April 20, 2018

  • An Emergence of Beautiful New Romantic Choral and Solo Songs

     Joanna Estelle: Emergence

    Morgan Strickland, soprano. Laura Dziubaniuk, soprano. Susan Elizabeth Brown, soprano. Laurence Ewashko, baritone.
    Roland Gjernes, cello. Brandon Wilkie, cello.
    Frederic Lacroix, piano.
    Robert Ryan, tenor. Ewashko Singers/Laurence Ewashko
    Aude Urbancic, piano.
    Capitol Chamber Choir/Jamie Loback
    Navona Records 6147
    Total Time: 60:25
    Recording:   ****/****
    Performance: ****/****

     

    Canadian composer Joanna Estelle had a bit of a left turn in her career when she was encouraged by her parents to pursue a career other than music.  She ended up becoming an accountant and spent her spare time exploring and creating music in her spare time.  Later in life, she would return to her academic musical pursuits including a doctorate in composition.  The present Navona release illustrates her own “emergence” and journey.  After a brief piano “suite”, the album turns to a variety of works for vocalists and chorus, areas for which she has garnered a host of performances across Canada and the UK.

    Umori opens the disc.  It is a setting of ten different “moods” noted on the score and is intended as an intermediate piano-level work.  It was written as part of a class in her MM program, and developed into a longer work.  The musical language here is mostly in a post-romantic bent with an almost improvisatory feel.  Each idea feels like a brief song with often touching melodic writing.  It makes for a rather engaging introduction to Estelle’s music with equally interesting melodic ideas that feature some occasional popular jazz rhythmic ideas along the way.

    The central third of the album is devoted to a variety of solo songs, some with added, or solo, cello.  Morgan Strickland performs three of these.  The first two were among Estelle’s first publicly-performed art songs.  “Susannah’s Lullaby” was commissioned by Susan Murray who first performed it in 1996.   These too continue in this very accessible, romantic harmonic language.  The melodies are quite gorgeous here as well with the piano serving more as one might expect more in a popular song or ballad, with rich harmony that also undergirds the solo line melodically.  A warm cello line adds an additional emotional intensity in “Language of a Rose”.  These are songs that have some rather achingly beautiful twists and emotional turns that one might hear in a modern musical.  Things become a bit more emotional in the touching duet, “Moyi mamji (For My Mother)” which has a folklike feel hinting at its core inspired by the Ukrainian poetry sung here.  This is the beginning of three works set in other languages.  The second, “Quest-ce que c’est vie? (What is Life?)”, is dedicated to Princess Diana whom Estelle met shortly before the princess’s horrible accident and subsequent death.  The poetry here explores what Diana may have been reflecting perhaps before she headed out on that fateful night.  It is a bit more impassioned and dramatic, with touches of darkness along the way of often little glimmers of light and hope.  A setting of the Lord’s Prayer (for soprano and cello) in Aramaic follows and closes off this section of the disc.

    Four choral works bring us to the final third of this engaging program.  Performances by the Ewashko singers are the bookends.  First they perform the “Water Canticle” which was written on invitation from the Cantata Singers of Ottawa for a benefit concert devoted to providing sanitary and safe water in developing countries.  Estelle was inspired by Margaret Trudeau’s (wife of former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau) own philanthropic endeavor for a project in Africa to honor her late son.  The comments Trudeau made during an interview became the source for Estelle’s text in this rather beautifully-rich choral piece.  The Capital Chamber Choir performs two contrasting works.  The first is a gorgeous and light “La Chanson de ton coeur” which has a wistful and languid beauty.  The second is a beautiful Christmas carol, “Child of the Manger”.  The concluding work, Song for Abwoon is a more extensive work coming in at just under twelve minutes.  It takes its inspiration from the work of Hildegard of Bingen and also includes a version of the Lord’s Prayer in the text.  The music is a blend of the composer’s exploration of spirituality and religious themes that was hinted at earlier in the album.

    Estelle’s choral pieces here need to grab some attention of choral conductors as they are quite wonderful pieces that should be excellent audience pleasers as well with their often rich writing and traditional harmony.  The style overall tends to hover in this romantic milieu with an uncanny ability to create often compelling melodies.  The album overall sequences quite well finding nice threads that move us gradually through these different pieces.  There is a great deal of beautiful music here to enjoy and the album is worth seeking out especially for its fine choral works.  Performances are equally fine here with an accompanying booklet of texts available for the CD release.