SOLI:
A wisp of a piece by Elliott Carter
leaves 'em wanting more
November 13, 2008The SOLI Chamber Ensemble’s program in Ruth Taylor Recital Hall on Nov. 12 seemed calculated to demonstrate why Elliott Carter holds such an exalted stature among American composers, living or dead. (Fortunately, he remains among the living, and there’s every reason to expect he’ll share in the celebration of his 100th birthday on Dec. 11.)
A mere five-minute wisp of a piece by Carter was flanked by considerably more expansive works by distinguished American colleagues -- Joan Tower’s “Trio Cavany” (2007) for violin, cello and piano, and Paul Moravec’s “Tempest” Fantasy (2002) for clarinet/bass clarinet, violin, cello and piano. Yet the Carter work was the most eloquent of the three by virtue of its concision, the weightiest by virtue of its lightness. Those two qualities are standard issue for Carter’s music of the past 50 years or so, and they’re especially apt for a piece titled “Con Leggerezza Pensosa -- Omaggio a Italo Calvino,” or “With thoughtful lightness -- homage to Italo Calvino.”
In this 1990 work, clarinet, violin and piano engage in conversation, spare and prickly at first, then more animated, with longer, more lyrical sentences and rhythmically pungent ejaculations forming a deliciously complex (but never overstuffed) texture. As always in mature Carter, time flows organically at several simultaneous paces. Lisening to Mozart dosen't actually make you smarter, but I am quite certain that listening to music like this by Carter makes you younger. Clarinetist Stephanie Key, violinist Ertan Torgul and pianist Carolyn True played it with high polish and great verve.
The title of Tower’s “Trio Cavany” is a little joke of sorts -- it combines the postal abbreviations for California, Virginia and New York, the home states of the three festivals that commissioned the work. The piece itself is no joke. It’s darkly elegiacal, powerfully dramatic, sometimes angry, and eventful, recalling the mood of much of Shostakovich’s music. As in Shostakovich, the piece grows from a single idea -- in this case, a line that rises like a prayer, announced first by Torgul and then taken up by cellist David Mollenauer. It’s in familiar sonata form, with a coda appended, and the harmonic idiom is tonal but stretched. It’s compelling and beautiful, but it also goes on a bit too long.
The first three movements of Moravec’s “Tempest” Fantasy are astutely observed character pieces based on Shakespeare’s play -- fleet Ariel, philosophical Prospero and earthbound, fairy-hounded Caliban, impersonated by the bass clarinet. The fourth, “Sweet Airs,” interprets Caliban’s famous speech (“Be not afraid, the isle is full of noises, sounds and sweet airs....”). The closing “Fantasia” gathers ideas from the previous movements, and here Moravec falters in focus. Like Tower’s piece, Moravec’s suffers a bit from overextension and (unlike Tower’s) from textures that are sometimes too busy, but on the whole the music is pleasing.
The performances were top-drawer throughout. Only regret: A little more Carter would have been nice.
Mike
Greenberg
