San Francisco Classical Voice

To come away with a feeling of spiritual hunger after participating at a feast of meaty violin music performed by none other than Midori is to set one thinking about the road being traveled by today's young artists.

At a San Francisco Performances concert given at Davies Hall Monday by Midori, a violinist of extraordinary ability, accompanied by the superior pianist Robert McDonald, one could only marvel at the command she and her partner have over their instruments. That said, I can just report with sorrow that hearing these two instrumentalists in a diverse program containing Mozart's A Major sonata, K. 526, Corigliano's 1963 sonata, Brahms' G Major sonata, Op. 78, Stravinsky's Pastorale, and the Ravel "Tzigane," I soon became aware of listening to these two artists as if peering into the large end of a telescope and seeing the small view of the music at the opposite end.

The sense of style, differentiating the feeling and periods of the music, was completely lost. Time after time, Midori used the same musical or a-musical cliches to make a point. The music started and stopped, sputtered and back-fired, with no sense of the path to be traversed.

Some technical matters must be mentioned here concerning Midori's abilities as a violinist: she can play as fast and as cleanly as anyone on the stage today, but her sound is hampered by a vibrato that is too tight in amplitude, which contributes to a restricted tonal palette. Her posture, too, is harmful to her projection. As an artist who has been shaped by the television age, she turns and twists her body theatrically, causing the violin's tone to be projected into the piano, away from her audience, and rendering many of the lower tones inaudible in the house.

The Mozart suffered from preciousness--no beautiful singing tone despite the fact that the sonata was written about the same time as "Don Giovanni." However, Midori and McDonald handled the difficulties of the Corigliano perfectly. It is an effective piece that explores the violin technique beautifully,

After intermission, Brahms, the great symphonist, was treated to a total dimunition of his majestic powers. Time and again the thematic material was treated to a miniaturization process that seems to pre-occupy Midori.

The Ravel "Tzigane" also missed the boat, musically speaking. Apart from the brilliance of the playing, there was too much vulgarity in the opening solo section, the famous page of music written for only the G string, The following pages also contained much musical backing and filling. People living in a musical democracy must be disciplined and aware of parameters or frames around music. The goal, albeit a difficult one, is to know how much freedom can be taken, so that the music becomes an entity or totality and not a series of miniature vignettes. The concert ended with two encores--"Melodie" by Tchaikovsky, and "Syncopation" by Fritz Kreisler-- demanded by a large and enthusiastic audience.

(Stuart Canin, former Concertmaster of the San Francisco Symphony and of Hollywood film orchestras, is Music Director of the New Century Chamber Orchestra.)

©1998 Stuart Canin, all rights reserved