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WORLD MUSIC REVIEW
Kotos, Shakuhachi, Shamisen Vy At A "Summit"
January 14, 2001
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By Heuwell Tircuit
The always adventurous chamber series of Old First Church have adorned the Bay Area for an honorable 31 years. Their chance-taking regularly presents forays into neglected regions, including artistic stands of a high order, including some programs devoted to world music and (more recently) jazz as well as traditional and modern music.
While the Oakland Raiders were struggling to a final seasonal loss, Old First Concerts hosted the premiere outing of the new Bay Area Japanese Music Summit. The mixed concert of instrumentalists included koto and shakuhachi specialists, shamisen players plus guest additions of a guitarist, percussionist and string bassist for the final fusion piece— Next Time, by Shirley Muramoto and Ben Paderna. Their program offered works for assorted combinations, some notable solos and an opening Rokudan for the full ensemble.
Unfortunately, the program promised more than it could deliver. Although this was a worthy and serious effort, only two of the performers struck me as worthy of the term "master," which was attached to all the names on the pre-concert announcements. After all, "master" implies complete mastery of the instrument as well as the style of the music at hand.
The finest performances were those by the unaccompanied soloists, particularly Philip Gelb's virtuosic work on shakuhachi — the Japanese bamboo flute, played in recorder position. Gelb's performance of the soulful Flutter Bye, Butterfly was indeed that of a master. So too with Shoko Hikage's koto playing. Everything was perfectly in place during Hikage's exemplary performance of the modern Dokoku (1969) by Tadao Sawai. The piece features a number of distinctly modern harp techniques. Nothing seemed to shake Hikage's control as he soared through this riveting and often startling piece, or indeed through the bulk of his contributions to traditional ensemble work. Indeed, Gelb and Hikage could stand with pride beside the best of Japanese performers without hesitation. Sterling! On the other hand, ensemble performances were generally too cavalier about rhythm and ensemble. Clearly, the members all know how to play. But too often, they were merely playing at the same time--not together. Rhythmic imprecision in even some of the duos and trios proved bothersome much of the time. I suspect the problem centered around the fact that these performers are predominately of Japanese-American and European-American ancestry — hence too "democratic" in attitudes. Fine ensemble playing requires a leader, a demanding central boss figure. It's a matter of listening more carefully to one another. That seemed lacking in this Japanese Music Summit. True Japanese style can be difficult to grasp--even for Japanese. There are instances, for example, when the music will require a distinction between a tense silence and a silence of repose. (In European musical tradition, a silence is a silence and that's that.) This is a matter of mental concentration more than anything else. If that seems odd, consider the importance of a good follow-through by a golf or baseball swing after the ball has flown. There's your tense silence, albeit of action rather then sound.
Then too, within the general placid texture of traditional Japanese music, extremely subtle inflections of timbre, dynamics and phrasing are nearly constant. One can not get by with merely playing the notes in the correct order. Gelb and Hikaga presented such subtlety in full measure. But the remainder of the performers were usually literal. What emerged then were readings rather than full performances. The group needed a more polished feeling for the intricate suavity of Japanese poetics. The audience was, as mentioned, large and appreciative — as they should have been. It's a beginning, but the Music Summit stands in need of a firm whip-cracker to demand the more intricate little niceties before being congratulated as a collection of masters. The basic concept is sound. Some may remember how half-baked the Philhamonia Baroque's performances were in their early days, before the appointment of Nicolas McGegan as director. Only after that did the orchestra bloom into the marvelous success it has become. There's a wonderful Japanese word, kimochi. It does not quite have an equivalent in English. "Soul," "texture," "sense of communication," and "feeling" come close without quite conveying the full meaning. Kimochi has to do with the total essence of a thing. Many European musicians have, for instance, mastered the kimochi of jazz performance. But if you've ever squirmed through a Russian rock band's attempt, you've experienced what lack of kimochi does to a performance. It's the little things of life which defeat us all. (Heuwell Tircuit, chief writer for Gramophone Japan and former music reviewer, SF Chronicle, previously was a percussionist and reviewer in Japan for eight years.) ©2001 Heuwell Tircuit, all rights reserved |