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CHAMBER MUSIC REVIEW
March 6, 2004
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By Jules Langert
The Oakland Chamber Ensemble is a welcome and exciting new musical presence in the East Bay. Its inaugural concert at Mills College attracted a fairly sizable audience to an ambitious and rather unusual program, starting with Janácek's brilliantly original and rarely performed Capriccio for piano (left hand) and winds, that was commissioned by a pianist who had lost his right arm in the First World War.
This four-movement work backs the piano soloist with a septet of flute, two trumpets, three trombones, and tuba. In an otherwise tentative performance, pianist Hadley McCarroll persuasively brought out Janaček's moody, episodic lyricism, whose arching lines suddenly break off or are interrupted by jagged rhythmic fragments. Elsewhere, brief, forceful motivic patterns echo and reecho between brass and piano. The flute has a uniquely melodic role, with ornamentally flowing lines that were beautifully realized in this performance by Laurie Camphouse. First trumpet Scott Miller's forthright, assured playing was also essential in bringing this complex piece to life.
Copland's suite from the ballet Appalachian Spring followed, in its original scoring for nine strings plus flute, clarinet, bassoon, and piano. Copland's extraordinary ability at combining music of the utmost simplicity with a highly individual and sophisticated musical craftsmanship may have received its fullest realization in this piece. Hearing it in the original chamber setting allows the work's touching intimacy and fragile innocence to cast a spell that is lost in the later orchestral version. This performance was effective if somewhat constrained. Conductor Bryan Nies was skillful and musical in his direction, but insufficiently dynamic. Heightened contrast, accents, more-vividly articulated lines, and greater rhythmic urgency would have given the piece (probably under-rehearsed) a much more strongly expressive profile.
After intermission, Dvorák's Serenade for Winds provided a striking timbral contrast to Janácek's brassy Capriccio and Copland's mellifluous string writing. Here oboes, clarinets, horns, and bassoons played dark, richly hued melodies and harmonies in the open, hearty, folkish manner of Dvoràk's earlier style. With none of the twentieth century's self-consciousness about form and manner, this piece held the audience with its charm, directness, and unmistakable originality. The final work was Stravinsky's Concerto for Piano and Winds (1924, revised 1950). Twenty-five brass and woodwind players wandered uncertainly on stage while their seats and stands were put in place, an ongoing logistical problem during the concert. The piano soloist was again the ubiquitous McCarroll, who had also played in the Copland piece and, in addition, wrote most of the evening's program notes! This three-movement concerto is a maniacally surreal extravaganza, where pseudo-Baroque keyboard passages suddenly lurch into stuttering syncopations or find themselves overwhelmed by intrusive riffs from the wind ensemble. The slow movement begins with a long-breathed arioso interrupted by a wild parody of circus music and, later, by a hysterical would-be cadenza that goes nowhere. The unpredictable clash of styles and textures requires some rapid shifts of tempo and dynamics, the soloist needing fingers of steel to compete with all those other instruments. The conductor has constantly to adjust the tonal balance so that the right things come out on top. Placing the piano front and center on the stage gave it prominence, and pianist McCarroll was superbly in control of all the rhythmic and textural components, but her pianism lacked that fiery, percussive edge needed to drive the music along. Even so, the performance was lively and exhilarating, like everything else on this fascinating, engrossing program. There are so many good and talented musicians in this group that, with a few more performances and a closer, more dynamic connection between conductor Nies and the players, the Oakland Chamber Ensemble will be on its way.
(Jules Langert is a composer and teacher who resides in the East Bay.)
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