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First Metropolitan United Church
February 17, 2006
According to his teacher, Rimsky-Korsakov, Anton Arensky and his music would "soon be forgotten." (What a wonderfully inspiring and encouraging teacher Nikolai must have been!)
It is undeniable that little of Arensky's output is heard regularly today, but his true significance may lie elsewhere than in his own music: as professor of harmony and counterpoint at the Moscow Conservatory his pupils included Gliere, Rachmaninov and Scriabin.
One of the few pieces by Arensky that has "continued to occupy a corner of the modern repertory" (as The New Grove puts it) is his Op35a: the Variations on a Theme of Tchaikovsky. The theme, incidentally, being that of Tchaikovsky's Legend, Op.54 No.5.
The variations originally formed the central movement of Arensky's String Quartet No.2, written in 1894, as a memorial to Tchaikovsky, who had died the year before; the string orchestra arrangement was the composer's own.
It is only within the last few years that the somewhat tangled story of the work reached its culmination: Arensky originally scored his quartet for violin, viola and two cellos, but later rescored it for a conventional string quartet, before orchestrating the slow movement.
Now we have an arrangement of the entire work - all three movements - and on Friday night Yariv Aloni and the Victoria Chamber Orchestra ended their concert with what must surely have been the Victoria premiere of the transcription, in a performance which could hardly have been more persuasive.
The work opens with a sombre and mournful introduction, redolent of Russian Orthodox Chant; the main body of the movement is an impassioned allegro - although there are plenty of gear changes, which Aloni and his players coped with splendidly - which was played to the hilt.
The famous variation movement (in Arensky's own orchestration, of course) was wonderful and it was here - and perhaps only here - that the legacy of Arensky's original instrumentation showed, with its frequently divisi cello lines.
The slower variations allowed the orchestra to show just what a fine sound they can make these days; the quicker ones sparkled with life.
Aloni took the fugue which forms most of the finale at a slightly deliberate pace. Probably advisedly, for it enabled contrapuntal lines to remain clear and ensemble secure; nor was there any lack of energy in the playing.
I came away with a new respect for Anton Arensky; and a word of advice for Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov: predictions will catch up with you in the end.
The cantatas of Bach can seem somewhat intimidating - there are, after all, over 200 of them. (Quite when he found the time to father twenty children is beyond me)
Non sa che sia dolore is unusual not only because the text is in Italian but also because of its scoring: for solo soprano, solo flute and strings.
After a brisk instrumental sinfonia, the soprano soloist enters with a recitative which might be synopsised as "parting is such sweet sorrow"; Alison Cecilia Arends has a fine voice and she handled it exceptionally well throughout both recitatives and their succeeding arias.
It is the first aria which features a wonderful dialogue between the two soloists. Or rather, I believe that it does; if I had one criticism of Friday's performance, it was simply this: the accompaniment was too loud. Too much of the time the soprano and flute were either buried completely or simply present as just two more strands in the musical texture - which I suspect was not Bach's intention.
This criticism is a reflection of the VCO's rising standards: where, once upon a time, their excellent intonation and superb ensemble would have occasioned comment, now one has come to expect this from them and so the critical ear must range further.
Not that I'd have it any other way.
When one could hear them clearly, the soloists were both first-rate: Lanny Pollet's fluid and agile flute lines were, as always, a joy; and that dialogue between him and Arends, what one could discern of it, was quite lovely.
The evening opened with an excellent performance of Mozart's Serenata Notturna. From the opening bars - crisply played but with a most impressive depth to the sound - this was a delightful reading of the music.
The contrast between the solo "orchestra" - violinists Yasuko Eastman and Sue Innes, violist Janet Sankey, cellist Leslie Atherton and bassist Mike Cox - and the full orchestra (with timpani!) was extremely well handled:- I am thinking, in particular, of that marvellous passage in the opening movement which counterposes the solo group with a weighty pizzicato from the rest.
The witty finale, with its myriad tempo changes and false endings, put me in mind of nothing so much as a Haydn quartet and was performed with an appropriate degree of élan.
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