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Alix Goolden Performance Hall
April 30, 2006
None of the composers on this evening's programme has a household name and yet each them was a major figure in the nineteenth century. Louis Spohr, Anton Diabelli, Giulio Regondi, Johann Kaspar Mertz and Mauro Giuliani all have a salient characteristic in common: they were great virtuosi in the heyday of heroic virtuosi.
In thirty years of concert going, this was only perhaps the second or third time that I have heard a performance of music by Spohr. (I only remember with certainty one other occasion, a Vancouver Symphony Orchestra performance in 1977.) Yet consider these lines from The Mikado by Gilbert and Sullivan:
These lines date from 1885. The linking of Spohr's name with those of Bach and Beethoven gives some idea of his stature, even twenty-six years after his death. (The lines also indicate just how badly the quality of music has fallen off at pops concerts.)
This evening's programme featured Spohr's Sechs Duetsche Lieder, op. 72 with Phoebe MacRae accompanied by Dunn on guitar. Between them the artists made a case for Spohr being heard more often. They are lovely songs, in no way inferior to, say, Schubert's lieder. One could easily imagine oneself transported back to a nineteenth-century German drawing room.
MacRae is an intelligent musician with an uncommonly lovely voice. This was the second time I have heard her this month. Earlier she performed Handel's Nine German Arias in an Early Music Society production, alas not reviewed on MiV. The differences between the musical styles of Handel and Spohr are, of course, dramatic. MacRae understands that and approached each composer in a different way. Here her singing was appropriately Romantic, without going over the top.
The texts of Spohr's Lieder are all quite melancholy, but a wide range of affects is still aroused. MacRae beautifully represented, by turns, agitation, passion, pensiveness, yearning and host of other states of mind. Make it a point to hear this fine singer next time she is town.
Dunn provided sensitive support. The guitar used for the Spohr was a copy of a René Lacôte guitar, the original made in Paris in 1843. It has a lovely sound: big, round, and ideally suited to the romantic repertoire.
Today Diabelli is remembered because of Beethoven's "Diabelli" Variations but he was an important figure in the nineteenth-century Viennese musical world. His Grande Sonate Brillante was written for piano and guitar, on both of which instruments Diabelli was a virtuoso. Not surprisingly, both players are given a chance to shine in turn. The music is technically demanding but they both tossed off their parts with aplomb. Robert Holliston is not an early piano specialist, but he took to the fortepiano "like a duck to water", as an accomplished pianist at the concert said to me.
The fortepiano used is a fine instrument, but it was not perhaps ideal for this repertoire. It is a copy of an instrument by Dulcken from the 1790s and pianos had evolved considerably by the time the Grande Sonate was composed. Apart from anything else, the Dulcken does not have enough notes to play to Diabelli's piece. Holliston had to do a little creative re-composition to tailor the piece to the instrument. (He succeeded brilliantly - the result was seamless) On the other hand, later pianos were louder. Had a later instrument been used, it would not have been so easy to achieve the excellent balance between piano and guitar that Holliston and Dunn found on this occasion.
For the Diabelli and the subsequent pieces by Regondi, Dunn switched to a guitar modeled on a Viennese instrument of 1815. It had a brighter, sparkling tone. In its way it was just as appealing as the Lacôte-style instrument.
The first of two solo pieces by Regondi, the Rêverie-Nocturne was next. Dunn played this gypsy-flavoured composition entirely from memory. The piece is a challenging one, somewhat reminiscent of Paganini's compositions for the guitar, that uses the full compass of the instrument. One cannot say that anyone would perform such a composition effortlessly, but Dunn certainly acquitted himself with distinction. The other piece by Regondi was the Deuxième Air Varié. This series of increasingly complex variations ended with Dunn providing the audience with a thrilling tour de force.
The second half of the programme began with four pieces by Mertz, regarded by many as the Liszt of the nineteenth-century guitar. (Dunn returned to the Lacôte-style guitar for the pieces by Mertz) Dunn was joined for this piece by guitarist Stephen Lochbaum, playing a terz guitar (that is, one pitched a minor third higher than normal). The Mertz pieces that were selected are introspective, sensitive works. Even the Trauermarsch (funeral march) was (apart from an episode of grief towards the end) calm and resigned rather than disconsolate. Dunn and Lochbaum gave the works appropriately deft, delicate performances.
The final programmed piece was Giuliani's Troisième Concerto, op. 70 for piano and terz guitar. This piece featured bright, alert playing from Holliston and Dunn, as they took turns showing off their technical skills. They again achieved a good balance between their instruments. Highlights were the expansive opening Allegro Maestoso and the concluding, sprightly Polonaise. The Polonaise featured a big finish. Just as I thought the piece was building to a climax, more elaborate riffs would follow. When the climax finally arrived it was almost orgasmic.
The evening concluded with Dunn playing as an encore Mertz's Lieber Lied. He offered it as a sort of serenade to the audience, wandering around as he played.
We did not get the music that was advertised. Elissa Poole (flute) was nowhere in evidence. Not a note by Mozart was heard. Holliston sat in for the promised Michael Redshaw. Still, I have no complaints. Altogether, this was a rewarding evening of music making that rescued from obscurity some compositions and composers that deserve to be heard more often. Hats off to Alex Dunn and everyone else associated with this fine event.
MiV HomeLast modified: Mon May 1 23:24:30 PDT 2006