Among the five pieces on Earplay's lively and stimulating concert last Monday in the Veterans' Building Green Room, Quatuor VI by the French/American composer Betsy Jolas was particularly captivating and original. Its ongoing dialogue between string trio and clarinet createda piquant chain of constantly evolving moods and textures. Violin, viola, and cello were frequently clustered together, forming a backdrop against which the clarinet pursued its elegant, free-ranging acrobatics. Sometimes the four instruments acted together in a spirited give and take, usually starting with a figure tossed out by the clarinet in the course of its mercurial wanderings. There were also separate episodes for the string trio, with single instruments thrusting out in accented relief to form intense focal points of sound. Near the end of the piece, a sudden climax of rising octaves for all four players led to the quiet, hesitant conclusion of a few last notes softly traded between clarinet and strings.

The final piece, Ross Bauer's Motion (1998) for piano trio, was on a completely different stylistic track. Romantic and impassioned where Quatuor VI had been provocative, mysterious, and playfully coloristic, Bauer's trio in three seamlessly-connected movements was propelled by long sinuous melodic lines, frequently played in octaves by violin and cello. Much of the writing added a harmonic underpinning that gave weight and urgency to the expansive, upwardly-tending melodies. This was a subjective, instinctual kind of music that seemed to proceed from moment to moment, often without a clear sense of direction, despite its strong overall unity. There were striking episodes — one with interlacing string harmonics and another for solo piano come to mind — but the whole ultimately was less satisfying than many of its individual parts.

Three interesting pieces made up the program's first half, two of them duets. The brief opening work, David Rakowski's Two Can Play That Game, was given its premiere by bass clarinetist Peter Josheff, for whom it was composed, and marimbist Jessica Van Oostrum. In this engaging piece the instruments were closely partnered, often in the same register, sharing some rhythmically-tricky motivic material before gradually moving into separate territory and then merging once more. In a similar vein, Paul Siskind's Duo Bagatelles paired bass clarinetist Josheff with cellist Thalia Moore. Again the instruments were treated as close relatives, blending and separating as if from a single source. But this piece had considerable variety of color and texture over the scope of its five fairly short movements.

Perplexing Sorrow by Yu Hui Chang, commissioned by Earplay and receiving its first performance by flutist Tod Brody, violist Ellen Ruth Rose, and pianist Marja Mutru, was permeated by strongly-opposing moods. Episodes built on short, intense outbursts gave way to bleakly-subdued passages of low emotive density, reflecting a duality of feeling that arose from the composer's reactions to the World Trade Center disaster on September 11, 2001. This aptly-titled work portrayed the shock and conflicts of emotion that such an event can bring about, as well as suggesting the underlying yin and yang of antithetical forces at large in the world.

The concert was preceded by a silent tribute to Alexander Post, a valued member of the Bay Area's musical community, who died last month after a prolonged illness. He was an organist and composer who taught for many years at San Francisco State University, and was also a faithful supporter and former board member of Earplay, cited by composer Richard Festinger for his compassion, humor, and wisdom.

Earplay's last two concerts, usually held at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, have been presented in the Green Room because of an unexplained policy decision by the directors of Yerba Buena levying an increased cost on the use of their facilities by Earplay. Let us hope that next season Earplay will be able to return to Yerba Buena, a better venue for their music, with clearer, more-balanced acoustics and less sound from sirens, noisy traffic, and life in general as it impinges on the Green Room from Van Ness Avenue.

(Jules Langert is a composer and teacher who resides in the East Bay.)

©2002 Jules Langert, all rights reserved