The two greatest inhibiting factors a cultural critic has to deal with are expectation and exaltation. The first only brings an easy review to fruition when it is failed, and the second is difficult to write without seeming unnecessarily extravagant with language. The truth is, I have a certain bias towards the Australian Chamber Orchestra, but it is not what you think. I don’t have any real personal connection to its members, nor to its repertoire. I am not a long lost cousin of Richard Tognetti and his limbic elasticity. In its entirety, my bias has been conceived by a personal reputation they have built with me by simply being stunning to watch and listen to. But there we find the problem. Expectation and Exaltation, in equal doses, waiting in the wings as it were. Common sense says to avoid both, but the nature of quality performance wills me to include them and so I must.
As I entered the Sydney Opera House, I had a thought which often struck me in the historical venue. It is hard not to expect something majestic in such a large, inviting space. Honestly, I have seen some average performances in the space, and some marvellous ones, but this history seems to elude me as I take in the space. Yes, something majestic must occur. But this again, is expectation. The reality of the situation causes me to believe that the Chamber Orchestra is better served by the Angel Place Recital Hall (where all Sydney dates, bar this one, were performed.) The Opera House, being as well known as it is, draws an ambling crowd who appear to cough, converse and drop heavy objects throughout concerts. In such a large space, with minimal application, a Chamber Orchestra would naturally find it hard to compete (without of course sacrificing the dynamic delight they have become so familiar with expressing.) Fortunately, Tognetti (a man far beyond ‘leader’ - his achilles outstretched like the beginnings of flight) has the capacity to draw focus, flaunting great musical prowess with his ensemble; the Australian Chamber Orchestra performs like a slowly swelling wave, swaying wistfully as if connected by an invisible line, leaving pretension behind for pure performance... Read more.
Showing posts with label golden flute. Show all posts
Showing posts with label golden flute. Show all posts
Wednesday, 4 November 2009
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
Flautist honours hall with golden performance
FLAUTIST Sharon Bezaly has commissioned several concertos for her own use, one of them featuring in her appearances for the latest round of Australian Chamber Orchestra subscription concerts.
To an impressively well-populated hall, Bezaly gave the Melbourne premiere of conductor-composer Jose Serebrier's Flute Concerto with Tango, which allowed the soloist to display breath control and rapid articulation. She also displayed her expertise in Carl Vine's Pipe Dreams. This Australian composition requires extensive stretches of legerdemain from the soloist, with lashings of rapid-fire passage work that impress with their virtuosity more than their actual content.
Like the Serebrier concerto, this work has an angular vocabulary, spiky in impact yet without confrontation.
ACO artistic director Richard Tognetti is celebrating 20 years as the ensemble's head. Concerts this year have featured works written for the occasion, but none as extensive as Peteris Vasks' Vox Amoris, a wearingly long fantasy that gives its principal exponent a worthy challenge in terms of powerful expression, especially in its two gripping cadenzas.
The Latvian composer's love voice is both passionate and consistent, not so much repetitious as lacking variety.
These three works written over the past six years were encased by readings of Handel's concerto grosso Op. 6 No. 7 - its final hornpipe performed with the ACO's refreshing brand of whiplash vigour - and Tchaikovsky's String Serenade, which has rarely sounded better, with some splendidly burnished phrasing to once again show the excellence of this richly talented ensemble.
To an impressively well-populated hall, Bezaly gave the Melbourne premiere of conductor-composer Jose Serebrier's Flute Concerto with Tango, which allowed the soloist to display breath control and rapid articulation. She also displayed her expertise in Carl Vine's Pipe Dreams. This Australian composition requires extensive stretches of legerdemain from the soloist, with lashings of rapid-fire passage work that impress with their virtuosity more than their actual content.
Like the Serebrier concerto, this work has an angular vocabulary, spiky in impact yet without confrontation.
ACO artistic director Richard Tognetti is celebrating 20 years as the ensemble's head. Concerts this year have featured works written for the occasion, but none as extensive as Peteris Vasks' Vox Amoris, a wearingly long fantasy that gives its principal exponent a worthy challenge in terms of powerful expression, especially in its two gripping cadenzas.
The Latvian composer's love voice is both passionate and consistent, not so much repetitious as lacking variety.
These three works written over the past six years were encased by readings of Handel's concerto grosso Op. 6 No. 7 - its final hornpipe performed with the ACO's refreshing brand of whiplash vigour - and Tchaikovsky's String Serenade, which has rarely sounded better, with some splendidly burnished phrasing to once again show the excellence of this richly talented ensemble.
Tuesday, 20 October 2009
Golden flute lights fuse for a flaming string serenade
Vox Amoris, a fantasy for violin and strings - commissioned by Barbara Blackman, dedicated to the memory of Dr Louis Green, written by the Latvian composer Peteris Vasks and given its world premiere on this tour by Richard Tognetti and the ACO - attempts to sustain a piece almost only by intense, expressive tonal melody.
The locus classicus for such a strategy is perhaps Beethoven's Cavatina from the String Quartet, Opus 130, although Beethoven permits himself a brief, highly fragmented intermediary section and, despite its impact, the piece is not long.
Vask's work also has a central section, marked off by two cadenzas building to a climax of emotional abandon, but the change of tone in this section seemed to intensify the previous mood rather than offer contrast. The first cadenzas seemed a bit self-lacerating and flailing.
It is a beautiful work, like a long cinematic nocturnal soliloquy, though I found it a bit too intense to stay the distance. Tognetti made an earnest appealing sound. It is a work that deserves repeat performances, perhaps with some attention to contrast of sonority.
In Carl Vine's Pipe Dreams and Jose Serebrier's Flute Concerto with Tango the flautist, Sharon Bezaly, was a soloist of brilliance, polished control and deft agility. Her sound has the soft glow characteristic of the golden flute she plays and she draws from it gentle richness and evenness.
Vine's concerto, which the ACO premiered in its 2003 season with Emmanuel Pahud, followed a familiar Vine mould: argumentative-fast, sentimentally slow, energetically physical. Though he has obviously based it on classical antecedents, Vine gives this his own personality by pushing the slow music a little towards mawkishness and the final music towards modern dance, both perhaps with a glint of affectionate irony.
Serebrier's work, receiving a world premiere on this tour, was dominated by rhythmic music and passage work designed for display, and played a little too much to the more obvious aspects of writing a virtuoso work. Handel's Concerto Grosso, Opus 6, No. 7, the concert opener, received slightly perfunctory treatment (perhaps understandably in a program of so much new music), but Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings at the close had all the ACO's characteristic voluptuous brilliance and colour.
Review by Peter McCallum in the Sydney Morning Herald
The locus classicus for such a strategy is perhaps Beethoven's Cavatina from the String Quartet, Opus 130, although Beethoven permits himself a brief, highly fragmented intermediary section and, despite its impact, the piece is not long.
Vask's work also has a central section, marked off by two cadenzas building to a climax of emotional abandon, but the change of tone in this section seemed to intensify the previous mood rather than offer contrast. The first cadenzas seemed a bit self-lacerating and flailing.
It is a beautiful work, like a long cinematic nocturnal soliloquy, though I found it a bit too intense to stay the distance. Tognetti made an earnest appealing sound. It is a work that deserves repeat performances, perhaps with some attention to contrast of sonority.
In Carl Vine's Pipe Dreams and Jose Serebrier's Flute Concerto with Tango the flautist, Sharon Bezaly, was a soloist of brilliance, polished control and deft agility. Her sound has the soft glow characteristic of the golden flute she plays and she draws from it gentle richness and evenness.
Vine's concerto, which the ACO premiered in its 2003 season with Emmanuel Pahud, followed a familiar Vine mould: argumentative-fast, sentimentally slow, energetically physical. Though he has obviously based it on classical antecedents, Vine gives this his own personality by pushing the slow music a little towards mawkishness and the final music towards modern dance, both perhaps with a glint of affectionate irony.
Serebrier's work, receiving a world premiere on this tour, was dominated by rhythmic music and passage work designed for display, and played a little too much to the more obvious aspects of writing a virtuoso work. Handel's Concerto Grosso, Opus 6, No. 7, the concert opener, received slightly perfunctory treatment (perhaps understandably in a program of so much new music), but Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings at the close had all the ACO's characteristic voluptuous brilliance and colour.
Review by Peter McCallum in the Sydney Morning Herald
Monday, 19 October 2009
Here's a pipe dream that comes true
ISRAELI flautist Sharon Bezaly's commitment to contemporary music is beyond doubt: she has commissioned or inspired almost 20concertos. For her tour with the Australian Chamber Orchestra she is performing Australian composer Carl Vine's Pipe Dreams (written for French flautist Emmanuel Pahud) and premiering a flute concerto by composer-conductor Jose Serebrier.
Both concertos allowed Bezaly to unleash her dazzling artistry. She executed rapid leaps and runs with breathtaking assurance while maintaining superb clarity of articulation. By contrast, she displayed smoothly sinuous phrasing in more reflective sections.
Bezaly's tone was even and full-bodied: warmly mellow in the lower register, piercingly clear at the top. Just as impressive was her astonishing breath control (Bezaly is an exponent of circular breathing) and subtle ornamental flourishes. Like Pahud, she is the complete artist on her chosen instrument.
The two works offered different perspectives on the concerto form. Although appealing and well-crafted, Serebrier's piece is little more than a vehicle for Bezaly's virtuosity. Vine's is a more integrated work: its haunting central passage provided a satisfying emotional counterweight to the scintillating brilliance of the outer sections.
Latvian composer Peteris Vasks's Vox amoris, written for Richard Tognetti and the ACO, was the other world premiere on the program. Conceived as a love story for solo violin and string orchestra, the piece eschews virtuosic display in favour of slow, steady speeds and soft dynamics.
With his rich, sostenuto tone, Tognetti was a highly expressive soloist. His violin sometimes soared freely above the accompaniment, elsewhere it was tightly woven into the orchestral texture. Vasks gives his curvaceous cantabile lines enough dynamic, textural and rhythmic contrast to create a compelling, well-proportioned work.
A polished account of Handel's Concerto Grosso, Op.6, No.7 was a pleasing, if unremarkable, opening to the proceedings. However, in Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings, Tognetti and the ACO again demonstrated their ability to invigorate repertoirestaples.
Right from the tense, taut opening, the players generated an atmosphere of urgency and drama that still respected the work's melodic impulses.
Their ensemble sound was lean and muscular in some places, warm in others. Textural clarity and nuanced dynamic shading revealed a multitude of inner-voice details. Occasional intonation problems and moments of loose ensemble did little to detract from this refreshing, exciting account of Tchaikovsky's masterpiece.
Review by Murray Black in The Australian
Both concertos allowed Bezaly to unleash her dazzling artistry. She executed rapid leaps and runs with breathtaking assurance while maintaining superb clarity of articulation. By contrast, she displayed smoothly sinuous phrasing in more reflective sections.
Bezaly's tone was even and full-bodied: warmly mellow in the lower register, piercingly clear at the top. Just as impressive was her astonishing breath control (Bezaly is an exponent of circular breathing) and subtle ornamental flourishes. Like Pahud, she is the complete artist on her chosen instrument.
The two works offered different perspectives on the concerto form. Although appealing and well-crafted, Serebrier's piece is little more than a vehicle for Bezaly's virtuosity. Vine's is a more integrated work: its haunting central passage provided a satisfying emotional counterweight to the scintillating brilliance of the outer sections.
Latvian composer Peteris Vasks's Vox amoris, written for Richard Tognetti and the ACO, was the other world premiere on the program. Conceived as a love story for solo violin and string orchestra, the piece eschews virtuosic display in favour of slow, steady speeds and soft dynamics.
With his rich, sostenuto tone, Tognetti was a highly expressive soloist. His violin sometimes soared freely above the accompaniment, elsewhere it was tightly woven into the orchestral texture. Vasks gives his curvaceous cantabile lines enough dynamic, textural and rhythmic contrast to create a compelling, well-proportioned work.
A polished account of Handel's Concerto Grosso, Op.6, No.7 was a pleasing, if unremarkable, opening to the proceedings. However, in Tchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings, Tognetti and the ACO again demonstrated their ability to invigorate repertoirestaples.
Right from the tense, taut opening, the players generated an atmosphere of urgency and drama that still respected the work's melodic impulses.
Their ensemble sound was lean and muscular in some places, warm in others. Textural clarity and nuanced dynamic shading revealed a multitude of inner-voice details. Occasional intonation problems and moments of loose ensemble did little to detract from this refreshing, exciting account of Tchaikovsky's masterpiece.
Review by Murray Black in The Australian
Golden moments with flute phenomenon
All that glitters truly is gold when Israeli flute sensation Sharon Bezaly launches into a concerto written for her by Uruguayan composer Jose Serebrier.
Bezaly, who lives in Sweden and has been dubbed the David Oistrakh of the flute, plays a 24-carat Japanese instrument which has a slightly mellower sound than the conventional silver model.
The 37-year-old former child prodigy showed her phenomenal technique - super-fast tonguing, circular breathing and faultless fingering - in the largely solo Cadenza before dazzling her Angel Place audience with an “inconclusive tango” and a harum-scarum presto finale.
Making her Australian debut, Bezaly first impressed her audience with an effortless performance of Carl Vine’s challenging work, Pipe Dreams, written in 2003 for the ACO and the Swiss Emmanuel Pahud, perhaps the only other contemporary flautist to rival the Israeli.
As well as her wonderful playing, Bezaly comes across as an engaging performer with no pretensions and a good line in humour. When she found herself blocking the audience’s view of violist Christopher Moore in his solo passage she skipped out of the way with a comical shrug to leader Richard Tognetti.
The other works on the program featured the orchestra, which was in particularly fine form for the warm-hearted romanticism of Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for strings.
Handel’s concert grosso Op 6 No.7 moved along at a measured but well-considered pace and the hornpipe finale put listeners in a good mood for the revelation of the evening, the latest new work to celebrate Tognetti’s 20-year tenure as the ACO’s artistic director.
Latvian composer Peteris Vasks is an artist who deals with the big issues: nature, the beauty of life, world survival and, biggest of all, love.
His fantasy for violin and string Vox amoris lasts for 10 minutes, but it seems longer - not because it drags but because it has so much to say in such a beautiful way.
Tognetti’s $10 million fiddle was heard to great effect in two dramatic cadenzas where the virtuosity lay in the dramatic double-stopping and unison passages rather than thrilling runs. Intonation was slightly off-kilter in a couple of places but this mattered little.
The solo’s Cantilena lovesong sang out over the string ensemble, starting with a whispery tremolo but gradually building in passion and drama before subsiding to a slightly melancholic, post-coital mood.
For me this was the most satisfying of the season’s Tognetti tributes, the Vine and Peter Sculthorpe’s pieces notwithstanding.
Hopefully the ACO will bundle them all up in one CD package to add to their already impressive body of recorded work.
Review by Steve Moffatt from Parramatta Advertiser
Bezaly, who lives in Sweden and has been dubbed the David Oistrakh of the flute, plays a 24-carat Japanese instrument which has a slightly mellower sound than the conventional silver model.
The 37-year-old former child prodigy showed her phenomenal technique - super-fast tonguing, circular breathing and faultless fingering - in the largely solo Cadenza before dazzling her Angel Place audience with an “inconclusive tango” and a harum-scarum presto finale.
Making her Australian debut, Bezaly first impressed her audience with an effortless performance of Carl Vine’s challenging work, Pipe Dreams, written in 2003 for the ACO and the Swiss Emmanuel Pahud, perhaps the only other contemporary flautist to rival the Israeli.
As well as her wonderful playing, Bezaly comes across as an engaging performer with no pretensions and a good line in humour. When she found herself blocking the audience’s view of violist Christopher Moore in his solo passage she skipped out of the way with a comical shrug to leader Richard Tognetti.
The other works on the program featured the orchestra, which was in particularly fine form for the warm-hearted romanticism of Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for strings.
Handel’s concert grosso Op 6 No.7 moved along at a measured but well-considered pace and the hornpipe finale put listeners in a good mood for the revelation of the evening, the latest new work to celebrate Tognetti’s 20-year tenure as the ACO’s artistic director.
Latvian composer Peteris Vasks is an artist who deals with the big issues: nature, the beauty of life, world survival and, biggest of all, love.
His fantasy for violin and string Vox amoris lasts for 10 minutes, but it seems longer - not because it drags but because it has so much to say in such a beautiful way.
Tognetti’s $10 million fiddle was heard to great effect in two dramatic cadenzas where the virtuosity lay in the dramatic double-stopping and unison passages rather than thrilling runs. Intonation was slightly off-kilter in a couple of places but this mattered little.
The solo’s Cantilena lovesong sang out over the string ensemble, starting with a whispery tremolo but gradually building in passion and drama before subsiding to a slightly melancholic, post-coital mood.
For me this was the most satisfying of the season’s Tognetti tributes, the Vine and Peter Sculthorpe’s pieces notwithstanding.
Hopefully the ACO will bundle them all up in one CD package to add to their already impressive body of recorded work.
Review by Steve Moffatt from Parramatta Advertiser
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