Have You Heard: Ground/Sumire Yoshihara

Listeners of Japanese percussion music are sometimes frustrated by the lack of recordings available in mainstream distribution. Years ago while shopping through the bins at the now-defunct Tower Records store on Wabash Avenue in Chicago, I purchased Ground: Sound Space for Percussion III by Sumire Yoshihara. Recently, to my delight, I rediscovered this recording in my collection and wanted to write a few notes about the recording.

Ground: Sound Space of Percussion III (Camerata 32CM-314) is a collection of abstract Japanese percussion works, including Ground for solo percussion by Norio Fukushi, Ichinogotoshi I and II for percussion solo by Masanori Fujita, and Dolcissima Mia Vita, Op. 16 for metallic-percussion solo by Yoshio Hachimura.

The recording presents moving interpretations of each work that are filled with energy. The most challenging technical passages are executed smoothly, with resolve, and in this listeners opinion, appropriate to the genre. The highlight of this recording for me is in the last thirty-seconds of the title track Ground where Yoshihara's command of her technical facilities is displayed while playing on a high-pitched wood.

Two color photographs and three black-and-white photographs of the performer are attractively set throughout the 12-page booklet. The first two tracks were recorded in analog and re-mastered digitally; the remaining three tracks are entirely digital. Liner notes are provided in Japanese with English translation, and engineering, production, recording equipment, dates, and locations are also provided.

Ms. Yoshihara's recording may be lesser-known in the United States, but this recording, if a representation of her playing as a whole, should put her on-par with any other great percussionists.

Iphigenie en Tauride

Last Saturday I attended Lyric Opera's staging of Iphigénie en Tauride at the Civic Opera House. Susan Graham offered the audience an outstanding Iphigénie, who is a high priestess tasked with killing any strangers captured in Tauris. If you are not familiar with the opera, it is one of the more prominent roles for mezzo-soprano in operatic literature. Ms. Graham had such wonderful control in all registers and gave a wonderful rendition of the classical role. There's a great writing by Susan Graham that is contained within this publication [local copy] in which she explains her thoughts that Gluck naturally bridges the gap between Mozart and Berlioz, thereby bridging classical and romantic music. If you get a chance, read that article.

Lyric's staging was very minimalistic, using water and lighting effects against a black stage and backdrop. There was no scenery to speak of in this production, and only near the end of the opera does the stage setting change. However, I enjoyed the minimal setting that was presented, and I felt that the stage setting was perfect for this dark, ominous opera. In retrospect, the staging of this opera was strikingly similar to the way Greek tragedy was presented, and I'm assuming this was done purposefully.

Iphigénie is fairly light in it's percussion requirements; only cymbals, triangle, field drum, and timpani are used. The battery of instruments all perform within the first act of the opera and depicts Turkish music which was normally offered by the Janissary bands. Only the timpanist plays the full opera,although in a limited capacity.

If you are able to attend this opera, I recommend it highly. It's also a good "beginner" opera as it isn't very long and the dialogue is fairly straight forward.

Incorrect!

Friday night we went to see the Grant Park Symphony render the film score to Sergei Eisenstein's Battleship Potemkin. There's several different versions of what everyone thinks is the "correct" film score for this movie. However, the original score was written by Edmund Meisel and performed by a salon orchestra during the 1926 premiere in Berlin. The original score was not a collection of Shostakovich symphonic excerpts, like that which was used in this performance. I love Shostakovich's music and everything it stands for, but it just does not fit this film. Instead, it transformed the film into some strange "art film" instead of the dramatic masterpiece that film truly is (yes, I know it's truly an art film, but it's also a drama!).

My question about the choice of music is why GPSO didn't choose to perform the actual score? There's a re-orchestration by Mark-Andreas Schlingensiepen that is available; did the music director of the GPSO not have this option available? Surely someone must have told him that this would have been the best, most true presentation of the film. Or was the orchestra not capable of performing the music? I highly doubt that: GPSO isn't half-bad. The reason the "frankenstein" score was used is perplexing, at best. Nearly all the drama of the film was lessened, even the famous scene at the steps of Odessa. What a bummer.

Review of Burritt's Recital

Last night I attended Michael Burritt's recital at Northwestern University. As usual, I was floored by his performance (you'll never see him play and NOT feel modest afterwards!). The program included a selection of his own works, The Blue Flame Quintet and the Recitative from his Waking Dreams; Steven Mackey's Busted for solo percussion; Kahn Variations by Alejandro Vinao; Mirage by Yasuo Sueyoshi; and Mudra by Bob Becker. Also included was an encore choral by J.S. Bach.

I'm a big fan of the interpretation Burritt gives to Mirage. Afterwards I spoke with him and asked if he'll be recording it -- apparently it's on his list of things to record at some point. Hopefully we'll hear it soon! Also, if you ever get a chance to hear him play Mudra, you'll probably be amazed! There are few people who can play 45 minutes of extremely difficult marimba music, then turn around and play 12 minutes of extremely intense drumming. Great job Mike!

A Study in Differences of Opinion

I'm listening to two recordings of Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Mostly, I'm interested in the second movement right now, Giuoco delle coppie: Allegretto scherzando for the eight bar excerpt at the beginning. I have the RCA Victor recording with Fritz Reiner from 1955, and the Deutsche Grammaphone recording with Pierre Boulez from 1994.

The Boulez recording uses a drum that is slightly lower in pitch and more muffled. The excerpt is played at approximately 84-86 b.p.m., and is a bit less strict to what is on the page. Whoever played the excerpt on this recording probably played more towards the center of the drum (thus, less ringing of the drum) and the player moves their stick towards the edge of the drum during the last 2 bars of the passage. This gives a substantial color change to the drum that is very noticeable when listening with headphones. I'm not certain it is what the composer intended.

The Reiner recording uses a higher tuned drum (probably a M2 to m3 higher than the Boulez recording) and is nearly perfect to the metromone at a more lively 92-93 b.p.m. (after all, Reiner was a stickler on tempo and rhythm). The decrescendo is performed without a noticeable move to the edge of the drum. However, there's quite a bit of ring, so I assume the percussionsist who executed it on this recording (Harry Brabec?) probably played halfway between the center and edge of the drum. Both players play the except with two sticks (one for the accented notes, and another for the unaccented notes).

I applaud both performances as they are both precise and well planned. My goal here was to show that there can be two different opinions on how to execute a passage. Take a listen sometime and see what you hear.

A Visit to Philadelphia

Last weekend I took a trip to Philadelphia, PA and had a chance to see the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra in Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center. The hall is magnificent; acoustically it's wonderful for the audience (unfortunately I wasn't on stage playing, so I can't comment on how it is on stage) and architecturally interesting. The concert (01 October 2005) was:

Midori Plays Prokofiev (cond: Christoph Eschenbach)

LINDBERG Chorale
PROKOFIEV Violin Concerto No. 1
BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 5

The Lindberg was an interesting soundscape, only lasting about 9 minutes. Our seats were in row G near the 4th stand of 1st violins. This wasn't the best location, as the sound was "string heavy". Alas, I don't hear that often (being in the back of the orchestra), so it was bearable.

Next, Midori absolutely stunned the audience with an amazing performance of the Prokofiev concerto. This performance is definitely one of the most intimate concerti I've heard live. Midori has amazing control and displays a picture of what, I feel, Prokofiev would have desired in his music. A much-deserved standing ovation was given to soloist and orchestra to conclude the first half of the concert.

To round out the concert, Eschenbach chose Beethoven's Symphony in C minor. From the initial knock of fate to the last chord, I couldn't help but think of all the music directors that have programmed the Symphony, including Ormandy and Stokowski. The strings, musically, brought the symphony alive in a way I'm not used to (being from Chicago), and the brass and woodwinds were smooth in their performance of both loud and soft passages. Timpanist Don Liuzzi gave an excellent performance as well, and was a pleasure to watch!

All in all, I can't wait to get back to Philly to hear them again. It's also a beautiful city, and one I'd recommend everyone visit.

Keiko Makes It to DVD

A few days ago I received a DVD of Keiko Abe and Mark Ford performing Prism Rhapsody II with the University of North Texas Wind Symphony conducted by Eugene Corporon. This is a great performance by both Ms. Abe and Mr. Ford, and it's the first time Ms. Abe has made her way to DVD. I hope she isn't shy in the future and appears in more places as it's great to see her extraordinary playing with two, four and six mallets. If you have a chance, pick up a copy.

Up Next: Satie and Kodaly

Today, while driving to a dress rehearsal, an interpretation of Eric Satie's Gymnopédies #3 was on WFMT The performance (which was the arrangement by Debussy) was delivered in very slow and deliberate manner. The performance turned out to be a live performance given by Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on 25 March 1960. I've never heard a more moving rendition of the Satie, and there are many excellent performances of it in existence.

The broadcast of the Satie was then followed by the live performance of Galanta Dances Zoltán Kodály. It's obvious that Reiner was a master of any score he chose to perform, and both these recordings should squash any ideas that Reiner's interpretations were "cold." It's my personal opinion that the adage "There can be no expression without technique" is a very fitting description of the CSO during Reiner's tenure.