Oberon's Glade

Tag: Paul Hall

  • Duo Gagnant: French Music for Two Pianos

    Maxresdefault

    Wednesday September 21st, 2016 – Dan K Kurland invited me to this concert of French music – from the familiar to the relatively obscure – for two pianos at Juilliard’s Paul Hall. The program looked very inviting, and since dance themes prevailed throughout the hour-long presentation, it was especially agreeable to have choreographer Claudia Schreier sitting next to me.

    We arrived just moments before the house lights dimmed; Paul Hall was nearly full, and we found seats in the front row, in the aisle. The balance of sound may have been slightly off, but it was a very interesting perspective visually.

    ~ POULENC L’embarquement pour Cynthère
    Pianists: Dan K Kurland and Jonathan Feldman

    Opening with this 1951 Poulenc gem – music that is so quintessentially French – the tone for the entire evening was set. Described as a Valse-Musette, this piece delights from its vivacious start to its ironic finish. Though Dan Kurland was not originally schedule to play tonight, he did…and wore red socks into the bargain, a subtle nod to a beloved French pianist. Joining Dan was Jonathan Feldman, chairman of Juilliard’s Collaborative Piano Department, making for a brilliant performance. 

    ~ DEBUSSY Prélude à l’après-midi d’une faune
    Pianists: Michał Biel and Brian Zeger

    Shifting moods, we are plunged into the erotic mystery of Claude Debussy’s Prélude à l’après-midi d’une faune in a splendid performance by Michal Biel and Brian Zeger. The composer completed his symphonic poem Afternoon of a Faun in 1894, and published a version for two pianos the following year. In a rapture-inducing performance of perfumed sonorities, the two pianists beautifully summoned up the music’s alternating currents of delicacy and turbulent passion. I so enjoyed seeing Brian Zeger again, here in the hall where I first heard him play many moons ago. 

    ~ FRANÇAIX Huit Dances Exotiques
    Pianists: Cherie Roe and Arthur Williford

    Dating from 1957, these eight miniatures represent the “newest” music on the program. Pianists Cherie Roe and Arthur Williford jumped right into the music hall swing-and-sway of the opening Pambiche. Sprightly syncopation and etched-in miniature glissandi delighted us in Baiao, and more syncopation followed in Nube gris; both here and in the lively Merengue that follows, sudden endings took us by surprise. The rolling rhythm of the Mambo was further enhanced by a mid-song change of key. Both the urbane, casually shrugging Samba and the bouncy swirl of the Malambeano caught us off-guard by ending in mid air. The final Rock ‘n’ Roll, wryly jazzy, would have caused my old friend Franky to exclaim, “This is so jive!” The two pianists seemed to be having a blast with this music.   

    ~ CHAMINADE Duo Symphonique
    Pianists: Dror Baitel and Nathan Raskin

    Cécile Chaminade, the sole female composer to be included on this evening’s program, wrote her Duo Symphonique in 1905. Of all the music heard this evening, this was the most traditionally “classical” in feeling. It opens operatically, runs on to swirls of notes and later to fanfare-like motifs. The highest and lowest registers of the piano are explored, the vast range adding to the truly symphonic quality of the piece: “…lyrical grandeur…” was one of my descriptive scrawls. A more delicate theme heralds a song-like interlude, followed by a build-up and an a grandiose finale. I loved every minute of it, and was very impressed by the expert playing of Dror Baitel and Nathan Raskin. 

    ~ SAINT-SAËNS Danse Macabre
    Pianists: Jinhee Park and Ho Jae Lee

    Saint-Saëns’ Danse Macabre is a musical setting of a poem by the French poet Henri Cazalis, based on the allegory of the ‘dance of death’. Pianists Ho Jae Lee and Jinhee Park maintained communication across the pianos, which in their sleek blackness took on a coffin-like aspect. The music rises from the depths to jangling heights, descending passages seem to point to the grave (or to hell), and at one point the very lowest notes of the keyboard resound. Becoming wildly dramatic, the music speeds up before turning more pensive and ending in sudden death. The audience took special delight in this piece, and in the two players. 

    ~ DEBUSSY Petite Suite
    Pianists: Katelan Terrell and Michał Biel

    Debussy’s Petite Suite was published in its original four-hands version in 1889; transcriptions for solo piano and for violin and piano followed in 1906. The work found great popularity in a 1907 adaptation for chamber orchestra by Henri Büsser. Tonight the four-hands version was played by Katelan Terrell and Michal Biel, seated together at a single keyboard. Commencing in dreamy softness, the suite continues with evocations of Spring, very slight tinges of gypsy allure, contrasts of rhythm and lull, and bursts of joyous rippling in the higher range which maintain brightness. The final movement seems very ‘Parisian’, and, after an interlude, we are carried back to the boulevards by our two sophisticated pianists.

    ~ RAVEL La Valse
    Pianists: Sora Jung and Adam Rothenberg

    Best known (especially to Balanchine admirers) in its orchestral version, Ravel’s La Valse was transcribed by the composer twice, once for solo piano and again for two pianos. The first performance of the piano duo version was given at the home of Misia Sert, with Ravel himself one of the pianists. Misia, one of my favorite characters in the history of music and dance, was the work’s dedicatee. Among those present at Misia’s salon for the premiere performance were Serge Diaghilev, Igor Stravinsky, Francis Poulenc, and Léonide Massine: how I wish I could have been there! 

    The mystery of the opening of La Valse loomed up from the depths as pianists Sora Jung and Adam Rothenberg launched their intense and remarkable performance. At last the waltz struggles to the surface, and the two pianists delight in flinging myriad colours onto the sonic canvas. Thunderous intrusions alternate with madly ironic swirls of dance. This is music on the verge of madness. 

    Throughout the Ravel, images of two beloved dancers – Janie Taylor and Sébastien Marcovici – overtook my imagination: they danced this Balanchine masterwork at their New York City Ballet farewell performance in 2014.

    Tonight, as all the pianists appeared for a bow on the stage of Paul Hall at the end of the concert, an exuberant standing ovation greeted them. A really wonderful evening!

  • Dual-ing Pianos @ Juilliard’s Paul Hall

    Steinway_piano

    Thursday September 26th, 2013 – Students and faculty members from Juilliard’s Collaborative Piano Department joined forces in a really enjoyable concert at Paul Hall tonight. The Department’s pianists had decided that, in addition to playing for singers and instrumentalists, they wanted to work together on music written for two pianos or piano four-hands. They gave their first programme last season and tonight theye were back for Round Two.

    Paul Hall is a special place for me. Having attended a few concerts there on my visits from Hartford many years ago, I started going frequently once I had moved the NYC in 1998. It was at Paul Hall that I first heard my remarkable contralto-friend Makiko Narumi as well as many other Juiliard singers who have gone on to successful careers. Following Makiko’s untimely death in 2002, I found it difficult to sit in Paul Hall, for all the memories the place stirred up. I mostly stopped attending performances there, and it wasn’t until May 2012 that I felt comfortable in the space again: a superb all-Britten programme evening with tenor Spencer Lang and pianist Dan Kurland seemed – in an odd way – a benediction to my friendship with Makiko; she would not have wanted me mourning her ten years after the fact.

    It was in fact Dan Kurland who told me about tonight’s Dual-ing Pianos programme. I’ve never seen such a big crowd in Paul Hall before; I sat in my customary seat – third row on the aisle – and thoroughly enjoyed every moment of this excellent presentation.

    Music spanning two centuries – from Mozart to Lutoslawski – was performed. After brief opening remarks from the head of the Collaborative Piano Department, Jonathan Feldman, the music commenced and rolled onward for 75 minutes without interruption; seven pieces were performed, nicely placed on the programme to emphasize the contrasting styles of the composers. The audience were attentive and appreciative, and the sound coming from the two Steinways was rich and evocative.

    Aaron Copland’s EL SALON MEXICO in a two-piano arrangement was played by Kristen Doering and Art Williford. Bright fanfares evolve into a swaying dancelike passage; a big rhythmic section melts into a gentle romanza which leads to another animated section. The fanfares return, and there is a motif of almost childish naïveté before the boisterous conclusion. This arrangement – and indeed every piece on the programme – would make an excellent dancework.

    Mozart’s Fugue for Two Pianos in C minor was performed by Margo Garrett and Jonathan Feldman, both of the Juilliard Faculty. Evoking  Bach, the work was wonderfully pleasing to experience in this intimate setting. I was very curious about Ms. Garrett’s score, which had an charming binder and in which the music seemed to appear in columns rather than full pages. 

    Darius Milhaud’s Scaramouche suite received a colourful performance by Juliana Han and Jung A Bang. The opening movement, Vif, has an almost music-hall quality; the second, Modéré, begins with a ‘classic’ feel which gives way to a rather wistful melody. In the concluding Brazileira – a full-tilt Latin dance number – the two girls played with enormous vitality.

    Robert Schumann’s Andante and Variations brought forth pianists Luis Ortiz and Miles Fellenberg, playing beautifully. The variations flow like the unwinding of a silken ribbon of melody, with the shifting rhythms and colours playing on our emotions; the final dreamy passage was particularly lovely.

    In Witold Lutoslawski’s Paganini Variations, the familiar strand of melody was marvelously corrupted by the 20th-century Polish composer, giving the music an off-kilter and nightmarish quality. Pianists Siyi Fang and Ari Livne did a brilliant job with this darkly luminous piece.

    Brian Zeger is a pianist I have long admired; tonight he and Bretton Brown played the evening’s only work for piano-hands – and the last work Franz Schubert composed in that genre: the Rondo in A major, D 951. Their playing had great clarity and purity of expression and was a highlight of the programe.

    The evening came to a conclusion with four pianists playing CARMEN Fantasy, arranged by Mack Wilberg. Dan Kurland and Raymond Wong were at one Steinway, Jung A Band and Zsolt Balogh at the other. This wild and wonderful piece draws on familiar themes from Georges Bizet’s opera: the Toreodor Song, the Habanera, the Act II prelude, and Carmen’s ‘Chanson Boheme’. Relentlessly paced and filled with cunning dissonances, this could be the soundtrack for a Hollywood horror film (Micaela’s Nightmare?). It brought the concert to a rousing conclusion, and had me humming the ‘Chanson Boheme’ all the way home on the A train.