San Francisco Classical Voice

October 20 , 1998

Melissa Hui

Elinor Armer

Marina Torres

Going to a concert of Composers Inc., like those of its peers, Earplay and the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players is like a visit to buddies in an extended living room, even though this time was special. Tuesday, Composers inc. was celebrating its 15th anniversary with a gala Concert, excellent music, beautifully performed, pleasantly acceptable, cosy contemporary for all its friends.

The Green Room of the War Memorial Building is no concert hall; everybody is too close, watching the endless parade of instrumental setups for each piece, the long marches of musicians through crowded seats to the center. But it's intimate, and that's what is sought after. Casual is the name of the game. Musical styles are varied but always welcome and eager to please; program notes are abundant and very user-friendly. This time was no exception -- eight pieces and nothing too daring, nothing far out, nothing to scare the innocent or stimulate violent reaction. You couldn't not like it; it's mainstream.

The first piece, "Thaw" by Eleanor Armer, was the oldest of the evening, an early work of this talented composer from 1974. Lois Brandwynne deftly pulled out the color stops on the Baldwin, manipulating the pedal to create shadings in the chord clusters, spreading glissandos across the keys for impressionistic effect. The title refers, according to the program notes, to a picture of wintry nature, "icy, crystalline, or melting images...organized...along the lines of a spring thaw moving gradually from frozen-ness to turbulence, and finally to evaporation". The end is articulated by repeated notes vanishing into the upper registers of the piano, a very difficult effect to accomplish considering the clunker of a piano with which the room is cursed.

While the first piece evaporated, the second work, "Blurts" by Herbert Bielawa exploded. The composer at the piano gave forth with wild, virtuoso sounds; flute and clarinet (almost always in rhythmic tandem) sustained another level, more sedate and tonal at the beginning, more violent as the piece moved on. In this very attractive work the titles of three short movements, "Piano Polemic", "Wild Winds", and "Ensemble Encyclical" suggested changing levels of motoric activity. Contributing to the general mood of accommodation, the composer wrote in the program: "If one likes tonal music, then listen for it. If one likes atonal music, then listen for it ...here is something for everybody!"

Melissa Hue's "Lacrymosa" was perhaps the most appealing work. She has set a fragment of the Catholic Requiem, sung by the talented soprano Marina Lucia Torres. Touches of George Crumb (singing into the piano while the pianist holds the pedal or plucks a note, evocative slow chords in the piano and clarinet) contributed a note of nostalgia - memories of past masterpieces. Still, Miss Hui carried it off; her piece left the audience in a haunting afterglow; Ms Torres did some accomplished high-note singing while the clarinet played softly, slowly. (One liked this one a lot.)

Robert Greenberg contributed a piece for solo trombone, "Behavioral Science," which seemed more impressive in the programmatic design than in the musical effect. The whimsical titles - "Misbehavior/Out of Control/Vulgar Behavior/...Whining and Whimpering..."etc., etc., ending with "Putting it All Together" suggested an extended joke ("to civilize the eternal adolescent") and the virtuoso Neil Hatler won a wild round of applause for his efforts. But the piece promised more than it delivered, sagging in the middle and too long. One was left with sound effects and a rather brash attitude which had its comic touches.

After intermission Glenn Glasow's "Quodlibet" was performed, a short (less than 3 minutes long) homage to Webern for five instrumentalists and soprano. This was dense counterpoint, tiny fragments of lines piling up into a thick melange of ideas. Torres joined in singing in Japanese, not as soloist but as part of the texture with the instruments to produce a satisfying color combination. Brevity was ideal; the piece was performed for a second time and it went better.

"A fistful of broken light.." by Thomas Goss, suggested harshness, but gave (the audience) sublime peace. Mr. Goss contributed a brief poem in the program to explain himself ("Sing through me the prayer of the girl With sunset in her hair And a fistful of broken light"). The wonderful Onyx Quartet, joined by Linda Ghidossi-DeLuca playing the viola, wooed its listeners with hymn-like textures, mildly dissonant chords that brought to mind Beethoven had he lived a bit longer, or Brahms in a somber slow-movement mood. It was slow, homophonic and breathed a lot; short phrases seem to float in half-sleep through empty rooms with the windows wide open. The effect was moving and totally convincing.

The last two works on the program could not match this work in inspiration; their ambition lay elsewhere. In David Sheinfeld's "Threnody" the solo violinist Frederick Lifsitz aptly and eloquently performed a more abstract work. Intensity and concentration were the goals, a dialogue of two lines in confrontation, short and to the point. "Exaudi" by Frank La Rocca extolled fragments of the Biblical Psalms for a capella chorus. It had lovely sounds, was soft and tonal, but occasionally recalled Stravinsky's "Symphony of Psalms". Perhaps it was a parody of that work, which begins its first movement choral entrance with the same obsession of two notes. The chorus, well conducted by David Stein, worked valiantly (occasionally slipping in intonation) to sing the prayers of King David. Like much of the program the music was in a conservative style, heart-felt and attractive.

Composers Inc does not go out on a limb. It doesn't have to; it has nothing to prove. It plays itself; some of these composers are members of the board. This anniversary concert seemed a summing up of a certain segment of modern music, intriguing and appealing, but more than anything else, copacetic.

(Marvin Tartak, a pianist noted for contemporary music, teaches a course in Opera at City College of San Francisco. He has written program notes for the San Francisco Symphony and Opera, has also has edited two volumes of Rossini for the Fondazione Rossini, and is soon to embark on a third.)

©1998 Marvin Tartak, all rights reserved