Signum Saxophone Quartet & Kristian Winther

Musica Viva. Adelaide Town Hall. 10 Nov 2022

The acclaimed Germany-based Signum Saxophone Quartet is making its debut tour of Australia, and their playing and artistry is revelatory.

The quartet comprises Blaž Kemperle (playing soprano saxophone), Jacopo Taddei (alto), who is replacing Hayrapet Arakelyan on this tour, Alan Lužar (tenor), and Guerino Bellarosa (baritone). It is rare to see and hear classical saxophone on an Australian concert stage, let alone four of them. (Perhaps the last such concert in Adelaide was by Australian virtuoso saxophonist Amy Dickson with the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra back in 2018?)

Tonight’s concert in the Adelaide Town Hall was enthusiastically received by the modestly-sized audience, and they likely didn’t really know what they were in for. This reviewer certainly wasn’t! What we got was a diverse program that included JS Bach’s Italian Concerto, Kurt Weill’s seldom-heard Concerto for Violin and Wind Orchestra, Gershwin’s Three Preludes, Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances (from West Side Story), and Chick Corea’s Spain. All pieces were of course arrangements for saxophone quartet, with violin in the Weill.

Notably, the Weill concerto was arranged by well-respected Australian composer Jessica Wells as part of the Hildegard Project, which is an Australian initiative that advocates women composers. (Wells has orchestrated over seventy films, written chamber operas and underscores for plays, and …. the theme for ABC TV’s Q&A program!)

The concert began with Bach’s ever popular Italian Concerto, BWV971, which has been much arranged for other instruments. Originally written for a two-manual harpsichord, and nowadays mostly heard on piano, it is a three movement work in which Bach imitated the style of contrasting different instruments found in an ensemble. Tonight’s arrangement by Japanese saxophone virtuoso Katsuki Tochio captures Bach’s intent, especially in the allegro and andante movements, with stunning articulation, phrasing and dynamic control by the baritone and soprano saxophones. The presto movement is arguably the least successful arrangement, with individual voicing at times overemphasising the contrapuntal nature of the piece.

Kurt Weill is best known for his score of Threepenny Opera written by Bertolt Brecht, which includes the hit song Mack the Knife. He also wrote other satirical musicals for Broadway, such as The Seven Deadly Sins, and other iconic songs, such as Surabaya Jonny that is a favourite of various chanteuses (recently sung by Meow Meow in her Adelaide Cabaret Festival show Pandemonium). Weill’s violin concerto is altogether of a different ilk. Originally scored for violin and wind ensemble with percussion, it is a difficult composition to grapple with, at least on a first listening. It is largely atonal, punchy and percussive, and melody is excitingly elusive. Australian violinist Kristian Winther played the violin, with masterful displays of double stopping and deft bowing to produce diaphanous shimmering sounds in the serenata. The tussle between soloist and orchestra that is usually evident in a concerto was discernible in the final movement, but the saxophones never overshadowed the violin. The audience loved it.

The second half of the program contrasted compositions of Gershwin, Bernstein and Corea, and appealed to what we all instinctively think of as the ‘right type’ of music for saxophone. The arrangements, with some by ‘the Signums’ themselves (is that an acceptable abbreviation?) are superb. Gershwin’s Preludes were written for solo piano, and are strongly jazz infused requiring articulation and precision but with an extemporised ‘feel’. The Signum’s provided all of that in spade loads. The moodiness and sultriness of the andante prelude was just sublime.

Sylvain Dedenon’s arrangement of Bernstein’s Symphonic Dances are first rate, and this evening’s performance was a standout. So good are the arrangements, and so accomplished is the playing by the Signums, that one could believe there were many more instruments on stage. For example, in Tonight, Kemperle on soprano saxophone produced sounds that were uncannily like a flute that captured the yearning nature of the song. The tempo in America was spirited and relentless, and the Signum’s demonstrated exquisite breath control and crystalline articulation. I Feel Pretty exuded coquettishness. Somewhere began with an evocative alto start, but the arrangement seems busier and more complex than needed, at least initially.

The concert finished off with an exciting arrangement of Chick Corea’s Spain, which begins with substantial quotations from Concerto de Aranjuez by the Spanish composer Joaquín Rodrigo before it metamorphoses into something that is more Latin infused. It finishes with an exuberant upbeat that seemingly asks a question begging to be answered, but isn’t except by the exuberant applause and whistling from a highly appreciative audience.

Again, Musica Viva has pulled another musical rabbit out of the bag. Superb programming!

Kym Clayton

When: Closed in Adelaide

Where: Adelaide Town Hall

Bookings: musicaviva.com.au - Performances available in other states 

Avi Avital & Konstantin Shamray

Musica Vivia. Adelaide Town Hall. 6 Oct 2022

Israeli virtuoso mandolinist Avi Avital is no stranger to our shores – he has wowed Australian audiences on other occasions with his luminous musicality. On this occasion Musica Viva was to tour him with renowned Italian composer and cellist Giovanni Sollima, but sadly the ever present COVID menace put those plans to the sword, with Sollima unfortunately contracting the virus and therefore unable to travel.

However, Adelaide-based pianist Konstantin Shamray (or ‘Saint’ Konstantin, as Avital affectionately quipped from the podium) stepped in at relatively short notice and worked with Avital to prepare a new program for the tour. Our political and civic leaders talk about the need for us to be increasingly agile and flexible in these troubled times, and it seems our artists should be no exception. Avital and Shamray are clear examples of that, thank goodness!

The program planned with Sollima clearly had to change – it was never a case of the piano merely replacing the cello. This reviewer has not heard duets for cello and mandolin ever before, but Vivaldi’s Concerto for Mandolin, Strings and Basso Continuo in C Major RV425 perhaps gives a clue about how cello/mandolin duets might sound. The modern grand piano has the potential to overwhelm the delicate sound of the mandolin, but in the ever capable and supremely musical hands of Shamray, this did not occur.

At the start of the seventy-minute non-stop concert, Avital and Shamray assuredly take to the stage and no sooner are they seated than a brisk nod from Shamray launches them into an arrangement of Romanian Folk dances by Béla Bartók. Shamray extracts light bell-like tones from the piano, and Avital plays with lightness and purity of tone as he weaves through the varying textures and rhythms.

The collection of dances demonstrate the potential for collaboration between the piano and mandolin, and this potential is tested by an arrangement of Mozart’s Violin Sonata No. 21 in E Minor, K.304. This piece is well known and the combination of violin and piano works well, but the substitution of the mandolin for the violin often seems to deprive the piece of its gentle-heartedness and melancholy. Shamray compensates for this potential deficit with a delightful gentleness in his touch where necessary and allows Avital to become the focus of attention when required. The piece finishes with a strong flourish from both instruments and the audience loves it.

The Mozart is followed by the first of two solo brackets from Avital, in which he performs a work by Sollima himself. It allows Avital to demonstrate aspects of his virtuosity with simultaneous pizzicato of the double strings with the left hand and playing a form of ponticello with the right. Later in the program Avital plays a most interesting piece written in 15/16 meter (“almost 4/4” he again quips!) which is frenetic and has an irresistible momentum that keeps the audience pushing forward in their seats. It finishes with an almost nonchalant strum and the audience erupts in exuberant applause and wolf whistles!

Avital and Shamray’s performance of Manuel de Falla’s popular Seven Spanish Songs is interesting. It is not entirely clear whether the vocal line is simply taken over by the mandolin with the piano accompaniment played ‘as written’, or whether the arrangement is somewhat more ambitions and includes the two instruments sharing the vocal and accompaniment roles. Whatever the case, the result is infectious. Some of the songs more obviously evoke Spanishness, such as the third– Asturiana – in which Avital produces the most evocative and beautiful yearning melodies. In the last song – Polo – the almost violent strumming of the mandolin is contrasted with the close interweaving of Shamray’s hands on the keyboard as he essays incredibly dense chords.

The concert concludes with three Israeli dance tunes that provide a final demonstration that the unusual pairing of mandolin and piano can produce musical magic, at least in the hands of two virtuosos. In the first dance the piano is decisive and the mandolin is more subservient, but in the second the focus carefully moves backwards and forwards between the two instruments, with careful and empathetic playing from both musicians – each alert to the needs of the other. This culminates in almost wanton enthusiasm in the third dance and final piece of the program, and the audience is so excited that it is almost on its feet! Some did.

Kym Clayton

When: Closed

Where: Adelaide Town Hall

Bookings: Closed

Hoodoo Gurus

With special guests the Dandy Warhols and Even. Frontier Touring. Adelaide Entertainment Centre. 20 Sep 2022

Three bands and three amazing stories to tell. This was a night of music for the purists and Hoodoo Guru’s Dave Faulkner knew it.

‘We’re a stadium rock band and this is – uhhhh – almost a stadium,’ he quipped of the reduced circumstances of the Adelaide Entertainment Centre’s Theatre setting. So that meant about 1200 people got a night in a cavernous space which comprised a stage, lots of lights and a big PA system, and lots of standing room.

First, Even. Melbourne’s Even are one of the criminally underrated bands in our history; a vehicle for the musical output of guitarist Ashley Naylor. If you’ve seen Aussie music anytime in the last 25 years you’ve seen Naylor, gun for hire with Rockwiz, Spicks N Specks, The Bull Sisters and pretty much any other Melbourne based music outfit. I got inside as they launched into 1998’s Black Umbrella, a jaunty pop guitar number which evokes the era of The Kinks and The Beatles. It expresses the band’s style perfectly, and shows why the era has such fascination for Naylor and the band; Matthew Cotter on drums and Wally Kempton on bass guitar.

Calling onstage guitarist friend Anton, they launched into Dandy Stomp, a twin guitar attack bringing an enhanced sound which I thought more closely resembled The Smithereens, themselves power pop royalty. By the time they finished an admittedly short set with Chase The Sunset (from their latest album 2021’s Reverse Light Years) and the apocrypha of Rock ‘n Roll Saved My Life – brilliant to the end, they showed their class to all.

I’ve never been utterly convinced by the Dandy Warhols schtick, the slacker stoner sonic equivalent of a racehorse forever held back to the canter. Even so, I’d never deny the upbeat joyfulness of the melody of Not If You Were The Last Junkie On Earth and Bohemian Like You: more about them to come.

It begins with a mood - a swath of cobalt blue light, washing the stage in a cooling blur of sonic extravaganza, synths and distorted feedback loops from guitars whose pickups have been tweaked to extract every last milliamp of texture. In Godless, the light was the sound, the blue wash became a shrieking mauve, a stab of white, then a muffled roar of blue light returns. This band trade in rumbling psychedelica, less Primal Scream and more Jesus & Mary Chain, though the effect suggests perhaps the opposite… extended passages where all the instrumentation is compressed and gated then fed back across the stage in sheets of reverberation, the bottom end tightly controlled by Zia McCabe at her riser and surrounded by electronics. Courtney Taylor-Taylor works the vocal lines through two different microphones, incidentally.

The mood changes at about song four. McCabe comes to front of stage and takes up the bass guitar, suddenly the tempo changes and there are three vocalists for Not If You Were The Last Junkie On Earth. Drummer Brent DeBoer astounds, supplying vocal through the most demanding passages. The change in vocal fortunes makes all the difference as the tempo lifts and all the songs become hits. We Used To Be Friends, Get Off and Bohemian Like You all make an appearance. Compelling, and possibly mesmerising.

When the Hoodoo Gurus take the stage it becomes immediately clear they mean business. It would be trite to describe this – their final tour – as a purists gig, largely because it seems difficult to draw a bead on who the average Gurus fan is, depending on what part of their music career is involved. It seems much clearer with other bands; you’re either a Midnight Oil fan or you’re not. Hunters & Collectors, similarly. Ditto Barnes, Farnham… Faulkner…?

Arguably Dave Faulkner has penned more hits than most of the rest of them, and tonight they come tumbling out, one follows another as a series of ‘oh yeah’ moments. This is a band who entered our national psyche with My Girl and stole the soundtrack to summer with the anthemic Like Wow -Wipeout, from 1984. How quickly they became part of the scene.

Emerging from the punk rock swamp of Perth, Le Hoodoo Gurus headed East to Sydney in the early 1980s. By the 1990s and 2000s they had become a power pop act, but tonight, in a surprise to beat all, they have decided to plumb the depths, a more muscular guitar at 11, overdrive pedals on 11 Hoodoo Gurus than I could have imagined.

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn… Nik Rieth powers the back end like it’s meant to be, hitting his floor tom with real authority. Bassist Rick Grossman is implacable, squeezing the neck of his instrument. Faulkner and guitarist Brad Shepherd appear gleeful, swapping lines, and the interplay between to two is almost telepathic.

World Of Pain, a single from this year is the opening number before Faulkner chuckles ‘you don’t wanna hear the new stuff’ and launches Tojo (Never Made It To Darwin) from their debut album Stoneage Romeos (1982). A confession. I suspect I’m the only person in the crowd who was at that album launch show at the Strawberry Hills Hotel in Sydney, forty years ago. The ringing Tojo is followed by 1993’s The Right Time and 2022’s Save My Soul and then back to Death Defying (oh-wee) from 1986.

Suddenly, a song I never thought I’d hear them play – Dig It Up – is amazingly powerful, leads to In The Wild and then to I Want You Back. This is a Hoodoo Gurus show for the ages, one to savour. It has the stomp, the swagger, the rough edges of a pub band in full flight such as I thought had been largely lost. And towards the end, Bittersweet, Miss Freelove ’69, 1000 Miles Away and then, as a way of vexing the newcomers, I Was A Kamikaze Pilot, another one from that absurd debut album, Stoneage Romeos. And there was still an encore to come: Be My Guru, What’s My Scene? and then Like Wow – Wipeout provided the perfect close to a really special night. I hope it also seemed that way from the stage.

Alex Wheaton

When: Closed

Where: Adelaide Entertainment Centre Theatre

Bookings: Closed

Z.E.N. Trio

Musica Viva. The Adelaide Town Hall. 25 Aug 2022

The comprehensive, informative and readable program notes provided by Musica Viva tell us that Z.E.N is an acronym formed with an initial from each artist of the trio, and a philosophical statement about their performance style. Zhang Zuo on piano, Esther Yoo on violin, and Narek Hakhnazaryan on cello are three young artists – all on the right side of 35 years of age – who are clearly at the top of their game. They play with passion, technical virtuosity, and crucially a shared understanding of the music. Individually they are accomplished; together they are much greater than the sum of their parts.

At the half way point of the concert, they played young Australian composer Matthew Laing’s new composition Little Cataclysms, the performances of which are world premières on this particular Musica Viva tour. Laing himself was present at tonight’s performance and offered some introductory comments about his music. His words essentially alerted the audience to the fact that what they were about to hear would be entirely different to the style of compositions that bookended it on the program, namely Brahms’ Piano Trio No.1 in B major, Op. 9 (Revised version, 1889), and Babajanian’s Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello in F-sharp Minor (1952), and he was right.

Little Cataclysms comprises five short non-related pieces that are strident and unsettling. The instruments in the trio are asked to frequently produce sounds that are at their limits and otherwise seldomly heard. It begins with Zhang Zuo attacking the piano as if it is a mainstream percussion instrument, and Esther Yoo and Narek Hakhnazaryan produce shimmering tonal undercurrents that can barely be heard above the boisterousness of the piano. There is a monotonously repeated note on the piano, and the strings nervously dance about it. Complexity is added. There are teasing suggestions of melody, but these are not developed and give way to other material that is ominous. Each piece seems to be over before it really begins, but this is deliberate. Perhaps it’s a metaphor for the fractured times in which we live, with the need to be agile and able to adapt to rapid change?

To what extent does Z.E.N. capture Laing’s intentions? Do Zuo, Yoo, and Hakhnazaryan really ‘know’? Is it just a matter of reading what’s on the page, or, in the true spirit of Zen practise, do they eschew the egotism of ‘learned’ knowledge and instead favour direct understanding developed through individual performance? To this reviewer, the latter seems more likely, with the five ‘little cataclysms’ each comprising three disparate voices that retreat into and exist unto themselves, and together create a chaos that is just in control.

Laing’s Little Cataclysms is followed by Babajanian’s Trio for Piano, Violin and Cello in F-sharp Minor (1952). Arno Babajanian was an Armenian composer who died in 1983 in Yerevan – the capital and largest city of Armenia – some five years before Narek Hakhnazaryan was born in Yerevan. Babajanian’s Trio is infrequently played today, which is a great shame. It is majestic, has wonderfully evocative melodies and an astonishingly beautiful middle slow movement, and it has a robust and stirring allegro vivace final movement. Hakhnazaryan noted in his introductory remarks how honoured he is to bring his countryman’s composition to our attention, and he played it with deep conviction. He is a joy to watch.

The concert began with a spirited performance of Brahms’ Piano Trio No.1 in B major, Op. 9 (Revised version, 1889). Z.E.N. immediately captured the joy and lyricism of the first movement. Zhang Zuo‘s use of the sustaining pedal is dramatic and theatrical, with her radically high-heeled shoes all but punishing the pedal into submission. Yoo provides the tonal backbone throughout, and Hakhnazaryan fleshes it out with expansive and lavish tones.

The Z.E.N. Trio is an exciting outfit, and the enthusiastic audience demanded an encore which they got: a feisty performance of a transcription for trio of Sabre Dance by Armenian composer Aram Ilyich Khachaturian.

Kym Clayton

When: Closed

Where: Adelaide Town Hall

Bookings: Closed