Adelaide Festival. Marwood, Valve & Cassomenos. Ukaria Cultural Centre. 8 Mar 2020.
The combination of Anthony Marwood (violin), Timo-Veikko Valve (cello) and Stefan Cassomenos (piano) has been brought together just for this concert, and will likely never be repeated. This is lamentable, because they produced a world class performance that even established trios would struggle to match.
The program comprised Shostakovich’s Piano Trio No.2 in E minor, Op. 67, and Beethoven’s Piano Trio in B-flat, Op.97 ‘Archduke’. The two works contrast spectacularly: the Shostakovich has the characteristic dissonance and spikey rhythms often found in the Russian master’s writing, whereas the Beethoven is most often lyrical with soaring melodies.
The opening andante movement of the Shostakovich begins with the gentlest of crescendos, and then soars into near chaos with a multiplicity of thematic material and aggressive dynamics. It is exciting to both watch and listen to, and the members of the trio are constantly observing each other as if to check on their well-being! Cassomenos is effusive at the keyboard, and he elicits the dreamiest sounds from the Bosendorfer in the largo movement.
They are so much in sync as an ensemble that Valve assisted Marwood with a page-turn that was going horribly wrong. Marwood tried to use his foot while still fervently playing, but Valve used a brief pause in his part to help out!
The performance of the Archduke is a tour de force. The trio laid out a clear dynamical plan from the outset and prosecuted it compellingly. The opening allegro moderato features beatifical lyrical lines from the cello, and the legato in the opening of the third andante cantabile movement produced by Marwood and Valve was silky smooth. The final presto is simply thrilling and the audience erupts into enthusiastic applause at the conclusion.
A thrilling concert, and such a pity that we are never likely to hear this combination of artists again. Ah, such is the stuff of festivals!
Kym Clayton
When: 8 Mar
Where: Ukaria Cultural Centre
Bookings: Closed
Musica Viva & Adelaide Festival. Adelaide Town Hall. 2 Mar 2020.
Garrick Ohlsson is an authoritative presence on the concert stage and one of the greatest pianists alive. He sits close to the piano and infrequently raises his arms above the rim. He has strong arms and hands and achieves fortissimo sounds with apparently little effort. When he does raise his arms higher, as he does in his first encore – Rachmaninoff’s mighty Prelude in C sharp minor Op.3 No.2 – the impact on the audience is almost overwhelming: for a while one stops breathing and blinking one’s eyes. But Ohlsson also plays the softest and gentlest of melodies with sublime skill, and his second encore sends the audience home with a dreamy performance of Debussy’s ever popular Clair de Lune: perfect legato, nothing percussive, gentleness in strength. A massage for the psyche.
Ohlsson’s playing is a force of nature, and it is simply to be marvelled at and held in awe.
Ohlsson’s program is varied and includes Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No.11 in B flat major, Op.22, and Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No.6 in A, Op.82 before the interval. The second half of the program is entirely devoted to Chopin and includes Impromptu No.2 in F sharp, Op.36, Etudes, Op 25, Nos. 5-10, the exquisitely beautiful Berceuse, Op. 57, and the Scherzo in C sharp minor, Op 39.
The diverse program allowed Ohlsson to demonstrate his technical brilliance and profound musicianship, but the Adelaide Festival audience likely would have appreciated a program that had a little more ‘fire power’ in it. Although neither Beethoven’s Op.22 nor the Chopin Etudes are frequently heard performed by a virtuoso on the concert platform, at least in Adelaide, the Prokofiev piano sonatas are heard too infrequently.
Ohlsson’s performance of Prokofiev’s Op.82 is the highlight of the evening. Music should stand on its own merits, and knowing the ‘back story’ to a composition should not be necessary for one to enjoy it. However, knowing something of Prokofiev’s context at the time the sonata was written adds to the enjoyment. It was written during WWII and Prokofiev, like many other composers, was deeply impacted and not just artistically. Ohlsson manages the sonata’s discordance, abrupt changes of meter, rhythm and dynamics with consummate skill and allows Prokofiev’s feelings about the contradictions of a world at war to break through.
Ohlsson is a recognised Chopin expert, and has recorded Chopin’s entire piano oeuvre. Ohlsson’s performances of the six selected Etudes are an object lesson in technique and demonstrate precisely how trills and arpeggios should be played with evenness of touch even at speed. Etude No.7 was especially beautiful: perhaps there is something about Ohlsson and the key of C sharp minor, for the Scherzo that finished the program and the Rachmaninoff encore were also high moments of the concert. The Berceuse was extraordinary: such delicacy, feeling and controlled strength from a man capable of the most bravura performance.
Musica Viva has again curated a superb concert, and the large audience left the Town Hall knowing it had experienced greatness in action.
Kym Clayton
When: Closed
Where: Adelaide Town Hall
Bookings: Closed
Selby and Friends. Elder Hall, University of Adelaide. 1 Mar 2020.
Selby and Friends concerts are relaxed: Kathryn Selby (or one of her associates) speaks amiably to the audience from the stage about the music we are about to hear, idiosyncrasies about the structure of the concert, and… ‘housekeeping’. Today she thanked the Adelaide Harmony Choir for again providing the catering for afternoon tea, and noted that today’s concert – entitled A Tale of Two Cities – featured music created in two of the world’s greatest cultural hubs of the 18th and 19th centuries, Vienna and St Petersburg. She mused that with travel restrictions the way they are in today’s world (think corona virus), we could use the music to imagine being in these far flung corners of the world. The audience tittered, settled back and relaxed into an outstanding programme.
Mozart’s Piano Trio No.5 in C, K.548 is less complex than his earlier trios, and was composed later in his career. Selby, on piano, combined beautifully in the cantabile second movement with Emily Sun (violin) and particularly with Clancy Newman (cello), and did not dominate, which on occasions was almost the case in the first movement. Newman was particularly eloquent in the cantabile and produced warm and lush tones. Selby’s pedalling was authoritative and any piano student in the audience witnessed an object lesson in legato playing. Sublime.
Brahms wrote his Trio in A Minor for clarinet, cello and piano, Op.114, after being inspired by the playing of clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld. The combined timbre of this combination of instruments presents compositional challenges, and the repertoire deriving from the romantic period is comparatively thin. Many more pieces have emerged since the 1900s as musical styles and tastes have changed. The robust gypsy-style of the allegro fourth movement of Brahms’ Trio is particularly pleasing to a modern ear, and Selby and Sun combined well to draw out its spiky rhythms. Benjamin Mellefont on clarinet plays with the confidence of someone who is at the top of his game.
The second half of the program wrenched us from German traditions to Russian styles, and Stravinsky’s Suite from L’Histoire du Soldat (for violin, clarinet and piano) demonstrated to us that the combination of instruments truly has something special to offer. Selby, Sun, Newman and Mellefont individually and collectively shine during their bravura performances of this exciting work. Their timing and articulation is precise, and the dialogues between the instruments are passionate but never self-serving. Mellefont and Newman somehow create an uncommon concordance from the two instruments.
The excitement continues with a lush and richly layered performance of Arensky’s Piano Trio in D minor, Op.32 No.1. The piece teems with lyrical melodies which are echoed across the work, but it is the painfully beautiful third movement which is marked elegia/adagio. The piano and cello sustain a dream-like quality to which the violin adds empathetic embellishment showing Sun at her best. Selby’s delicate and light treatment throughout the movement is a highlight of the afternoon. The fourth movement draws the whole piece together and is explosive and sternly unrelenting. The tension that is evident on the faces of the musicians says it all, and its release at the final chord is palpable as they smile beamingly at each other and accept the applause from the large admiring audience.
Kym Clayton
When: Closed in SA, but playing until 8 Mar in other states.
Where: Adelaide Town Hall
Bookings: selbyandfriends.com.au
Adelaide Symphony Orchestra. Adelaide Town Hall. 8 Feb 2020
With its majestic and upbeat opening fanfare, Shostakovich’s Festive Overture, Op.96 impressively proclaims the opening of the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra’s 2020 season and exhorts Adelaide audiences to “create a space for music”! The adventure begins, and what a beginning it is!
The Festive Overture, along with Rimsky-Korsakov’s symphonic suite Scheherazade, Op.35 (which closed out the concert), both provide ample opportunity for the various principals in the orchestra to shine, and they do! Principal clarinet Dean Newcombe is in sparkling form in the Shostakovich, and almost every principal has their moment in the spotlight at various times throughout the Rimsky-Korsakov. Special kudos goes to concertmaster Natsuko Yoshimoto who played the pivotal violin solos in Scheherazade, and it was fitting that at the end of the concert guest conductor Hendrik Vestmann gave Yoshimoto first acknowledgement. This is her final season with the Adelaide Symphony, and every concert in which she performs is to be savoured.
Vestmann’s approach to the entire program is one of precise articulation, in which every dynamic change is used to great effect, and every pause and briefest moment of silence is an emphatic musical statement itself. Scheherazade, always an audience favourite, was delivered with excitement and style. His enunciated approach to the opening of Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D, Op.35, featuring Grace Clifford on violin, is almost unexpected, but it works, and Clifford echo’s Vestmann’s precision but not in a studied or stifled way. Clifford injects great feeling into her interpretation of this much loved concerto (even though it was abhorred on debut), and the results are astonishing. Her playing is firm and technically precise, but it has heart and is not restrained. She appears ‘delicate’ on the concert stage, almost awkward – she always has – but deep within rages musical passion and understanding that results in extended periods of absolute harmonious beauty. This performance sees Clifford raise the stakes a notch – she is still in the ascendant and her next appearance with the Adelaide Symphony is eagerly anticipated!
A great start to the season! The next Master Series concert will feature Yoshimoto playing the Brahms Violin Concerto on April 3 and 4. Not to be missed.
Kym Clayton
When: 8 Feb
Where: Adelaide Town Hall
Bookings: Closed
Musica Viva. Adelaide Town Hall. 7 Nov 2019
The Skride Piano Quartet is a relatively new ensemble having been formed barely three years ago by sisters Baiba (violin) and Lauma Skride (on piano). They are accompanied by Julian Steckel (cello), who only joined the quartet very recently, and Lise Berthaud (viola).
All four artists are individually accomplished and have busy concert diaries, but individual talent alone does not necessarily make for a successful ensemble. However, in this case, the Skride Piano Quartet richly deserves its accolades and reputation as a “supergroup”. Their whole is greater than the sum of the parts, and the technical virtuosity, sensitivity, thoughtfulness and unfussed nature of their music making is quite simply a joy to behold.
The ‘Skrides’ are touring Australia with two programs for Musica Viva, and the Adelaide audience enjoyed pieces by Beethoven, Brahms and a new composition by Adelaide based composer and music pedagogue Graeme Koehne. As with all Musica Viva concerts, the programming is varied and thought provoking.
Beethoven’s Piano Quartet no 1 in E-flat major, WoO 36 is infrequently heard in concert halls and was written when Beethoven was only fifteen years old. Being such a youthful composition, it is at times ‘raw’ and lacks the musical sophistication of the master’s later works, but its very nature gives license to the performers to ‘cut loose’ and let their individuality shine. Lauma Skride was ebullient on piano from the outset and encouraged sprightly readings from the strings. In the allegro con spirito second movement Lauma extracted delightful bell-like tones from the Steinway.
For many in the audience, Koehne’s new composition Socrates’ Garden was the highlight of the program, and this tour sees it making its world première. Commissioned for Musica Viva by Tom Breen and Rachel Kohn, and inspired by their 40-hectare garden estate in the Blue Mountains, Socrates Garden is a tonal meditative work that is fundamentally driven by melody and an infectious recurring leitmotif. It begins delicately with broken chords on the piano and is then joined by the violin and then the outer strings. The listener is quickly soothed into contemplative thought and the music inexorably encourages deeper questioning and striving towards more sophisticated and refined ideas before settling towards a conclusion. Koehne was present at the concert and acknowledged the audience’s deep felt appreciation in his usual self-effacing way.
The concert concluded with a garden-fresh reading of Brahms’ Piano Quartet no 1 in G minor, op 25, which features the ever popular so-called ‘Gypsy Rondo’ in the final movement. Aspects of the composition garnered some reasonably terse criticism in its day, but the Rondo alla Zingarese guaranteed its instant and lasting success. The Skrides avoid a heavy handed approach, which can often dog performances of Brahms’ music, and phrasing and dynamic balance throughout were thoughtful and well-constructed with Brahms’ rich melodies always at the forefront.
Yet another enjoyable concert presented by Musica Viva.
Kym Clayton
When: 7 Nov
Where: Adelaide Town Hall
Bookings: Closed