ADDA Simfonica in Bernstein and Mahler with Josep Vicent and Josu de Solaun

Some concerts are different from the norm. Some turn out to be different, some look different from the start. Last Friday in ADDA, Aliante, our concert fell into both categories.

The start looked conventional enough with an overture. But this was Bernstein, and upbeat Bernstein to boot. As the evening progressed, this celebratory, overtly smiling music became a focus for the theme of ‘false hilarity’ that underpinned the rest of the program. Though the Candide Overture is upbeat, and it is an audience please, its origins are on Broadway, a place that, for the stage, peddles the same kind of illusory happiness that creates sparkling plastic dreams on film in Hollywood. It was a perfect start, played perfectly, and received with much enthusiasm.

But then the mood changed. On the backdrop, we saw a painting by Edward Hopper, whose canvases at first sight seem to be technicolour stills from the black-and-white of Hollywood’s golden era. But a closer look reveals that usually no one is talking to anyone else. No one is even noticing where they are. Their environment is stripped of many of the accoutrements of modern life, indicating a colourless life, lived in a rainbow. The people seem self-absorbed, but neither happy nor reflective. They are, it seems, anxious. Alongside a passage capturing the spirit of Auden’s poem, which talked of going for a drink with a chance encounter, and then feeling a sense of false hilarity, the image was the perfect introduction to the world of what followed, which was Bernstein Symphony No. 2, The Age of Anxiety.

This is an enigmatic work. It claims to be a symphony, but equally it could be a piano concerto. Josu Solaun was the soloist. His playing was the perfect balance of detachment and energy that the work demands. There are many periods of silence, interspersed with percussive passages. In the hands of a pianist not thoroughly in sympathy with the work’s overall character, this part can easily become across as disjointed and incoherent. In the right hands, it is a portrayal of an individual’s experience of the modern age of anxiety, false hilarity mixed with anxious self-absorption, reflection not softened by religious belief. This is a tough world that, even when it invites you in, leaves you isolated.

Bernstein’s Age of Anxiety is not a work that will bring the house down. But in ADDA, Alicante last Friday, it did. It is certainly a work that will be remembered by an audience privileged to hear it. But it won’t send them home humming an earworm. But of course Candide will. The contrast is at least part of the point.

If the first half was something of a surprise, then the second half exceeded. We heard three movements from different Mahler symphonies under the general title of The Echo of Being. The music came from the third movement of the Symphony No. 4, the Totenfeier from Symphony No. 2 and the fourth movement from Symphony No. 9. The idea was that these would accompany The Echo of Being, a three-sectioned film made by Lucas van Woerkum based on the life of the composer. Each section concentrated on one member of a three- person family, a mother, a dying daughter, and a father.

Musically, and surprisingly, this hung together. The slow movement start is tender, but underpinned by alienation and, when the outburst comes, bitterness, which then transforms into regret. The violence and anger of the Totenfeier here becomes the suffering of illness with all the resentment this brings. Then, the valedictory fourth movement of the Symphony No. 9 seems to approach the unknown of death, but from the standpoint of thinking you know who you are. There is a familiarity about the unknown experience, perhaps a false heaven arrived at before death claims life. The illusion becomes complete, and the survivor survives, alone.

By the end of the concert, the ADDA audience was in suitably reflective mood. As the dying tones of the fourth movement of Mahler nine drifted towards silence, so did the audience. At the end, Josep Vicent left the audience to enjoy this beautiful sensation of shared quiet. It was prolonged and memorable. And so was the joy of those minutes. There was nothing false or hilarious about this profound experience.

I forgot to mention Josu de Solaun’s encore. The Debussy Prelude was certainly lighter than what had gone before, but it was no less disturbing. What was utterly impressive was the fact that the Solaun could play pianissimo in front of an audience of over a thousand, where everyone could hear everything perfectly and no one missed a note.

Fumiaki Miura, Josep vicent and ADDA Simfonica in Ravel and Shostakovich

This was a concert of two halves, both superb, both contrasted, both within and between. Shostakovich in the first half and Ravel in the second provided the between contrast between. The works chosen, two by each composer, provided the contrast within.  To the second half first.

Ravel’s Daphne and Chloe Suite No2 is a concert hall favourite. It is a post-impressionist splash of colour, like Matisse cutouts dancing around their own space. But it’s also symphonic: it feels like the colours develop and transform, though strangely they do not seem to merge, except in the opening sunrise. Josep Vicent used two locations for the wordless chorus, one group, at the rear right of the stage as the audience saw it, and the second in a box, higher and further to the right, above the stalls. The effect was akin to surround sound. The orchestral playing in this work, and the one that followed was outstanding, with all the timbre and textures of the music glowing in their own right.

Ravel’s Bolero has been described as the music of madman. Ravel’s own assessment of the opinion was that it was correct. The work is so well known that I will say nothing about the music itself, except to point out one aspect which Josep Vicent chose to stress. The drum rhythms are usually insistent and ever-present in this piece. There are performances where the audience hears very little else. But this was not one of them. Josep Vicent had the drum’s contribution in dynamic balance with the rest of the instruments. At the start, the drum was barely audible above the pizzicato strings. As a result, the superb orchestral playing was able to communicate all the textures the composer chose to exploit, and these became the focus. That magical passage where a horn and celeste play together sparkled like Christmas lights. We even got an encore of the final sections, just in case we had missed it first time round.

In the first half, the ADDA audience heard two works by Shostakovich. The Jazz Suite No1 was played by an ensemble including saxophones, trumpets, trombone, violin, bass, various percussion, an upright piano, a banjo, and a slide guitar. As always with the music of Shostakovich, the listener is never quite sure whether to take anything seriously. He always seems to be looking over his shoulder to judge reaction, except, of course, when the subject with himself, when he wallows in DSCH, as in the Eighth Quartet or the Tenth Symphony. The personal signature motif, however, seemed to be lacking from both the Jazz Suite and what followed. The textures and witticisms of this music came across vividly, as did its inherent self-doubt mixed with tragic whimsy. It was, after all, Shostakovich.

The piece that ended the first half of the concert was something completely different from the rest of the evening. This was Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No2 with Fumiaki Miura as soloist. This particular concerto is not played often and dates from thirty years after the rest of the programme. Like much late Shostakovich, such as the Viola Sonata, quartets and symphonies, it seems almost distracted. This is music made of lines that don’t seem able to decide where to go, never mind join up. It’s an unsettling experience, full of questions that are not even finished, let alone answered. Unlike the other works in the program, however, this second violin concerto by Shostakovich does invite further listening. The almost chamber music feel of the orchestration, where particular sounds stand out unexpectedly, is surely part of what the composer was trying to achieve. And what would you make of the interjections from a tom-tom that seem to interrupt and threaten? The solo part often seems to be screaming, but quietly, almost trying to hide its nervous agitation.

All of this complexity was perfectly interpreted and conveyed by Fumiaki Miura, the soloist for this performance. It’s not performed as much as other concertos, so Fumiaki Miura understandably chose to have a score in sight. But his interpretation of this narcissistic, self-conscious, self-referential. perhaps self-mocking music was as close to perfect as I could imagine. And that drum? Is it fate knocking on the door, or the police? Or is it Shostakovich waking up the audience?

Despite all the brilliance of Daphnis and Chloe, the firework show of Bolero and the witticisms of the Jazz Suite, it is Fumiaki Miura’s playing of this enigmatically understated work that will last in the memory. And, just to add to the surrealism, he played the Vieuxtemps Variations on Yankee Doodle Dandy as an encore. Memorable.

Costa Blanca Arts Update - Cassado and Chopin in Alfas del Pi, Stravinsky and Elgar in Alicante

 

Just over a year ago, it would not have been anything special to declare that it had been possible to attend four quality concerts in this area over three days. And then there was covid. Here is Spain, we had a strict initial lockdown, but since then schools have stayed open and some cultural spaces have kept running in spite of restrictions on numbers. Before saying anything else, it is necessary to remind oneself that the new norm has involved social distancing, fifty per cent capacity for venues, compulsory hand sanitiser, masks, the recording of contact details and a temperature test on entry. This has severely restricted audience’s willingness to attend and has persuaded many, perhaps a majority of venues to cease activity altogether. In addition, performers’ travel has been as restricted as the population in general, despite there being the possibility of exemption permits for work. The combination of restrictions on travel, availability of travel and reluctant venues has severely curtailed cultural activity, however, and there have been many perennial supporters of live events who have expressed the opinion that such gatherings should not be happening during a pandemic. Opinion is on one side, while the law places the limits. Also, many more elderly regular attendees have decided that now is the time to lock up and stay in. Individuals have made their own choices.

And now, on the day that bars and restaurants can open until ten o’clock in the evening and when cultural venues can admit seventy-five per cent of their capacity, it was under the previous, more severe restrictions that saw concerts on Friday evening, Saturday lunchtime and evening and Sunday lunchtime in Alfas del Pi and Alicante.

On Friday in Alfas del Pi, Antonio Garcia Egea and Fernando Espi joined as Duo Arbos to play a works from the repertoire of violin and guitar. This was the kind of programme one does not encounter often. It started conventionally with Spanish Dance no5 by Granados, but Carlo Domeniconi’s Sonatina Mexicana has probably not figured often on concert programmes in the last year. It has probably never been followed by Ravi Shankar’s El Alba Encantada, and the microtones of Indian music have probably never before led into Paganini’s Cantabile! Astor Piazzolla’s Historia del Tango, Bourdel 1900 and Café 1930 followed by Libertango was conventional in comparison, as perhaps was Pablo Sarasate’s Playera Romanza Andaluza, despite the understated but stratospheric virtuosity of the ending of the violin part. We finished the evening with Fernandon Espi’s own Impromptu and we were particularly grateful in these times to be taken by the performers on such a varied journey.

On Saturday lunchtime the orchestra at ADDA (Auditori de la Diputacion de Alicante) marked fifty years since the death of Igor Stravinsky with a breath-taking performance of Petroushka. Yes, it’s a work that the majority of the audience had hear many, many times, but it remains a work that is fresh with every new exposure and particularly so in this reading by Josep Vicent, whose reading of this music is faultless. The colours were always vivid, the scenes clear and beautifully depicted in this work that paints with sound. We also heard a superb reading of the Elgar Cello Concerto by Damian Martinez and then had encores of the Valse Triste of Sibelius and, and true to the form of current concerts, a short piece of Piazzolla, Oblivion, with the leader’s violin as soloist.

Then on Saturday evening, back in Alfas del Pi Duo Fortecello, the cello and piano of Anna Mikulska and Philippe Argenty, gave the first of their two concerts. This one featured works by Chopin, Nocturne opus 9, Cello sonata and Polonaise Brillante coupled with Piazzolla (yet again!) in the form of the Triptyque "la Trilogie de l'Ange" and finally the Danse Macabre of Saint-Saens. We only just made the curfew…

Then on Sunday, Duo Fortecello presented their second programme in Albir. While their first programme was the epitome of the conventional, the second was as opposite as it is possible to be. They opened with Joaquin Nin’s Seguida Española and followed with what proved to be a rare gem. Gaspar Cassado wrote a famous sonata for cello and piano based on old Spanish tunes, but this Sonata en la menor, though from the same year, 1925, is quite different in character. Exactly how many times this work has been performed in Spain cannot be assessed, but it is certainly not many times. And it may have been performed elsewhere even less. The work itself is superb and deserves to be much more widely heard, especially when it is compared to other works that form the basis of the repertoire for cello and piano. Any music lover will find great reward in searching out this work and hearing it performed. It has to be said that the fourth movement, Paso Doble, does not live up to the quality of the first three, but the criticism is minor. How many composers, after all, were capable of writing finales that lived up to their preceding movements?

Anna and Philippe continued with a Flamenco solo for cello by Rogelio Huguet y Tagell and then Andaluza by Granados. Manuel de Falla’s Siete Canciones Populares Españolas is music of genius and Gaspar Cassado’s Requiebros, though derivative, is a superb way to finish any concert. And so the duo had given a musical tour of Spain, visiting most regions and sampling its musical soul. Superb. And what a relief from current preoccupations!