertante function tangibly enhances the speculative aura overall.

Does it all work?

Yes, providing one remembers the music from this composer’s maturity is less about ongoing evolution than incremental variation (the Eighth Symphony rather seems to indicate a stylistic shift in its priorities). Such pieces are best listened to individually, though the programme as assembled is persuasive in its follow-through; with Inna Galatenko eloquent during her vocal contributions and Oleg Bezborodko a pianist of no little finesse. Lyndon-Gee secures playing from the Lithuanian National Symphony as to indicate an orchestra punching above its status.

Is it recommended?

Indeed, and at its modest price this is an ideal introduction to the composer for those yet to be acquainted with his music. Conductor and orchestra will hopefully tackle more Silvestrov, not least the three symphonies (the Ninth pointedly entitled Ode to Joy) he has gone on to write.

Listen & Buy

You can listen to clips from the recording and purchase, either in physical or digital form, at the Naxos website

 

On record – Eighth Blackbird: Singing in the Dead of Night (Cedille Records)

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Eighth Blackbird [Matt Albert, Matthew Duvall, Nathalie Joachim, Lisa Kaplan, Nick Photinos, Ken Thomson]

Cedille Records CDR90000 195 [46’02”]

Producer Elaine Martone
Engineer Bill Maylone

Recorded 30 September – 2 October 2019 in the Reva and David Logan Center for the Arts, University of Chicago

Written by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

A major new work from the three composing members of Bang on a Can, which both fulfils a commission from Eighth Blackbird – among the most enterprising of American ensembles who are devoted to new music – and also finds these composers at something near their best.

What’s the music like?

In an introductory note, David Lang explains how he, Michael Gordon and Julia Wolfe have often collaborated on projects, but here determined to create something where their own and naturally gregarious personalities were subsumed into a composite whole. The resulting work offers a stern test even for such virtuosic musicians as those in Eighth Blackbird; in addition offering opportunities for their sometime collaborator, the choreographer Susan Marshall, to create a theatrical context for a score whose often stark contrasts belie its modest dimensions.

The first part of These Broken Wings is the most archetypal in its tightly interlocking patterns along with hard, bright sonorities and rhythmic clarity. The music’s near clinically objective progress continues until being suddenly curtailed then replaced by several seconds of silence.

In contrast to the foregoing, The Light of the Dark focuses on not always controlled anarchy. In addition to this ensemble’s regular line-up, instruments such as guitar and accordion take their place in what the composer terms a ‘‘late-night jam session’’. From the swerving drone of its initial cello solo develops an often deliriously OTT interplay, given unlikely definition by the pauses which cut right across the activity and for no other audible reason. The closing stage initially unfolds in a crescendo of velocity before hurtling into a ‘brick wall’ of silence.

The second part of These Broken Wings is very much the ‘slow movement’ in its held chords and ethereal harmonies. An undetermined element is introduced with musicians told to ‘‘drop things when they are not playing’’, as though smearing paint on an otherwise pristine canvas.

The longest and also most intriguing component, Singing in the Dead of Night (seemingly a reference to a certain Paul McCartney song) is also the most varied in its superimposing of distanced and otherworldly timbres that evolve as dissonant cluster-chords, before suddenly exploding in a maelstrom of undirected energy. This duly alternates with more introspective passages, in the process suggesting a kind of morphed variations on those opening chords as ultimately blow themselves apart in what feels an unnerving corollary to nocturnal isolation.

The third part of These Broken Wings restores something of the initial extroversion, with its heady interplay for ensemble. Not that this is wholly a reversion to type, the melodic line that eventually crests the ensemble opening-out the rhythmic activity on its way to a hectic close.

Does it all work?

Yes, in that the level of cohesion between the three component pieces (necessarily) overrides the contrasts between them. It helps, of course, that the members of Eighth Blackbird are in their collective element as regards the rhythmic and co-ordinational intricacies of this music.

Is it recommended?

Indeed, and its relatively short measure no doubt matters less in the post-CD era. The booklet, which includes succinct and informative notes on each piece from its composer, is enhanced by Susannah Bielak’s cover art such as sets almost all the pages in appealingly varied relief.

Listen & Buy

You can listen to clips from the recording and purchase, either in physical or digital form, at the Cedille Records website

 

On record – Victoria Borisova-Ollas: Angelus (BIS)

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Victoria Borisova-Ollas
Angelus (2008)
The Kingdom of Silence (2003)
Before the Mountains Were Born (2005)
Creation of the Hymn (2013)
Open Ground (2006)

Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra / Andrey Boreyko (Angelus), Martyn Brabbins (The Kingdom of Silence, Before the Mountains Were Born), Sakari Oramo (Open Ground)

BIS BIS2288 SACD [82’08”]

Producers Thore Brinkmann, Ingo Petry
Engineers Marion Schwebel, Matthias Spitzbarth

Recorded August 2016 (Open Ground), November 2017 (Angelus), August 2019 (The Kingdom of Silence, Before the Mountains Were Born) in Stockholm Concert Hall

Written by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

BIS issues what is only the second release dedicated to the music of Victoria Borisova-Ollas (b1969), Vladivostok-born and resident in Sweden for almost three decades, superbly played by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and sumptuously recorded in Stockholm Concert Hall.

What’s the music like?

UK audiences have had few opportunities to hear Borisova-Ollas, but her piece Wings of the Wind was second at the Masterprize International Music Competition in 1998, and her multi-media drama The Ground Beneath Her Feet was premiered at the Manchester International Festival in 2007. Her orchestral writing is confident and assured – drawing on a lineage that takes in such as Rimsky, Glière and Respighi in music which is never less than evocative or atmospheric, but lacks greater expressive focus so as to convey a more arresting personality.

An in memoriam to her teacher Nikolai Korndorf, The Kingdom of Silence duly proceeds as the ‘journey of a life’ from beatific stasis, through episodes of angst and decisiveness, and on to a serene if underwhelming catharsis. More distinctive is Before the Mountains Were Born, the third of this composer’s works to draw inspiration from the Psalms (here No. 94 – ‘Lord, you have been our dwelling place’) and whose supplicatory yearning informs a cadenza-like passage for the four principal woodwind prior to a decidedly unexpected close.

The nearest thing here to a showpiece, Open Ground picks up on American minimalist traits in its swift and unrelenting while highly eventful progress to a tellingly evanescent conclusion: a tale of reality and stability which could yet find favour with orchestras on both sides of the Atlantic.

Most expansive is Angelus, inspired by a visit to Munich and the sheer range of bell-sounds to be heard there – the result being a ‘morning to evening’ evolution where elements of chant and tintinnabulation are prominent within a texture of lingering and iridescent sonority such as enfolds the senses without engaging the intellect. Moreover, the accumulation of incident toward its centre lacks underlying emotional intensification, or the organ-capped climax any semblance of tension and release. More substantial is Creation of the Hymn – a sequence of variations, on an original theme of some trenchancy, originally written for string quartet and reworked for 15 strings. A range of stylistic associations is evoked, but the astute dovetailing of expressive contrasts and purposeful follow-through to a fervent ending holds the attention.

Does it all work?

Whatever else, this music is certainly good as regards first impressions. Dig deeper, however, and lack of substance in the actual ideas and way by which these generate the larger content is hard to deny – for all that the aural enticement of the orchestration cannot be gainsaid. Nor is there any lack of commitment from the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, guided by Messrs Boreyko, Brabbins and Oramo to performances of real virtuosity. Those who already have the earlier disc of Borisova-Ollas’s orchestral music on Phono Suecia will certainly want this too.

Is it recommended?

Yes, with reservations. Wide-ranging sound is on a par with BIS’s customary high standards, while the composer’s annotations are quirky but informative. Hopefully releases of Borisova-Ollas’s chamber and instrumental work will emerge to open-out the perspective on her music.

Listen & Buy

You can listen to clips from the recording and purchase, either in physical or digital form, at the BIS website

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Switched On – Manu Delago: Circadian Live (One Little Independent)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Releasing a live album in these times of isolation is a bittersweet experience. Manu Delago will know more than most, as he has played well over 1,000 gigs – but this is the one program he wanted to freeze frame and share with his home audience.

The music centres on the European tour of Delago’s Cicadian album in late 2019, where the 18 gigs in 21 days were performed by the nine-piece Cicadian Ensemble. This is a band long in the making but with a pleasing symmetry, three players each assigned to the areas of percussion, strings and wind instruments.

The aim of Cicadian Live is to show that while electronic music forms an important part of Delago’s thinking, his musical communication is equally strong – and arguably emotionally deeper – through acoustic performance.

What’s the music like?

Every bit as enchanting as we heard on Cicadian, but with the added frisson of the live music environment. To hear these tracks evolve in the moment is to be there in the cycle with Delago himself, hanging on the next move of each of his instrumentalists.

As tracks like Draem evolve, with their striking textures, the ear is drawn to each new melodic development, each percussive layer and each twang of the string bass. Delago’s enchanting sound world benefits greatly from the intimacy of these live recordings, and the instinctive chemistry between all the players involved.

The collection Immediately creates its own rarefied atmosphere with The Silent Flight Of The Owl, one of Cicadian’s standout moments, and does not let up until we are set down 70 minutes later with B.F.G.

In the middle there are intimate moments of rare beauty, where the listener dare not breathe lest the peace be broken, and these contrasts with powerful bursts of momentum such as Almost Thirty, where a series of crescendos break out into no-holds barred freak-outs, and Zeitgeber, a blend of virtuosity and concentrated feeling which is a testament to the fine musicianship of all involved.

The brassy rasps of Satori work well, building up a head of steam, and contrast nicely with the ripples of Circadian itself, stopping time to mesmerising effect. Down To The Summit, like Almost Thirty a fully scored piece from 2015’s Silver Kobalt, captivates with its twists and turns.

Does it all work?

Yes, because the instincts and musical understanding of the nine ensemble members is compelling the whole way through. This was clearly a special tour, and it serves to hear the new tracks from the Cicadian album rub shoulders with the more established Delago output.

Is it recommended?

Very much so. The live album works even better if you have heard the studio account of Cicadian first – but if not it serves as an excellent introduction to Delago’s craft. Each track sets its own unique atmosphere but captures the attention with intricacy, craft and spontaneity.

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