San Francisco Classical Voice

Two successful pieces out of six make a good evening of modern chamber music. On the second concert of its season last Tuesday, these two pieces stood out above the four others, so well-written and clearly emotional that they struck an immediate approving response from the audience

Both works circled about the subject of death, but not exclusively. A string trio entitled "Joyous Light of the World," by Paul Barsom, was so moving that I wanted to hear it repeated. The title comes from a line in Friedrich Rückert's Kindertotenlieder, the set of poems that Mahler set in his song cycle. It refers to the death of a child: "A small lamp has gone out in my dwelling, hail to the joyous light of the world!" The trio was dedicated to friends of Barsom's who had recently suffered the death of their daughter.

The music was intensely personal; a mournful dirge of four slow notes opened the piece and gripped one's attention with its sincerity and power. Over this pedal figure rose the dark sound of the viola with a deeply sad melody. The emotion was simple, grief-stricken and, as it developed, most passionate. The musicians drew the material to a powerful climax, then suddenly stopped in evocative silence, before singing the poignant return of the four-note motive. It was direct and beautiful. The wonderful performers were Anne Pressler, violin, Anna Kruger, viola, and Leighton Fong, cello.

The other work giving pleasure was the concluding piece, the winner of the Lee Ettelson Composer's Award. This too, was a trio, but for piano, violin and cello, composed by Pierre Jalbert. Its emotional content was more colorful than the Barsom work's, combining the affirmative and joyous "Life Cycle" and the movement entitled "Agnus Dei," which was treated in a dour manner and celebrated a religious darkness. (Jalbert told the audience that he considered the first of the two movements as secular.) This piece belonged to the traditional world of the 20th century past, and was so old-fashioned in its compositional devices that one could consider it in the mainstream of Bartok and Stravinsky.

It is easy to understand why Jalbert's trio won its prize; it was attractive, and it had a dramatic profile. The first movement had exciting syncopations, piano trills underlying a lively plucking from the strings. The pianist frequently reached into the piano to to damp its strings and strike violent bass tones, while the cello doubled these struck notes, nowadays a conventional sound device, but one which succeeded marvelously in this environment. The second movement began with strings bending tones in long-held pitches, sounds invoking grief. Gradually the music swelled into passionate declarations; climactic moments were outlined by clear major chords stressed by the piano. The trio was easy to listen to, a quality not to be taken for granted in an evening of contemporary music. Much of the impressiveness of the work was due to expert work by the musicians, Suzanne Leon, violin, Jean-Michel Fonteneau, cello, and Aglika Angelova, piano.

The four other works on the program, while attractive in some respects, were not as successful because they seemed distant, removed. Delightful moments in the three solo works were only moments, the pieces not holding attention for very long. Opening the program was Momentum for piano by Daniel Kellogg (played deftly by Matthew Laurence Edwards), a tour-de-force for the keyboard of rapid, incessant chattering. It began with clanging chords, rapidly sweeping up and down in a world of rather friendly dissonances. Unfortunately, there was little repose; all the melodic shapes sounded similar as they tumbled about, sometimes in a muddy fashion as the music grew breathless. With too many climaxes, the overall shape of the piece was lost.

Recollection, for violin, by Jeffrey Miller, was more impressive, as Philip Santos eloquently phrased its slow and simple music. After the flashy "Momentum," it cooled the air. Though written to be played in a violin competition, it stressed interpretive problems rather than showy technical ones. To its detriment, however, it was so contemplative that it lacked tension, its elegiac tone eventually becoming uninteresting.

Later in the program, Eric Achen performed Three Pieces for French Horn by Thomas E. Barker. This was the virtuoso piece of the evening, and Achen did wonders with it. The three movements, Lauda, Apotheosis and La Chasse, presented some programmatic elements, particularly the last "hunt" piece, but the musical imagination was weak and didn't convince.

The least memorable work seemed the longest, Whispers, by Sebastian Currier, for flute, cello, percussion (mostly vibraphone) and piano. The title suggested a musical identity, displayed in the opening by feathery, quicksilver gestures. There were good things in it, perhaps too many good things. For all the sprightly rhythms, effective pedal notes, and constant counterpoint, it was so busy that the listener's attention strayed. The musicians performed nobly, but spent their time keeping all the strands together, so that whatever emotive level rests in the piece did not come across.

The musicians were first-rate, and performance levels were excellent. Most interesting about this concert was its display of creative American talent. Composers Inc. this evening made an effort to introduce new writers to the Bay Area. On this program only one of the six, Jeffrey Miller, lives here. Such exposure of American composers from faraway places is a tradition worthy to be maintained.

(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, also has edited two volumes of Rossini for the Fondazione Rossini, and is soon to embark on a third.)

©1999 Marvin Tartak, all rights reserved