July 2, 2021

  • Intriguing New Quintets for Winds

     

    Blow: Wind Quintets by Donatoni, Salonen, & Lash
    The City of Tomorrow:
    Elise Blatchford, flute/piccolo; Stuart Breczinski, oboe/English horn
    Rane Moore, clarinet/Eb clarinet; Nanci Belmont, bassoon/contrabassoon
    Leander Star, horn.
    New Focus Recordings FCR 294
    Total Time:  64:21
    Recording:   ****/****
    Performance: ****/****

    The City of Tomorrow is one of the more adventurous contemporary wind quintet groups often exploring diverse and experimental works that expand the repertoire and challenge their own technique.  The group likes to focus on 21st-Century works with a host of new commissions to their credit.

    The album’s title comes from the opening work by Franco Donatoni, Blow (1989).  There are a variety of repeated phrases that help provide some connection for the listener as these also get slowly deconstructed after they are introduces as with a series of harmonic ideas that then flit and scatter.  This fragmentation then begins moving through the different instruments that seems to pit one or another against the group as a whole.  The flute takes on a primary role while the rest of the ensemble seems committed to interrupting its rapid-flight feel.  A more lyrical episode separates the next departure point as the oboe takes over the rapid material.  Each of these episodes allows for further virtuosic display across the work’s thirteen-minute playtime.  The harmonic ideas often flirt with an extended, jazz like quality, which is further heightened by the syncopated rhythmic ideas.  It makes for a rather engaging work that ends with a rather dense and intense chord.  Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Memoria (2003) closes off this program with some interesting coloristic choices beginning with the use of alto flute against horn and a bubbling undercurrent.  The forward motion makes this a rather compelling work in its central segment before things give way to a modern chorale that provides some fascinating harmonic work but brings the album to a rather somber conclusion.

    Leander and Hero, the central work here, is just such an example of COT’s musical interests.  This impressive multi-movement half-hour work by Hannah Lash was commissioned by the group.  A prelude and postlude frame seven interior movements that move through this ancient mythic tale.  Overlaid onto the desire of a lover swimming across water to see his love is the impact of climate that can be heard in the storm movements of the piece.  The music creates a series of scenes to unfold the story in quite accessible musical language.  Often the lines seem to float effortlessly in different waves, from those that depict the lapping of water to the rather fascinating bird-like textures of flying that appear in “Flocking”.  Lash’s music moves deftly through the ensemble highlighting individual virtuosity, but also providing some opportunity for lyrical phrasing in the midst of these other fluttering sounds.  It is a quite compelling work that should hold up well on repeated listening.

    The ensemble here is of course quite superb in exploring these pieces.  They really make each sound like something that they can toss off with ease and that provides one window into just how tight an ensemble they are.  Phrasing for the lyrical moments is easily overlooked at times with the plethora of rapid-fire passage work demanded for the accompanimental patterns used for rhythmic propulsion in these pieces.  All of it makes for a very engaging release of modern woodwind quintet music.