January 18, 2017

  • Exploring the Orchestral Miniature

     Sparks: Miniature Works for Orchestra
    Siberian State Symphony Orchestra/Vladimir Landa
    Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra/Petr Vronsky
    Richard Stoltzman, clarinet.  Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra/Kirk Trevor
    The Wembley Players/Bruce Babcock
    Navona Records 6050
    Total Time: 48:53
    Recording:   ****/****
    Performance: ****/****

    Navona Records tends to focus on highlighting modern music and in this release provides some space for a variety of composers to be exposed.  Sparks features 13 works for orchestra by an equal number of new composers (though there is one arrangement at the center of Gershwin’s “Summertime”).  As such, the listener has a chance to hear the state of orchestral writing in a postmodern world.  The music tends to be quite accessible and often very dramatic lending a more filmic quality and often tied to a single idea.  The recordings date mostly from the past couple of years, though one (Bruce Babcock’s Event Horizon) was made in 1984, and the Gershwin in 2005.  The album is sort of a modern compilation of pieces that parallels some of the “pops” like covers of popular pieces of previous periods.

    Jay Anthony Gach’s Gangsta opens the selection.  It is entirely inspired by great 1940s crime and film noir styles and comes across like a long lost Rosza suite.  A touch of this, with some jazz-like suggestions with a nice inclusion of a vibraphone color, appears in the following work by Rain Worthington, Still Motion.  Marga Richter’s Fragments is a fascinating five-movement work exploring different orchestral color—it too has an almost film-like dramatic flow.  Motivic ideas are the binding factor here to move the music forward with fascinating textures.  Explorations of single dance forms are always a unique way for a composer to create a faster audience connection and Phillip Rhodes accomplishes this well in his A Tango Fantasy, a sort of deconstruction of the rhythms and musical phrasing of a tango.  At the center is a nice little arrangement of “Summertime” featuring clarinetist Richard Stoltzman whose central section allows for a variety of pyrotechnics and shift into suggestions of other Gershwin melodies in these riffs.  This is followed by a touching portrait for the late conductor of the Dayton Symphony, Charles-Wendelken-Wilson, Prelude for Charles.  Steven Winteregg's music here has a wonderful, romantic flow, exploring sections of the orchestra and following interesting musical gestures developed across the brief tribute.  In Memoriam continues this thematic sense of remembrance.  Douglas Anderson’s work though came out of a response to the 9-11 attacks and a personal sense of loss that might help heal and remember those lost.  The work opens with a chime and a cluster of sound that then opens into a warm string sound with delicate wind and brass lines floating through the texture in this moving work.  Film music fans will likely recognize the name Bruce Babcock.  He is an Emmy-winning composer who also has numerous orchestration credits over a career spanning some 40 years.  Event Horizon, recorded in 1984 with the Wembley Players, is his personal nod to the many film composers and teachers he has learned from and loves.  The work opens with unsettling and eerie string writing against brass.  It has a serial feel and is the most atonal of the pieces on the album (think some of Goldsmith’s Alien score).  Interestingly enough, the piece does reflect the sort of orchestral writing that was common in orchestral concert music at the time.  The final work is Stephen Lias’ Crown of the Continent.  The piece is an example of landscape-inspired orchestral music.  Here it is of Glacier National Park and the “old West” vistas of Montana.  The style is akin to that for the modern Western in scores like those by Bruce Boughton (Silverado).

     

    The performances here feel as if they were rehearsed well and the result is that the music is quite engaging.  The sequencing also works to draw the listener into the modern styles and then begin to strip things away gradually.  It all works quite well.  Many, if not all, of these pieces, could fit very well in any number of symphony programs both serious and light connecting to a specific theme.  Composers tend to be forced into smaller forms to find space on modern symphony programs and perhaps pieces like these might open the door a little wider for those represented here to try their hand at larger scale pieces.  Certainly, Sparks is an important collection of new voices for any music lover wanting to support modern orchestral music.  Checking out the links at their website even lets you explore some of the scores.