Following intermission, the program made an about-face into lighter fare. The trio opened with Stevan Kovacs Tickmayer’s Three Variations on a Theme of J.S. Bach (2005), then followed it with Pushkarev jazz parodies of Bach’s two-part Inventions: Invention in C Major (in the Mood of Bill Evans), Invention in D Minor (in the Mood of Oscar Peterson), and Invention in B Major (in the Mood of Dave Brubeck). The formal program then broke with the evening’s theme to offer four compositions by Astor Piazzolla: Le Grand Tango (1982), arranged for violin and piano. Finally, all three musicians joined in for Milonga Loca, Milonga del Ángel, and Milonga de la Anunciación. As encores, the three played a rather fugal Piazzolla tango, then a repeat of the Bach canon that opened the concert.

In a sense, Kremer was doing something new by returning to an old programming concept. In my student days, a recital usually offered a sonata or two to open and then a lot of smaller, brilliant works, plus some popular pieces as encores. That format is a great antidote to the all-sonata program, which I believe is what has hurt the current state of the recital business. (While I like roast turkey as well as the next person, I don’t fancy eating a whole one at a single sitting.)

That said, the most memorable event of the concert was Kremer’s death-defying performance of the Bartók Sonata. It was dazzling. The four movements are obviously influenced by Bach’s unaccompanied sonatas and partitas for violin: a chaconne, a fugue, a beautifully lyrical aria, and a rather frantic gigue in perpetual motion style — all sauced with a bit of modern goulash. To say the music requires virtuosity is to put it mildly, but that didn’t seem to faze Kremer. His pinpoint accuracy was jaw dropping, as was his sensibility to style. When poetry was required in the slow movement, he got the instrument to nearly purr. But when the music needed harshness, as in the violently raw fugue, Kremer dug in for some percussive playing, perhaps sacrificing his image to better achieve the composer’s intentions.

Whereas the Trio Sonata and the two ricercare in Bach’s Musical Offering are instrument specific, only one of the eight canons specifies instruments — the second, for two violins. So it doesn’t really matter what the other seven are played on. All are laid out as puzzles, leaving it up to the beholder to figure them out. The theme had been given to Bach on the spot by Frederick the Great to test the composer’s improvisation powers. Bach later organized a collection of pieces on the theme, partly to impress the king in the hopes of receiving a better work post. But alas, Bach could not have turned off Frederick more than by offering up these obtuse Baroque musical games. The king was only interested in the then-new, lighter Rococo style of composers like Telemann and Bach’s sons.

Both piano transcriptions of the choral preludes were dispatched glowingly under Zlabys’s fingers, neither one doing damage to the originals other than the shift in instrumental color. Pushkarev’s vibraphone playing was expert, and especially brilliant in terms of color control. I can’t say that I’ve heard better playing on that instrument, although his jazz transcriptions from the inventions struck me as overly obvious and less stylish than you’d expect. The Brubeck piece, for instance, shifted into a meter of five (after the famous Take Five Brubeck hit), leaving Bach behind in the haze. They were well played, but that was all.

Astor Piazzolla’s Grand Tango was originally written for cello and piano — Rostropovich, to be exact. Sofia Gubaidulina arranged it for violin and piano, to handsome effect. It’s a large fantasy, serious in mood and dashing whatever its guise. All three milonga pieces originated in Piazzolla’s film scores. (The milonga is another Argentinean dance rhythm, somewhat related to the tango, only less emphatic in accents.) The “Crazy” one was actually the most dissonant of the three presented, the angelic one all plaintive melancholy, and the third including a brief Bachian quote (I can’t tell whether it was in the original or merely an insert from arranger Pushkarev).

As the concert ended, the audience gave an ovation far beyond the usual perfunctory standing ovation. Let’s face it, those are too often like by-the-numbers paintings. Yet by taking chances in breaking with the usual concert form for trios, Kremer and his friends had provided an exceptionally fun time for us all.

(Heuwell Tircuit is a composer, performer, and writer who was chief writer for Gramophone Japan and for 21 years a music reviewer for the San Francisco Chronicle. He wrote previously for Chicago's American and the Asahi Evening News.)

©2006 Heuwell Tircuit, all rights reserved