An evening of firsts - Martin García García and Josep Vicent plus ADDA orchestra in Cano, Chopin and Tchaikovsky

In their first concert of a new season, the ADDA Orchestra under the direction of Josep Vicent began with a first performance. Composer Ximo Cano is from nearby La Nucia and his piece Ithaca Overture opened the concert. Ximo Cano’s piece embraces minimalism, but also lyricism and spectacular use of orchestral sound. Basically an overture in the Italian style of fast-slow-fast, it begins with a complex rhythmic figure in the strings which gradually disintegrates into a climax before the central slow section imposes calm on the process. There is extensive use here of the sonorous vibraphone, with the piccolo sustaining some of the higher notes’ overtones. Momentum then reasserts itself, and the piece burns bright until its end. Ximo Cano’s style could be likened to John Adams, but here there is a complexity in this work that comes across paradoxically as simplicity. This world premiere of Ximo Cano’s Ithaca Overture thus presented a perfect opening for a new season, being positive, affirmatory and celebratory.

On seeing the rest of the program, Chopin’s Second Piano Concerto, and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4, this particular concert goer felt that it might seem like a repetition of works heard hundreds of times before. How wrong can you be? What we heard was both fresh and enlightening. No matter how many times you have heard a piece of music, in performance it always has the potential to surprise anew, and both these works did just that, and to an extent that this listener, with literally thousands of concerts behind him, heard both pieces as if for the first time, so surprising were their effects.

Soloist in the Chopin concerto was Martin García García, a young man still in his 20s from Gijon. To say that his touch was delightful would be to understate the pure artistry he brought to this work. His playing was not only faultless, it reached a level of communication with the audience that one rarely witnesses. Especially in the slow movement, he engendered such a degree of concentration amongst the audience that even the most pianissimo of touches were heard, absorbed within a story that unfolded, told by fingers pressing on keys. This performance rendered a familiar work newly fresh, newly moving and completely satisfying musically. Memorable? Life-changing.

An encore of Tchaikovsky’s October followed. This is Tchaikovsky using understatement, in reflective mode as mists appear and trees colour, and then shed. For the first time I noticed in this piece the main theme of Scriabin’s Prelude And Nocturne For The Left Hand. Another first. I do hope that this first time to hear the playing of Martin García García will not be my last.

And then to Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. It was for me personally to be the second time in performance in five months. Nothing from the past, however, could have prepared me for the surprise I felt during every moment of this performance by the ADDA Orchestra. Artistic director, Josep Vicent, had the orchestra sculpt literally every phrase. Nuances of feeling, musical details, and indeed overall structures within the work were revealed as if I had never heard the work before, so fresh was the approach, so energised and at the same time subtle was the playing.

Examples could fill a book, but particularly memorable was the way in which the main theme of the slow movement was phrased. It is far too easy, it seems, for an orchestra to rely on the overall beauty of the theme rather than pin down the transitional emotions that make it up. This performance did exactly that. The overall theme still worked fine, but it worked because its individual elements created an emotional journey that was complex and sophisticated, and made perfect sense.

The scherzo, also, provided its surprises. It again is easy to regard the whole movement as a piece of orchestration first and a piece of music second. We all expect to hear the episodic contrast between pizzicato strings, decorating woodwind, and firm brass. What we do not regularly hear in this work of the details that remind us of Slavonic dances, and variations of dynamics in the pizzicato of the strings that add shape and texture. I may have heard hundreds of performances of this work, but this was completely new, as if hearing it for the first time.

As an encore, Josep Vicent offered his audience Guridi’s Amorosa, a simple plea for people everywhere to share love for one another. The overall effect of this concert first was to underline yet again the fact that this ADDA Orchestra, created by the direction of Josep Vicent, is now among the first rank of world ensembles. Bravi!

Congyu Wang - 24 Oct Denia International Piano Festival

 

 

Congyu Wan's playing was explosive and at the same time tender. He has definitely thought about every phrase. But he does not over-shape or over-interpret. The emphasis is where it needs to be, the rubato is applied, but never overdone. The dynamics are wide, but never over-emphasised. He has a tendency with Chopin to slow the piano and accelerate the forte. In concert it works beautifully, but the approach might not get past a nit-picking reviewer on disc.

He chose to play the Chopin Nocturne and the Liszt Liebestraum together, deliberately holding off the applause at the end of the Chopin. The effect was to increase musical tension. The Denia audience was spellbound to silenece anyway! Quite memorable. The Earl Wild arrangement of the Vocalise transforms the melody into what sounds like another prelude to add to the Rachmaninov set. There’s a central section that is explosive. After that the Kreisler Libeslied sounds like a show-off piece, which is what it is, but the Rachmnaninov harmony saves it and, indeed, makes it interesting. The Gershwin preludes again sounded more pianistic than usual. Just a little research shows that Earl Wild reworked seven Gershwin Preludes – the usual performance does the three that Gershwin himself published under the title. These pieces were quite different. Highly pianistic and with recognisable melodies that kept poking through the notes. The overall effect was wonderful and simply put brought the house down.

After that, Congyu Wang then embarked on Gaspard de la Nuit. Now this is a challenge at the best of times. It is virtuosic in a way that perhaps only Ravel could write. It’s a style that is unique. It sounds literally like no-one else. But what demands he makes to mimic simplicity! One feels that Ravel always wanted to simplify, but the way his mind worked was just different from the rest of us. The pianistic elements don’t feel like decoration. They are essential elements in the music’s sense.

Congyu Wang’s playing was breath-taking. The emphasis here was in the contrasts. Slow-fast, quiet-loud, the contrasts seemed emphasised, but never mannered. Add to that the rhythmic tension that is always part of Ravel's thinking and the result is this masterpiece of the concert hall. He had really thought about the overall shape of the piece and that came across with clarity. Just what the rather strange mind of Maurice Ravel had in mind we will never know. What is clear is that the place he lived was not quite in this universe, such a transporting experience does his music offer - and this performance in particular.

And then, at the end of the programme, we heard Aldoraba de Garcioso. This is Ravel in “Spanish” mode and the audience will have been totally familiar with the musical phrases and harmonies that keep surfacing in this consciousness stream that is pure Ravel. The playing was again beyond brilliant, but always sympathetic, never spectacular just for effect. Congyu Wang is a true artist.

There followed three encores. Chopin, Debussy and more Chopin. The audience would have stayed for more, but after a programme like that at least one person involved deserved a rest.