San Francisco Classical Voice

Whereas music for percussion soloists and ensembles was long a standard part of many cultures — notably in Asia and Africa — European music was exceedingly slow to react to the concept. As far as I know, the first example occurred in Alexander Tcherepnin's 1927 First Symphony, the scherzo of which is for the unaccompanied percussion section. Then the dam broke and out flooded some of the finest percussion music to date, notably the Fifth and Sixth “Ritmica” of Cuban composer and violin virtuoso Amadeo Roldan of 1930, quickly followed by Varèse's masterful Ionisation in 1931. Those set the bar so high that they have yet to be topped.

Of Sunday's music, I was most impressed by Singleton's Greed Machine, which pianist McCollough and vibraphonist Warner used to open the afternoon. Original in vocabulary, the piece offered a clear sense of form and balance, mostly using sustained resonance from struck chords, with injections of flashy filigree dashes, largely from the vibraphone. Best of all, Singleton avoided the ostinato trap, where some basic rhythm is repeated over and over, as though the composer were running in place, waiting for an idea to come over the horizon. Greed Machine is a terrific piece, and it was superbly played.

On the other hand, Singleton's Argoru VII, for solo vibraphone, struck me as crude. Benkeser managed effortlessly, but the music was pushy and loud too much of the time. Part of the problem lay in essentially drab materials. Like so much current pop music, it sacrifices substance to the gods of volume who, excuse me, are all false.

Largest work of the program turned out to be Shapiro's At the Abyss, an expression of her concerns for the deterioration of civilization on all sides. Its three movements were titled “Observe,” “Reflect” and “Act.” As performed by Warner, Benkeser and McCollough, the most interesting turned out to be the second slow movement in nocturnal style. Shapiro worked for some time in Hollywood composing TV and film music. That seems to have infiltrated her recent work, which sounds too derivative. The ghost of Bartók was far too obvious, as were hints of Frank Martin's style.

Griffin's two pieces each suffered ostinato clogs, although he never slipped over the edge of the cliff into Minimalism. Visitations for solo percussionist Warner is certainly a test piece for melodic percussion. Warner had a vibraphone on her left, a grand marimba on her right, and two suspended racks of crotales (antique cymbals) behind the vibraphone. Apart from the technical demands of playing all the notes, Warner was presented a visual problem, considering she was half surrounded as she played on her extreme left and right at the same time. The visual effect was a bit eerie.

In the notes Griffin says he was influenced by Salsa music in New York and Mexico. “Salsa” is a kind of catch-all word for anything these days which sounds even vaguely Latin American. Ultimately, it means something like hodge-podge. I fear Griffin took no more than a gringo stab at it in his Cambiando, the poorest music of the afternoon.

To lighten the whole, there were the more charm-oriented pieces of Reynolds and Harrison. Each was in its way based on fairly simple folksy materials. Reynold's Play for piano and marimba 4-hand made no effort at grand dramatics or reinventing the wheel. The title was well suited, as the performers seemed to play around with simple tunes. It came along as a welcomed intermezzo relief from the intensities surrounding it.

Harrison's Concerto finale is one of those short outbursts of mildly naughty joy at which he excelled with such mastery. What one heard was a giddy toccata at moderately-fast tempo. In texture, the movement is casually related to Gamelan music — again, a Harrison speciality. The piano and percussion danced merrily away, as the two trombonists occasionally injected a bit of legato canonic seriousness. It made one thirst for a bit more such music.

For those who don't know, Old First Church produces many excellent recitals and concerts twice weekly on Friday evenings and Sunday afternoons. Often unusual works are presented by top local or visiting artists at an extremely modest price. One would be well advised to look into the possibilities of pleasure there.