San Francisco Classical Voice

Bang on a Can's performance of Music in Fifths was notable. They took the piece at a remarkable speed, such that the groupings of individual ascending melodic patterns took on their own rhythmic pulse. Added to this, the amplification and mixing of the instruments (which proved a major pitfall for much of the rest of the concert) created a blur of sound which helped to transform the piece into a staggering stuttering roar.

Glass joined the ensemble for "Music in Similar Motion." The players went for a more nuanced interpretation of this work with some surprising fluctuations of dynamics and mood. This contrast helped to differentiate it from "Music in Fifths" and also seemed to mark a shift in approach to Glass' earlier music. In the original recordings that Glass' ensemble made of these pieces, the instrumentation is very unified (almost exclusively synthesizers) and the volume, phrasing, and tempo are all rigid — representing the monolithic image of minimalism. This new interpretation seems to mark a shift toward the more traditionally "musical" or "pretty," in line with Glass' compositional movement away from more conceptually-driven works. Unfortunately these variations also added to the difficulty of the work. In their softer moments, the performers' uncertainties became more exposed and some rhythmic and counting errors began to crop up.

The second half of the concert opened with Glass performing “3 Etudes” from his growing set of Etudes for Solo Piano. Plagued by bad amplification and some crackling speakers, Glass' piano playing would have been better served in a more intimate space. The pieces have the quality of chamber music — nice pieces played in good spirit from friend to friend. Glass is an interesting case of the composer/performer. I often hear people comment that composers' performance of their own work is unsurpassable. The implicit idea that music is necessarily the communication of the composer's soul to the audience seems old- fashioned, though Glass seems to be an advocate both for and against this sentiment. On the one hand, he isn't the most technically proficient or clean pianist. His rubato and phrasing seem driven more by ability than by artistic choice. The most technically clean portions of his playing are also the most "expressionless" — the cold motoric patternings reminiscent of his early process works. This being said, there is something very touching and human about his performances. The grit of his technique perhaps gives the music an edge that a pristine performance would not. Personality takes precedence over purity. And Glass has certainly mastered the personality game.

Similarly, Bang on a Can as an institution has done well in creating an image as a cutting-edge populist new-music ensemble. The first half of the concert highlighted the music of three of their central figures: Julia Wolfe, Michael Gordon, and Evan Ziporyn. Each of the composers' works plays into a similar style: moody, rhythmically layered, and constructed with an intuitive sense of energy. Formally the pieces fall into the trap of single-mindedness: large textural crescendos from beginning to end or else stasis. Julia Wolfe's Big, Beautiful, Dark and Scary emphasized the former, with tremolo swells expanding outward in a dissonant and raucous soundscape. Michael Gordon's Light is Calling explored the latter, as a mood piece with ostinato bass lines and smeared upper voices.

The centerpiece of this half was a set of instrumentals from Evan Ziporyn's ShadowBang, a work that in its full version combines the Bang on a Can All-Stars with Balinese shadow puppet master I Wayan Wija. In many ways a survey of post-minimalism techniques, the work integrates overlapping out-of-sync ostinati, expanding melodic lines, and an overriding concern for texture. The performance was remarkably fluid, with a sense of ease and control given to the rhythmic language, and balanced the seemingly disparate aesthetics of rock band and contemporary chamber ensemble.