Tag Archives: Daniel Herscovitch

On Record – Kate Moore: Velvet (Heritage Records)

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Ole Böhn (violin) (Heather, Dies Irae, Way of the Dead); Minah Choe (cello) (Velvet), Daniel Herscovitch (piano) (all) with Benjamin Kopp (piano) (The Body is an Ear)

Kate Moore
Zomer (2006)
Velvet (2010)
The Body is an Ear (2011)
Heather (2013)
Dies Irae (2015)
Way of the Dead (2017)
Lucidity: Eyes of Hands (2018)

Heritage HTGCD137 [79’38’’]
Producers Kate Moore, Daniel Herscovitch Engineers David Kim-Boyle, David Kinney Recorded 3 March, 8 August and 9 October 2023 at Verbrugghen Hall, Conservatorium of Music, Sydney

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Heritage rings the changes on its schedule of welcome reissues with this release of music by Kate Moore (b1979), Australian composer born in the UK who currently resides in the Netherlands, all played by a notable roster of musicians based at Sydney Conservatorium.

What’s the music like?

As the booklet notes make plain, any tendency to Minimalism in Moore’s music is rendered from a distinctly maximalist perspective. Hence an inexorable build-up of tension in the two-piano version of The Body is an Ear (initially for organ and recast for two such instruments), with its inspiration in Sufist legend, or growing plangency of Dies Irae where violin intones elements of that plainchant against some ominously undulating harmonies on piano in what the composer has aptly described as a ‘‘spiritual meditation on forgiveness and redemption’’.

Arguably even more revealing of Moore’s aesthetic is the title-track. Velvet draws cello and piano into a sustained and increasingly intense dialogue whose ostensible depiction of cloth in Renaissance painting yields great textural and colouristic diversity, while building toward an impassioned culmination from which the coda is more affecting for its brevity and pathos. Hardly less absorbing, Way of the Dead takes a not dissimilar formal trajectory – this ‘danse macabre’, as inspired by a Mexican festival, fusing melodic eloquence from the violin with an implacable rhythmic accompaniment on piano such as comes to the fore in those seismic final bars. At the opposite end of the scale in all senses, Zomer takes extracts from a sermon by John Donne for this piano rumination with the simple and profound artlessly combined.

The duo for violin and piano Heather takes its cue from the composer’s Hebridean hike – the incidence of vegetation growing in patterns according to outlines of now-vanished buildings effecting a piece where instrumental coordination becomes ever more exacting, as the music’s emotional velocity gradually while also remorselessly accelerates towards another of Moore’s reticent and poignant apotheoses. Lucidity: Eyes of Hands draws on the legend of St Lucie, as related by Dante, for a solo piano work whose polyrhythmic intricacy is in constant evolution as the music unfolds – though, on this occasion, there is no crystallizing of tension at the end; rather, the accrued impetus spills over into a forceful and even unnerving peroration to leave no doubt as to Moore’s identity with the narrative that made possible this piece’s conception.

Does it all work?

Yes, given that Moore’s is an arresting and appealing idiom, one whose outward consistency is countered by its variety of technical procedures along with its underlying expressive range. It certainly benefits from the advocacy of these musicians, their dedication and commitment coming across at every turn, while the clarity of recording emphasizes its visceral immediacy. Informative notes from the composer and Daniel Herscovitch. Those listening via download have an additional item – a Prelude for piano, whose limpid poise makes for a welcome tonic.

Is it recommended?

Indeed, and hopefully those who have acquired this Heritage project will investigate further releases of Moore’s music – the volume of piano pieces Dances and Canons (ECM) and the collection of vocal items Stories for Ocean Shells (Canteloupe) proving no less worthwhile.

Listen & Buy

You can hear excerpts and look at purchase options on the Presto website. For more information on Kate Moore head to her website – and for more on the artists click on the names Daniel Herscovitch, Ole Böhn, Minah Choe and Benjamin Kopp.

Published post no.2,128 – Monday 25 March 2024

On record – Roger Smalley: Piano, Vocal and Chamber Music (Toccata Classics)

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Taryn Fiebig (soprano), Darryl Poulsen (horn), James Cuddeford (violin), Daniel Herscovitch (piano), Scott Davie (piano), Roger Smalley (tam-tams)

Roger Smalley
Albumblatt (1990) Nine Lives (2008)
Capriccio no.1 (1966)
Barcarolle (1986)
Morceau de Concours (2008)
Piano Pieces I-V (1962-5)
Three Studies in Black and White (2002-4)
Lament for the Victims of Natural Disasters (2005)

Toccata Classics TOCC0501 [72’21”]

Producer & Engineer David Kim-Boyle

Recorded 2005, University of Western Australia, Perth (Three Studies in Black and White), 13 February, 28-29 March 2019, University of Sydney Conservatorium of Music

Written by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Toccata Classics releases this welcome overview of music by Roger Smalley (1943-2015), whose extensive output followed an eventful and unpredictable trajectory from unabashed modernism to post-classicism demonstrably informed and enhanced by a performer’s insight.

What’s the music like?

As varied as this selection might suggest. Earliest here is Piano Pieces I-V, tersely distinctive miniatures whose conspectus of radical tendencies from Schoenberg to Stockhausen is allied to a pianism at once resourceful and pragmatic. An aesthetic heightened in Capriccio no.1, whose often confrontational interplay between violin and piano owes much to Schoenberg’s late Phantasy while not precluding a more personal approach such as Smalley’s subsequent involvement with Stockhausen transmuted into a more progressive but less emotive manner.

By the time of Barcarolle, Smalley had moved away from modernist traits towards an idiom permeated by while never beholden to the Romantic era. Chopin’s famous example may not be evident here, but the ominous undulation of Fauré’s earlier such pieces is unmistakable; as is Liszt in the scintillating dexterity of Morceau de Concours, a test-piece to reckon with not just in terms of its technique. Most impressive, however, is Three Studies in Black and White, a trilogy likely inspired by Alkan’s Op. 76 Études – with the opening Gamelan a visceral yet ultimately eloquent exploration for left hand; by contrast, Moto perpetuo is an edgy and often volatile workout for right hand, then Dialogue reunites both hands in music at once resolute and consoling. Few, if any, piano pieces of such substance have been composed this century.

Which is not to underestimate the effectiveness of Nine Lives. Subtitled A Song-Cycle about Cats, these settings of feline evocation range as widely as that of the authors featured. Of the three extended items – that by Oscar Wilde is stealthy and secretive, that by Christina Rosetti a memorial of deadpan insouciance, while that by Oliver Herford is a luminous and affecting envoi. Framing the programme are a brief Albumblatt later subsumed into the Piano Trio, and Lament for the Victims of Natural Disasters where horn eulogizes against resonant tam-tams.

Does it all work?

Yes. Smalley’s academic career at University of Western Australia at Perth connected him to many significant musicians, several of whom are present here. Taryn Fiebig brings a wealth of nuance to the songs and is ably accompanied by Scott Davis, while James Cuddeford and Darryl Poulsen make salient contributions. Greatest credit, though, to Daniel Herscovitch for piano playing as not only makes light of the considerable technical demands but conveys the unity within diversity of Smalley’s musical language throughout four decades of evolution.

Is it recommended?

Indeed. The Smalley discography is not inconsiderable, and readers should investigate such major works as Accord (Continuum) or Pulses (NMC); while Poles Apart (NMC) focusses on more recent pieces.

A plea, too, for the reissue of the Symphony and First Piano Concerto (Vox Australis), two of his defining works. That said, this latest release makes as inclusive an overview as has been issued. The sound is unexceptionally fine, and booklet notes unfailingly insightful, but for the track-listing the Barcarolle and Morceau have added 10 minutes each.

Listen and Buy

You can listen to clips and purchase this disc from the Toccata Classics website