Monday night’s concert at the odd sanctuary of San Francisco’s St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church by the chorus Volti, under the direction of Bob Geary, offered an intriguing evening of new choral works. The first half of the concert was largely given over to a performance from conductor Geary’s Piedmont Children's Choirs. The blend and ability to sing difficult music of this 40-voice mixed boys and girls ensemble was, as always, quite impressive.
The core of the first half consisted of two works by Australian composer Elliott Gyger (b. 1968), now on the faculty at Harvard. Gyger’s craftsmanship showed in his colorful work for children’s chorus,
Fire in the Heavens. Most notable was the use of sibilants (sustained
s and
z consonants) to weave a constant evocation of fire and wind through the piece. Gyger, it should be noted, is not primarily a choral composer; consequently, I found his grasp of the idiom quite impressive.
More of note was a premiere by Gyger,
Dancing in the Wind, for combined children’s and adult choir made possible through a joint Volti and Piedmont Choirs commission. Such a commission presents unique compositional challenges, and Gyger largely rose to the occasion.
Dancing separates the two choirs much like draftsman’s transparencies — the children sing one thing, and the adults, another. Through this, the two layers are supposed to interact and comment on each other. Ultimately, Gyger’s work, although enjoyable, ended up a bit too texturally thick. It was a good piece in concept, but faulty in execution.
The children’s choir also offered two lush folk-song arrangements by 17-year-old Piedmont Choirs alumnus Eric Tuan. Such a remarkable opportunity should provide invaluable experience to this young musician.
A Range of Commissions
The somewhat thinned audience (presumably, some of the children's parents returned to the East Bay for the school night), were presented with an enjoyable performance of two movements from a work titled
The Essence of Gravity by composer Robert Paterson (b. 1970). This cute but sophisticated work deserves publication, and it should prove popular with other ensembles. Volti commissioned the piece in 2005, and this performance struck me as more secure than the premiere. The repeated performance is an encouraging development because too many worthy new works disappear after their first airing.
The real news of the evening was the premiere of Bay Area composer Kurt Rohde’s
Endless. I have encountered several of Rohde’s works for chamber ensembles over the years, but this was Rohde’s first attempt at writing for an unaccompanied chamber chorus. The result was the most challenging piece of the evening — a dense series of short vignettes perhaps deserving repeated hearing.
Rohde’s tonal language certainly stood apart as the most forward and sophisticated of the evening, and it reached its apex in the prismatic opening and closing movements. My initial impression is that Rohde could benefit from more practice with the choral idiom. In addition to some awkward voicing, the overall work struck me as having too many ideas in too short a piece. This was a shame because many were quite good.
Volti concluded the concert with
Ccolllanan Maria, a 2004 work by UC Davis composer Gabriela Frank (b. 1972). I think Frank’s piece would sound exceptional with a 40-voice collegiate ensemble. She offered the most “choral” work of the evening, albeit with a lousy ending. After some structured and idiomatic writing, featuring a series of impressive fortes by Volti, Frank sticks on a dated aleatoric element followed by spoken text, and plop, the piece ends. I always find such tired choral devices to be forced and unnecessary, and this was no exception.
Although Volti might be more accurately described as a semiprofessional than professional chorus (the singers are paid an honorarium), and as semiprofessional performers, the chorus sounded quite good. Oddly enough, however, small imperfections in tone quality and intonation tended to show through in more traditional tonal passages. Still, I know of no other noncollegiate ensemble in the Bay Area, and perhaps California, willing to engage an audience in such a program.