Listening Experiment

      Taking my last post as a jumping off point,  I listened to two very different pieces to see how my new reactions might differ from my original ones (though I never wrote the first ones down.  Sorry about that.)    I chose a piece I did not 'appreciate': Luciano Berio's Laborintus II and one I did: Nicholas Maw's Violin Concerto.    Yes, their styles are completely different, but that is the point of the thing: how does emotion and mental acuity play into (my) perceptions.     I listened to them only once, on the same day, with a sizable break between.    I will admit upfront I was surprised by my response.    I enjoyed the 'experiment' thoroughly.    What conclusions did I draw?    Well, let me tell you what I heard...this time.
     Berio's piece is an early one compared to the more famous, 'influential' ones.    It has a 'libretto' (no plot nor narrative drive is at play) by a Dante Scholar and poet Edoardo Sanguineti.    It is scored for tape, narrator, three female voices, a mixed choir of eight, and ensemble from which a jazz combo can be formed. It contains poems by Sanguineti, plus texts from Dante, the Bible, T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound.    They all have something to do with each other, but explanations are unnecessary, because the music neither  'explains' the texts nor 'enlightens' them.   Frankly, they could be any group of words.    It was commissioned by the French and Italian Radios to celebrate the 700th anniversary of Dante's birth.  So the Dante connections make sense.    The rest?   Well, the Narrator does have to speak very quickly to get some of them in before his 'time' is up.     On my recording, Sanguineti is the narrator.     That must have helped.
     I am a true fan of Berio, but I find (to my irritation or impatience) that he has these pieces I call 'sketches'--works that seem to hold unperfected ideas that will find far more success in larger, better, more accomplished works.  ('Sketch' does not imply shorter length in his case...alas.)   Certainly half-formed ideas here will show up in Sinfonia and Coro, not to mention his operas that occupied him during the later years of his life.    For one thing, Sanguineti formed the performing texts for both of those following masterpieces using many of the same authors.    And the musical ideas--in particular, the overlapping, 'battle' of voices both sung and spoken; the deconstruction of words into morphemes, vowel sounds, even phonemes repeated in no particular order; the soloistic / virtuosic nature of the instrumental parts; the abrupt changes in musical style, especially the appearance of some form of pop music; the juxtaposition of two things that do not share any obvious qualities --will show up over and over throughout his career, sometimes more successfully, sometimes less.     The more of his work you know, the more likely you are to hear the connections and enjoy seeing where they came from.    But Laborintus II is roughly thirty-five minutes long.     It is episodic to a fault.    Ideas seem to either evaporate before you can grasp their make-up or drone on long after their pleasure has past.    Certainly, multiple sopranos will be used far more advantageously in later pieces like the two named and one of his great operas, Un Re In Ascolto (A King Listens).     Not that this piece has no merits--on the contrary, this is a major composer fleshing out important ideas he will use for decades.   The vocal music is for the most part masterly, if a bit disjointed at times.    The flashes of fragments of jazz poking out of the fabric of the first half comes to fruition in a delightful jazz combo fighting for its life amongst all the other things going on (it loses, by the way.)     The ideas that would soon lead to O King are here in miniature and can be beautiful, as they are in the later work (though not much later, a few years.)     But mostly, I still feel, this is a 'worksheet' on 'what to use later in my better pieces.'    Well.    I liked it more than I first did, certainly, but I am still not won over.   I'd rather listen to Sinfonia.
     Nicholas Maw wrote his Violin Concerto 'for' Joshua Bell, claiming he had finally heard someone who was in the grand Romantic line of violinists.    (Or so says Bruce Adolphe in the liner notes.   The conversation took place in Maw's kitchen while the composer carved a turkey.    I want to ask, "How many violinists were you listening to?"    I can name at least half a dozen who could lay more claim to the title back then.   And now, triple that. )    So the piece was premiered by the people who play on the recording: Joshua "Romantic" Bell,  the conductor Roger Norrington, and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.   Bell plays wonderfully, actually, though I still wouldn't call him a "Romantic" violinist.    He seems to prefer a more "Classical" balance of things (for want of a more technical term) where nothing is too understated nor too overstated, the tone never too dark or coarse, nor, in fact, anything but lovely.     Sometimes this suits the music perfectly; sometimes, it does not help it through some of its weaker points, where someone less afraid to go too far might conceal weakness a bit better.    For the piece has some.   One: a huge mistake in my mind, a poor idea overextended.     It doesn't destroy the piece, but it blunts its impact.
     The work is in four movements: 1) Prelude 2) Scherzo 3) Romanza 4) Finale marked Allegro moderato e grazioso.     The style owes something to the mid-Twentieth Century Romantics, like Barber, but far more through-composed in form.  The movements have some ideas that bind them together very loosely: some melodic shapes that return, rhythmic motives, a recurring idea where the lower strings play a unison slow melody, usually forte, while the violin spins high free-flowing countermelodies.   A few others too technical to describe.    Most of the music is slow(-ish or not so -ish)--not all of it it, mind you, but more than half.    This tends to lessen the effect at times, but only for short durations.    The Prelude has one or two too many slow builds to a climax.   We'll skip the Scherzo and say the Romanza is lovely, probably the most successful of the four, and the Finale is a bit fragmented, luckily coming together with a welcome satisfaction at the end with some strong music.    But it does have a few awkward spots, meanders for a few short stretches, before finding its footing.    Not that I couldn't follow it, any of it.   It is most skillfully written.    Maw knows what he is doing as he should after writing music for forty years.  This is not abnormally complex music (nor too simple) but close concentration is needed for you not to drift off a bit on occasion.    Still, three of the four movements have mostly beautiful, memorable, enjoyable writing.    'Beautiful' often comes to mind while listening.    But there's that Scherzo.    Unfortunately.    It begins quite well: interesting fast movement of even note values, moving from small cells to larger, broader melodies...and then it gets highjacked by a big slow movement in the middle (!)    Why????    We've just had a slow movement to start (over ten minutes) and will have another at Scherzo's end.    And this is the least well-crafted of the lot.    And it seems to lose what momentum the movement had.    But Maw goes back to the original material and you shake your head but sigh relief that you're back on more solid ground.     And then he does it again.    Slower.    Thinner, mostly for long held chords with violin obbligato.    For more than just a passing instance.    Deadly.    Not ugly, just deadly.    Boring even.    A really poor idea that such an experienced composer should not use.    It all but ruins the effect of the beginning of the Romanza which begins like a second cousin to the chords in Britten's Billy Budd --the scene where Vere goes inside to tell Budd he has been sentenced to death.    If you know the opera, you know what I mean.   Isolated chords, in this case with small movements within them (just chords in the Britten.)    The piece moves into more lovely complexity, a fine chance for the violinist to play beautifully in all registers, which, of course, Bell does in spades.    The piece is a marvel of finely detailed work.    It would work perfectly well on its own.    If I could, I would cut the Scherzo right before it 'dies' and move directly into the true slow movement.    Maybe if this is how the piece went, the small weaknesses of the outer movements would pale.    Probably.    I was mostly happy with the Prelude.     The myriad ideas of the Finale might seem more germane if the piece hadn't been breaking into these slow reveries so often.    I found some flaws with it the first time I heard it.    I didn't like the Scherzo then either (from my recollection.)    I liked the outer movements more then (though I like them quite a lot now.)    I appreciate the Romanza more now.    Frankly, if a more risky, highly emotional soloist and conductor played it, they might help that big giant gaffe.   Say, Gil Shaham and Simon Rattle. Or maybe not.  In a few more years?