On record – Peter Dickinson: Lockdown Blues (Somm Recordings)

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Barber (arr. Dickinson) Canzonetta Op. 48 (1977-8)*
Berkeley Andante Op.23/6 (1945)
Cage In a Landscape (1948)
Dickinson Blue Rose (1978); Freda’s Blues (2016); Lockdown Blues (2020)
Ellington (arr. Dickinson) Twelve Melodies (1932-43)*
Gershwin Three-Quarter Blues (c1925); Who Cares? (1931)
Goossens Lament for a Departed Doll Op.18/10 (1917)
Lambert Elegiac Blues (1927)
MacDowell To a Wild Rose Op.51/1 (1896)
Poulenc Pastourelle IFP69 (1927); Bal fantôme IFP64/4 (c1934)
Satie Trois Gymnopédies IES26 (1888); Trois Gnossiennes IES24 Nos.1-3 (1889-90)

Peter Dickinson (piano)

SOMM Recordings SOMMCD0644 [68’24”]

Producer & Engineer Peter Newble

Recorded 16 and 17 April 2021 at Potton Hall, Westleton, Suffolk. * indicates first recordings

Written by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Peter Dickinson here turns the third phase of lockdown to his – and our – advantage with this collection of piano music touching on the blues and jazz which have long been a mainstay of his careers as performer and composer, and which also includes two notable first recordings.

What’s the music like?

The programme commences with the pensive sadness of Dickinson’s Freda’s Blues, written in memory of the widow of Lennox Berkeley, continuing with a poised and refreshingly non-mawkish take on MacDowell’s perennial To a Wild Rose – its blues and rag idioms made the basis of Dickinson’s Blue Rose. The empathetic feel of Lambert’s Elegiac Blues in memory of singer Florence Mills is affectingly caught, while Dickinson’s marrying of blues and Bach in Lockdown Blues recalls George Shearing’s pioneering such fusions. After the drollery of Poulenc’s Bal fantôme, Dickinson’s reworking of the Canzonetta which Barber intended for his unrealized Oboe Concerto proves a focal-point in its searching pathos. Such a quality is also to the fore in Berkeley’s limpid Andante, as is the alluring charm of Gershwin’s Three-Quarter Blues – and to which the whimsy of Poulenc’s Pastourelle provides a pertinent foil.

Whether as solo pianist or in recital with his sister Meriel, Dickinson has been unstinting in his advocacy of Satie and his reading of the original Gnossiennes (not those three published decades after the composer’s death) lacks for nothing in perception. Such is equally the case when, after the insinuating charm of Gershwin’s Who Cares? then the wistful eloquence of Goossens’s Lament for a Departed Doll, he renders Satie’s evergreen Gymnopédies with an objectivity that not unreasonably plays down the mystical aura often attributed to this music.

Perhaps the highlight here is Twelve Melodies that Dickinson has arranged from Ellington’s big-band numbers in what proved a veritable ‘golden age’ for such music and not previously recorded in this guise. Picking out a selection might hardly seem necessary, but the yearning of Solitude, eloquence of Lost in Meditation, questing emotions of Azure then the expressive warmth of Mood Indigo stand out in a sequence which concludes with the phlegmatic charm of Day-Dream then haunting atmosphere of Prelude to a Kiss. Moreover, Dickinson has one final trick up his sleeve with an elegant rendering of Cage’s In a Landscape – music in which this most recalcitrant of composers comes closest to his beloved Satie with its ineffable grace.

Does it all work?

Very much so, thanks not merely to the range of music covered but also through Dickinson’s insight. Into his 87th year when these recordings were made, his technique remains as fluent as his understanding and enjoyment are audible. Long able to accommodate the populist and the experimental within his own music, such inclusiveness extends to the idiomatic aspect of his interpretation and the deftness of his touch. Surely nothing can now prevent the Ellington set being taken up by pianists everywhere, with the numerous shorter pieces ideal as encores.

Is it recommended?

Indeed. The piano sound has a naturalness and clarity ideal for this music, while few writers other than Dickinson would be equally aware of technical details and chart standings. Here is looking forward to further releases by this always resourceful pianist in his ‘Indian summer’.

Listen & Buy

You can discover more about this release and listen to clips at the SOMM Recordings website, where you can also purchase the recording. For more information on Peter Dickinson, click here.

On Record – Erland Cooper & Shards: Egilsay EP (Mercury KX)

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What’s the story?

It has been an extremely productive and musically enriching year for Erland Cooper. This four-track EP is his second collaboration with Shards, the vocal ensemble with whom he worked on a festive release last year. Once again it has a visual accompaniment, with regular collaborator Alex Kozobolis.

What’s the music like?

Beautiful. Once again we are transported to Orkney, but each time we go we either learn something new about the place or are placed in a different context. Egilsay is one of the small isles to the north of the archipelago, and the compositions here are intended as meditations on shifting time and light. The song titles are Orcadian words associated with these phenomena.

This is immediately evident in the swooping vocal lines of Glimro and Lisbealad. The deeply moving first track shows how well Cooper writes for voices nearer the extremes of their range, with an angular line beautifully sung. The second has an even wider range, with soprano soaring and a bass down low, feeling the elemental qualities of the Orkney coastline. Tullimentan has a timeless quality, like an old Mediaeval incantation set against the steadily falling rain and flowing water. It is very emotive.

There is a second take on Glimro, reclothing the song and including a John Keats poem to mark the poet’s bicentenary. Its sotto voce words are read to the accompaniment of string arrangements from Uèle Lamore and Kathryn Joseph that put the piece in a new light, looking back to the previous EP Never Pass Into Nothingness.

Does it all work?

Yes. Once again this is music transporting its listener far away from their environment and directly into the place it reflects. Egilsay has a harsh, striking beauty that feels fully reflected in these concentrated portraits.

Is it recommended?

Absolutely, as another compelling chapter in Erland Cooper’s musical evolution. The voices make for an even more complete human experience.

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Let’s Dance – Dennis Cruz: Roots (Crosstown Rebels)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

This is the first album from established Spanish producer and DJ Dennis Cruz, who is ready to put his own spin on house music through a ten-track long player. He does this with a succession of guest artists, topped by an appearance from the late Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, but also including P. Rivas, Ian Luvig, Josh Butler, Iuliano Mambo and Leo Wood.

What’s the music like?

The propulsive rhythms of La Ratonera start the album, a signal of intent with their persuasive shimmying. The nine-minute track has plenty of room to grow, with sultry flute work and the sound of a party in the distance. This cuts to Los Tamales, an instrumental with a lovely swing to its rhythm and old-time piano riff. Later another instrumental, Bend, plays some games with a trumpet and voice imitating each other over a bouncy beat.

Ian Luvig then steps up to provide the stripped back vocal for Good Old Days, a minimal affair with quite a stark texture but a mission to hit the dancefloor hard. The same could be said for Ecua, with some flamenco flavoured brilliance added to the mix, spliced and diced by Cruz’s skilful production. The temperature stays heated for What U Doing, with Leo Wood’s sultry vocals dressing a heat hazed bed of keyboards.

Go Down will be of great interest to fans of the late Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, who fronts a busy rhythm track. This is a night piece that cuts up his voice inventively, delivering a fluid groove to go with it. It is countered nicely by the raucous trumpets of Ahora Toda Va (Dub), where Josh Butler whips up the crowd.

Te Quiero Cantar takes us back towards the pool, a really nice Mediterranean flavoured instrumental, before Back Again hooks up with Iuliano Mambo for a woozy, sun soaked jam with a big bass sound.

Does it all work?

It does. There is nothing staid or square about Dennis Cruz’s take on house music – the rhythms sway and sashay their way around the dancefloor as he applies plenty of flavour to the mix, keen to show off his Spanish heritage to the max. The vocal guests are the icing on the cake.

Is it recommended?

For sure. Cruz brings warmth to the winter with a set of grooves that prove pretty much irresistible.

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In concert – Hockley Social Club & the CBSO present: Symphonic Sessions 2 – Ooh la la

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2021.12.02 - Hockley Social Club Symphonic Sessions - cr. Hannah Fathers-5185

Symphonic Sessions 2 – Ooh la la

Emer/Piaf J’m’en fous pas mal (1946)
Milhaud Suite Op.157b – Jeu (1936)
Lili Boulanger Nocturne, ILB10 No. 2 (1911)
Satie Gymnopédie No. 1, IES26 No. 1 (1888)
Gould Benny’s Gig – VI, Calypso; VII, Jaunty (1962)
Khachaturian Clarinet Trio in G minor – Allegro (1932)
Louiguy/Piaf La vie en rose (1947)

Gilles Les trois cloches (1940)
Tiersen Amélie – Comptine d’un autre été (2001)
Debussy Première rhapsodie, ICD73 (1909-10)
Gershwin Shall We Dance – Walking the Dog (1937)
Stravinsky L’Histoire du soldat, Suite – Tango, Valse, Ragtime; Danse du diable (1919)
Tormé/Wells The Christmas Song (1945)
Glanzberg/Contet Padam, padam… (1951)

Gabrielle Ducomble (singer), Oliver Janes (clarinet), Colette Overdijk (violin), Julian Atkinson (double bass), James Keefe (piano)

Hockley Social Club, Birmingham
Thursday 2 December 2021

Written by Richard Whitehouse Photos courtesy of Hannah Fathers

It might not have featured the eponymous song from John Cale, but this ‘Ooh la la’ certainly had more than its share of surprises in among the entertainment. The artistic and commercial success of the first Symphonic Sessions event held back in October meant that its successor, once again co-presented by Hockley Social Club (a beacon of light in the dreary surrounding of Newtown) and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, would not be long in coming. Soon enough for this to have taken on anticipations of Christmas in its overall aura, and with a cabaret element provided by Belgian chanteuse Gabrielle Ducomble, whose cover-versions of Édith Piaf have previously (and rightly) attracted widespread plaudits. The stage, or raised platform towards the centre of the venue, was ready for another varied and enjoyable evening.

The first set duly got off to a striking start with Michel Emer’s J’m’en fous pas mal, Gabrielle Ducomble bringing out the world-weariness of lyrics which Piaf all too easily made her own; and to which Jeu, third movement of Milhaud’s Suite for clarinet, violin and piano, provided a vivacious foil. The evocative poise of Lili Boulanger’s Nocturne was elegantly conveyed by Colette Overdijk, then James Keefe drew surprising nuances from electric piano for the first of Satie’s Gymnopédies. Oliver Janes and Julian Atkinson enjoyed putting two numbers from Morton Gould’s suite Benny’s Gig through their paces, the central scherzo of Khachaturian’s Clarinet Trio most engaging with its alternate vigour and suavity. Ducomble’s take on Louis Guglielmi’s La vie en rose, Piaf’s signature-song, brought this set to a warmly eloquent close.

After a ‘dessert interlude’, the second set found Ducomble leaving her mark on Jean Villard Gilles’s Les trois cloches (a Piaf song introduced to a new generation by Tina Arena), before the ‘Theme’ from Yann Tiersen’s music for the film Amélie injected an appealing whimsy. A sure highlight was Janes’s rendering of Debussy’s Première rhapsodie, sensuous and poetic by turns, then perfectly complemented by the coy jauntiness of Gershwin’s Walking the Dog (aka Promenade). Four dance pieces from the suite for violin, clarinet and piano arranged by Stravinsky from L’Histoire du soldat received an incisive response, then Ducomble offered a soulful take on Mel Tormé’s evergreen The Christmas Song. The faux affirmation of Norbert Glanzberg’s Padam, Padam… saw this Piaf-centred programme to its gently fatalistic ending.

Probably the only thing not really evident over the course of this evening was the ‘‘specially dressed bohemian finery of a rather festive feeling Hockley Social Club’’ as was detailed on the promotional flyer, but no matter. The reaction from a capacity house was never less than enthusiastic – doubtless abetted by the variety of food and drink (including another designer cocktail) available, with DJ sets from Pritt Kalsi which enhanced the ambience between the live music-making. Incidentally, those who enjoyed Gabrielle Ducomble’s singing can hear her in residence at London’s Brasserie Zédel in the final week of December, and Symphonic Sessions will be back in action sometime next spring – now established as an attraction well beyond the confines of B19 and likely to remain so throughout 2022, and hopefully beyond.

symphonic-sessions-2

Further information on Symphonic Sesions can be found here. For more information on Gabrielle Ducomble click here, and head to the Brasserie Zédel website for details on her residence there.

In concert – Ning Feng, CBSO / John Wilson: Rachmaninoff Symphony no.3, Glazunov Violin Concerto & Gershwin’s symphonic Porgy & Bess

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Gershwin (arr. Bennett) Porgy and Bess: A Symphonic Picture (1942)
Glazunov Violin Concerto in A minor Op.82 (1904)
Rachmaninoff Symphony no.3 in A minor Op.44 (1935-6)

Ning Feng (violin), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / John Wilson

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Wednesday 1 December 2021 (2.15pm)

Written by Richard Whitehouse. Photo of Ning Feng (c) Felix Broede

John Wilson may have been taken by surprise when asked to introduce this afternoon concert from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, but there was nothing left to chance as to the performances in what proved to be a judiciously planned and finely realized programme.

Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess is now well-established as an opera as much as a musical (hybrid or otherwise), not least through Wilson’s advocacy at English National Opera’s staging three seasons ago, but there is still a place for the ‘Symphonic Picture’ as posthumously realized by Robert Russell Bennett. The pre-eminent arranger and orchestrator from Broadway’s ‘golden age’, Bennett may have regarded Gershwin’s masterpiece as essentially a sequence of classy showtunes, but the finesse with which these were fashioned into a cumulative overview of the drama cannot be gainsaid. Wilson drew sumptuous playing from the CBSO in an arrangement by no means dismissive of Gershwin’s orchestration. Perhaps another time he could schedule the far more arresting Catfish Row suite, but so fine a reading of the Bennett was no hardship.

If Glazunov refused Gershwin’s request for tuition, he surely realized no amount of technique could compensate for – in the former’s case – limited or erratic inspiration. Not that his Violin Concerto is an unalloyed masterpiece, but its expressive elegance allied to a formal ingenuity have deservedly kept it in the repertoire and Ning Feng (above) audibly believed in every bar. Maybe the presentation of its main themes in the brief opening section was a little too matter-of-fact, but the central ‘slow movement’ then ensuing development and scherzo were rendered with the right deftness and incisiveness; nor did a relatively lengthy cadenza hang fire on the way to a ‘finale’ that ensured a scintillating close. A sympathetic accompanist, Wilson judged the orchestra’s contribution to a nicety, with some especially felicitous playing from woodwind.

It was Glazunov’s disastrous conducting that had sunk Rachmaninoff’s First Symphony but, four decades later, the Third Symphony finds the latter near the height of his creative powers – its pithy melodic content harnessed to an orchestral astringency that underlines the exiled composer’s confrontation with though not embracing of the musical present. Right from its haunting ‘motto’, through its contrasted themes (with exposition repeat) then a development that culminates in graphic anguish, Wilson had the measure of this masterly first movement.

What ensued was almost as fine, not least the seamlessness with which the slow movement’s scherzo emerged out of then back into the main Adagio – the playing off the acerbic against the bittersweet its own justification. If the finale felt a little too sectional in overall unfolding, there was no lack of characterization – not least the strings’ superb articulation in the central fugato as this headed towards the reprise, though a more continuous acceleration might have imbued the coda with even greater conclusiveness in what is a QED of unequivocal defiance.

Even so, this was a confident and, for the most part, insightful performance of a work whose true emotions are barely concealed beneath the enticing surface. The CBSO, which gave its all, will be back at Symphony Hall next Thursday in a major new work from Jonathan Dove.

For more information on the CBSO’s autumn season visit the orchestra’s website. For more on the artists, click here for John Wilson and here for Ning Feng