BERKELEY SYMPHONY'S MODERNS, AND A NOTABLE PODIUM GUEST 
<>                                              By Paul Hertelendy 
        artssf.com, the independent observer of San Francisco Bay Area music and dance 
                                                                 Week of De. 9-16, 2011
                                                                  Vol. 14, No. 29
            BERKELEY---A significant modern program, a fast-rising guest conductor, and a paucity of music critics marked the Berkeley Symphony’s concert before a sizable Zellerbach Hall audience Dec. 8.
            The diversity of sound effects by a string orchestra these days appears almost infinite. The highly inventive Chinese-American composer Lei Liang, 39, weighed in with “Verge” (2009) for an antiphonally divided group of 18 string soloists. We get something close to a handbook of contemporary string techniques, with unearthly shimmers and high squeals, going from pizzicato to a rushing like a torrential river. There’s rapid scurrying of strings, bowing below the bridge (somewhere between a hum and a groan) and fast glissandi, even a few melismas suggesting Chinese roots. The net effect of “Verge” is a sparkling stimulus over 11 minutes, with hardly any bowing or harmony at all, but a lot of ear-tingling effects.
            “There’s half the orchestra missing, because of Occupy Salzburg,” quipped the BSO’s new executive director, René Mandel, in his introduction, alluding to the various on-going Occupy protests currently on both sides of the Bay Area.
            The late Californian Lou Harrison (1917-2003) embraced musical traditions from the Far East perhaps more than any one. And in his Piano Concerto of 1985 (not to be confused with his Piano Concerto with Gamelan), using a conventional string orchestra plus trombones, he used the familiar pitter-pat of timeless Javanese court ensembles, reminiscent of orderly processional music of long-gone sultans and kings.
            His relatively contourless work, superimposed on a calm pacific sea, comes vehemently to life in the animated “Stampede” section, recalling  the European troubadors’ “estampies.” Here the pianist calls on the octave bar---a stamper which depresses an octave’s worth of notes simultaneously---and occasionally depresses an even wider swath with the right forearm across the keys. The work profits greatly from these jolts before reverting to the tranquil mode of the lyrical Largo and the perpetual motion of the finale.
            This concerto does not get many plays, in part because the whole piano must be laboriously retuned to a system resembling the just intonation which had been in vogue  three centuries ago. (In one instance at Mills College, the retuned piano adamantly refused ever to return to equal temperament. I think it liked right where it was. Who ever called a piano an inanimate object??) Harrison’s refined ear tolerated, but never embraced, our modern equal-temperament system of tuning.)
            The piano soloist was Sarah Cahill, who gives as many recitals, and certainly as many or more contemporary recitals, than any Bay Area pianist in memory. She played cleanly, sensitively, with restraint, and was warmly received.
            The conductor is one to watch. Jayce Ogren is from the state of Washington, focused recently more on the East Coast and Europe, with appearances already at the Boston Symphony and the Cleveland Orchestra. He led with great animation, mastering the Lei Liang opus, and closed the concert with Sibelius’ familiar Symphony No. 5. Ogren, who cuts an attractive lanky figure on the podium, returns west early in 2012 for a guest stint with the Napa Valley Symphony.
            As for BSO Music Director Joana Carneiro, she returns to lead the BSO concert of Jan. 26, 2012.
            Berkeley Notes---An accident of scheduling led to most of the area music critics missing the Berkeley Symphony concert. The very same night the San Francisco Symphony just a bridge away played to mark its very newsworthy centennial, recalling  its inaugural concert across the Bay Dec. 8, 1911, under Conductor Henry Hadley. More about that later.
            Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, in concert at Zellerbach Hall, Berkeley. For info: (510) 841-2800, or go online.

        ©Paul Hertelendy 2011
                                       #
           Paul Hertelendy has been covering the dance and modern-music scene in the San Francisco Bay Area with relish -- and a certain amount of salsa -- for years.
    These critiques appearing weekly (or sometimes semi-weekly, but never weakly) will focus on dance and new musical creativity in performance, with forays into books (by authors of the region), theater and recordings by local artists as well.
                      #

             Return to main menu.