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BALLET – Onegin

 

 

W.A.Ballet Company

His Majesty’s Theatre, Perth

reviewed by Alice Woode

 

Mood-wise, this production of Onegin near-perfectly captures the autumnal essence of Pushkin’s immortal tale of love and despair.

 

In visual terms, its muted, finely balanced colours in both lighting, costumes and decor evoke bittersweet nuances of a tale of love spurned and lost, disappointment and violent death.

 

Jayne Smeulders is an altogether convincing Tatiana. In the famous letter scene, she could hardly be faulted, beautifully conveying the tragic heroine’s infatuation with Onegin and her devastation when she realises he does not return her affections. Melissa Boniface, too, is entirely persuasive as Tatiana’s sister Olga.

Jayne Smeulders and Jiri Jelinek RES

Jayne Smeulders and Jiri Jelinek
Photo Credit – Jon Green

Lavish bouquets for the manner in which technical skill and expressiveness blend to often moving effect in all the pas de deux in which Smeulders and Boniface are partnered by Jiri Jelinek in the title role and Dane Holland as Lensky;  these were the gems of the production, with finely honed technique and a world of disciplined emotion.

It was only in the duel scene where inspiration seemed to flag; it lacked the intensity and high drama that were needed.

 

One of the many delights of the production is the quality of the corps de ballet. With disciplined fluidity of movement and first rate ensemble, the corps’ dancing is like a silver thread through the production. The charm-laden ball scene in which both young and decrepit give comic point and meaning to the dance is in the best sense of the word diverting. Whether light-hearted or sombre, the corps come up trumps again and again. Carole Hill does wonders as Tatiana’s often hilariously fussy nursemaid.

 

Although the dancing is to the music of Tchaikowsky, one of the greatest of all composers for the ballet, none of it, of course, is purpose-written for the dance. Happily, though, nearly all of it fits seamlessly into the late John Cranko’s superlative choreography. A good many episodes are danced to orchestrations of some of the composer’s short pieces for piano: the haunting Autumn and the quiet rapture of the Barcarolle (both from The Seasons) – and the exquisite Nocturne from opus 19. Again and again, one is able to savour how cleverly Cranko’s choreography blends both movement and music to beguiling effect.

 

Imaginative lighting, too, does much to underscore the autumnal nature of the piece, an impression further enhanced by the use of Elizabeth Dalton’s wing scenery depicting, inter alia, a leafy forest that brings a charming, rather faded, mid-19th-century perspective to the production. Dalton also designed the costumes worn with great flair by the company.

 

At times, one wished for rather more uniform tonal sheen from the string section of the WASO.

Recital

 

 

Taryn Fiebig (soprano)

Mark Coughlan (piano)

Hale Auditorium

reviewed by Neville Cohn

 

If William Walton’s song cycle A Song for the Lord Mayor’s Table had been the only work on the program presented by Taryn Fiebig and Mark Coughlan, it would have been an altogether satisfying evening.

 

Had the shade of the composer hovered over proceedings at Hale Auditorium, it would surely have nodded approval at the performance of his song cycle.

 

From first note to last, this was a reading to savour with its complete identification with the score by  both musicians. The words were sung with a very real understanding of style – and the piano part could hardly have been bettered. It was a model of its kind.

 

Walton’s cycle is fiendishly difficult to bring off in both physical and interpretative terms – but on both counts the two musicians came through with banners flying. It was offered with splendid flair, the high point of the recital, not least for the exhilaration that informed so much of the more extravert songs in the cycle.

  Photo Credit: Steven Godbee

 

 

Also on the program were a bracket of lieder by Schubert as well as Samuel Barber’s Knoxville Summer of 1915. The latter was less persuasive due primarily to some less than clear diction. It lacked the fine focus that made the Walton cycle so satisfying. And of the Schubert bracket, it was Die Manner sind mechant (in which a young woman complains to her mother about her boyfriend’s roving eye) that came across best; it was a miniature delight.

 

Unintentionally, Taryn Fiebig has joined the ranks of that small group of artists who perform bare feet. Like the extraordinary flamenco dancer La Chunga and Rumanian violinist extraordinaire Patricia Kopachinskaja, Fiebig came on stage sans footwear which, she explained, was the unwanted outcome of playing with her pet dog. This resulted in a fall and broken toes which precluded the use of footwear.

Nuages

 

Panayiotis Demopoulos (piano)

Diversions ddv24142

TTP: 58:00

reviewed by Neville Cohn

Nuagesphoto
 

Liszt: Nuages gris; La lugubre gondola 1; Unstern; Vallee d’Obermann

Beethoven: Piano Sonata No 30 in E, opus 109

Demopoulos: Terakyts for solo piano

 nuages

Photo Credit: P.Demopoulos/Divine Art

 

 

I have long ago lost count of the number of performances – both live and recorded – I have listened to of Beethoven’s Sonata in E, opus 109. Many of them have been presentations of sterling worth, not least the recording Dame Myra Hess, late in life, put down on  HMV 78rpm discs. Even though she was by then past her prime, the chief joy of that long-ago performance was the poetic quality that suffused so much of the recording.

 

Panayiotis Demopoulos’ account calls that of Dame Myra to mind; its first movement, too, often has a poetic, extemporaneous quality that lifts it into a high category of excellence. With notes clothed in golden tone, dramatic outbursts and lyrical contemplation are finely contrasted. Certainly, the sensitivity with which Demopoulos employs rubato here is exemplary. And the toughly assertive manner and unflagging momentum that informs the prestissimo movement comes across impressively.

 

In the first of the variations which comprise the finale, Demopoulos maintains a sense of onward momentum at very slow speed; it’s a remarkable feat of musicianship. In Variation 2, staccato notes, like winking lights, call pointillism to mind. Nimble, sure fingers make light of the difficulties posed by Variation 3. Calmly reflective playing in Variation 4 gives way to impeccable contrapuntal, bright-toned playing. And extended, finely spun trills radiate calmness in Variation 6; it’s a tour de force.

 

Much of the opening movement of opus 109 has a dreamlike, extemporaneous quality and that is even more apparent in much of a bracket of four too-seldom-heard works by Liszt. Because none of these could be thought of as crowd-pleasers as, say, some of the Hungarian Rhapsodies or etudes are, they are seldom aired. More’s the pity because they enshrine some of the composer’s most memorable musical thoughts.

 

Beautifully controlled tremolo emphasises the bodeful, rather sinister quality of Nuages gris (Grey Clouds) – and the melancholy essence of La lugubre gondola 1 is masterfully evoked. Eerily, a month after Liszt wrote this funeral piece, Richard Wagner (with whom Liszt was staying at the time in Venice) died and was borne from his last home on just such a vessel. Here, too, Demopoulos shapes to the stylistic and physical demands of the music like wine to a goblet. This is equally apparent in  Unstern (Evil Star) in which insistent, imperious, stark utterances call Liszt’s much better known Funerailles to mind. Demopoulos clearly identifies with the piano music of Liszt – and no more so than in Vallee d’Obermann. Here, too, Demopoulos plays as if to the manner born, evoking the introspective, desolate, forsaken essence of the music. It is a tour de force.

 

In Taraktys, we hear Demopoulos as both composer and pianist in the four variations that comprise the work, the first dramatically dense-textured, with darting arabesques and simulation of a tolling bell, the second heavy-toned with massive blocks of tone hurling from the speakers. Variation three is softly dissonant and introspective, the fourth and final variation encompassing delicate arabesques


CONCERT0 PARADISO

                                         

 Presented by Festival Baroque Australia

                                                Perth Town Hall

  reviewed by Stuart Hille                                              

Soloists: Sara Macliver (soprano), Catherine Jones (cello), Leanne Sullivan (baroque trumpet).

 

Sara Macliver

Sara Macliver

With:  Julia Fredersdorff (violin), Giulia Panzeri (violin), Katherine Corecig (viola), Sophie Walker (cello), Tommie Andersson (theorbo), Stewart Smith (continuo).

 

 

photo credit-  Frances Andrijch

 

 

To preface this critique of the Concerto Paradiso I’d like to draw upon an anecdote of an occasion during which I presented a pre-performance talk to one of the ABC’s ‘Mostly Mozart’ concerts.  I wished to stress to the audience, Mozart’s uniqueness by comparing his Symphony no.38 (‘Prague’) to an orchestral suite by one of his contemporaries: Carl Ditters von Dittersdorf, both of which we had heard in the previous concert.  The suite was a benign, orderly affair and displayed the utmost in practicality or workmanship.  It certainly wasn’t remarkable.  Dittersdorf’s was a fashion-conscious, hermetically sealed world.  A few seconds later, the ‘Prague’ began and immediately, as I recounted to the audience, the heavens suddenly opened and rays of genius pierced the mediocrity.

I mention this occasion for two reasons.  The first of these relates to the fact that nearly all the items on the Concerto Paradiso program were, it their own ways, equivalents of Dittersdorf’s orchestral suite: innocuous, verging on a trifle dull but always very functional.  Each composer had clear command of figured bass and contrapunctus – all a composer really needed in the era of the baroque.  But there was one work – a Handel aria from ‘Alcina’ – that, like Mozart’s ‘Prague’ symphony, transported the listener to an entirely different world.  It’s akin, I imagine, to casting a spell: we lean forward because we strain to catch every musical strand, we watch carefully in order not to miss a gesture, and our listening suddenly becomes far more acute and sensitive.  And we then realise that the baroque period, like the classical, was hugely populated by functional and capable writers; but in every generation, or its equivalent, a creative beacon illuminates the minds of people, not simply entertains them.  

 

 

The second reason relates to the way in which the performers respond to such an occurrence.  Their reaction, it would seem, is entirely instinctive.  In Handel’s aria, the featured soloists – Sara Macliver and Catherine Jones – answered in a fashion that was quite breath-taking in its sensitivity, poise and accuracy.  Moreover, the small accompanying ensemble (including the omnipresent Stewart Smith) demonstrated beautifully balanced rapport.  They picked up and embellished any small melodic gestures in an attempt to nurture the music even more.  This rendition had the imprint of class and lambency.  Macliver’s ability to just ‘touch’ high notes (the placement of which, I should add, lifts this piece out of the ordinary) was most gratifying because it seemed effortless.

Initially, one questioned the need for a solo cello but as soon as the rendition began, the reasoning became apparent.  The cello has the capacity to not only combine with the soprano voice but also to extend its range.  Again, this shows Handel thinking beyond rigid, set definitions used by his contemporaries.  The piece isn’t a duet but an aria which is allowed to blossom in its registral breadth.

Catherine Jones was the very essence of baroque utilitarianism throughout the concert: at one moment she would become soloist (most notably in Vivaldi’s ‘Sonata no.6 in Bflat RV47’…a disappointing composition) and at another she would immediately join the accompanying ensemble.  One assumes this was a common baroque practice.  Requiring the musician to be as versatile as possible makes abundant financial and artistic sense.

Jones performs on a loaned Gagliano cello (1770) which has a richly honeyed and mellow timbre.  In fact it is so creamy in tone that its voice can easily become obscured by other instruments.  Indeed, there were a couple of areas in Leonardo Leo’s ‘Cello Concerto in Dminor’ when, despite the soloist’s obvious rapport with the instrument and her technical skill with baroque performance, her sound became engulfed by the general texture (which was very modest).  Even the Perth Town Hall’s nicely balanced but ‘shiny’ acoustics couldn’t ameliorate a situation that is the result of an instrument that ‘speaks’ uniquely.  This Gagliano cello is a true solo instrument in that it doesn’t like to share attention.

Having said that, it should be added quickly that Jones has all the indicators of considerable prominence.  Her bowing is decisive, and her pitch and dynamic control are solid and reliable.  Clearly, as her biographical details indicate, she has chosen the ‘niche’ of baroque performance.  Her style and approach will become more rounded and her digital skill better sublimated as she continues to mature as an artist in this field.  Given the nature of the instrument she plays, and taking into consideration her prowess, one feels she could be better assessed in a performance of one of the Bach solo cello suites.  These works test a player’s artistry and skill at the ultimate level.

 

 

 

Another soloist featured on the program was baroque trumpeter Leanne Sullivan.  A baroque trumpet is a natural (valveless) instrument used in period performance.  One couldn’t tell whether Sullivan performed on a totally natural trumpet or on one of the slightly vented instruments.  Whatever the case, she demonstrated, with only a couple of minor exceptions, fine ‘lip’ control (natural trumpets, reliant solely on the harmonic series, need to be literally ‘lipped’ into tune on certain partials). 

When Sullivan had the opportunity, as she did in Torelli’s ‘Concerto in D’ and Cazzati’s ‘Sonata a 5 op.35 no.11’, to display her developing skills, she so clearly relished the moment.  Hers is the sound which most readily evokes the grandeur and restraint of the baroque.  Sullivan also showed her talent to blend with the voice (Sara Macliver) in Scarlatti’s ‘Mio Tesoro per te moro’ and ‘Rompe Sprezza’.  Together, the two soloists displayed superlative concord, based on finely judged dynamic balance.  Moreover, their interpretation was further enhanced by a lovely reciprocity with the continuo, cello and theorbo (Tommie Andersson).  The final section was a true Alessandro Scarlatti quirk: so brief as to be finished before the mind has registered it has begun!

Mentioning the theorbo, one feels some regret the program couldn’t accommodate a work featuring lute solo.  The theorbo (a large lute with a doubling of strings) is an accompanying instrument which, as Andersson sensitively revealed, serves its purpose beautifully in the gentle baroque fabric.  But, given Andersson’s expertise, it seemed a pity not to be able to hear him as a featured solo artist.  On this occasion that wasn’t to be but both Andersson and Smith, as they showed so consistently throughout the concert, gave every item solid and ever-sensitive harmonic bedrock. 

Similarly, the other (primarily) accompanying instrumentalists show staunch harmonic support and neatly crafted interweaving.  However, Julia Fredersdorff and Giulia Panzeri (violins) appeared to be particularly absorbed by constant tuning.  One can hardly complain because their intention was purely musically based.  Nevertheless, I can’t recall another concert where there was so much tuning up of strings prior to movements being preformed, baroque or otherwise.  The custom almost became an addiction and soon included violist Katherine Corecig, cellist Sophie Walker and Andersson on the theorbo.  This causes one to wonder if there is any clear evidence that feverish tuning was a common practice during the period.  My guess would be that no such proof exists and that the procedure is more a result of our modern day preoccupation with precision.  Even Ms Macliver felt it necessary to make a short aside to the audience to this effect.  She was, after all, waiting for the frenetic buzz of tuning and re-tuning to be resolved, as was the audience, so she could begin singing!   

 

 

 

Indeed, Macliver, after such a superb account of the Handel aria, deserved more than one of the bouquets handed out after the encore.  As much as it was to every one of the musician’s credit, it was her gentle unfolding of the music that lifted this concert into a sphere above most.  This program showed how the creative thinking of one genius can not only affect music history but it can also influence an entire concert’s complexion when placed in the context of his contemporaries.

Stuart Hille 2009.