Sunday, December 13, 2020

Sarah Cahill’s Faculty Artist Recital at SFCM

This afternoon at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music (SFCM), Sarah Cahill presented the only Faculty Artist Series recital for this month. The program was streamed through Vimeo with pre-recorded remarks by the composers of three of the selections on the program, one of which was also pre-recorded to allow video capture of a composition for two pianos. The entire program has now been uploaded to a Vimeo Web page for subsequent viewing.

Cahill’s recital program revisited all of the compositions that she had played for her Piano Break recital on December 4. However, the world premiere performance of the work for two pianos was added to the SFCM program. This piece, entitled “Up,” was composed by SFCM alumnus Riley Nicholson (class of ’16); and the second piano was played by SFCM alumna Regina Myers (class of ’05). Nicholson composed “Up” in four movements, but the SFCM performance presented only the first two of those movements and the interlude between them.

Nicholson explained that he wanted to explore the diversity of denotations of the word “up” through different ways of applying it, such as register and tonality (ascending through the circle of fifths). However, from a listener’s point of view, the strongest impressions came from the interleaving of rhythmic patterns between the two instruments. It was therefore helpful to be able to view the physical performances taking place at the two keyboards. Unfortunately, there seemed to be only one camera; and the back-and-forth “migrations” from one keyboard to the other were more than a little unsteady, threatening to induce motion sickness. Nevertheless, this was the piece that was not captured on video at SFCM; so one can sympathize with the limitations of the video work, which was still effective enough to assist the viewer in identifying rhythmic cues.

Unfortunately, it seemed as if the SFCM video work was also limited to a single camera (as well as a microphone configuration that did not pick up Cahill’s explanatory comments particularly effectively). The lack of a second camera was most evident in Cahill’s performance of Aida Shirazi’s “Albumblatt,” which required her to divide her attention between the keyboard and the interior of the instrument. The Piano Break video was more effective in helping the listener recognize the diversity of sonorities and the physical techniques responsible for that diversity. As one already aware of that diversity, however, this listener throughly enjoyed the opportunity to encounter this music a second time.

Nevertheless, much of the program again suffered from the absence of program notes that could be read while the compositions were being presented. This was particularly the case during the final selection, the four-movement suite Piano Poems composed on a commission by Cahill for Regina Harris Baiocchi. Each of the movements was based on texts by recently published poets, several of which were haiku. Baiocchi discussed a series of fascinating strategies of converting words into instrumental music, but it was more than mind could satisfactorily retain over the course of all four of the movements. Being able to see the poems themselves while listening to Baiocchi’s music would have made a world of difference.

On the other hand readers of this site’s account of the Piano Break recital know that Reena Esmail had prepared a Web page with program notes for the opening selection on Cahill’s recital, “Rang de Basant.” Indeed, there were two sets of program notes, one for Western readers and the other for those from her native India. In other words the composer took the trouble to provide Western readers with sufficient orientation to appreciate the Indian “spirit” of the music she had composed.

The SFCM program also revisited Mary Watkins’ spoken introduction for “Summer Days,” another composition that Cahill had commissioned. In this case, however, the music captured a single concept: images of children at play in the summer. The combination of Watkins’ imaginative technique for evoking those images through music and Cahill’s perceptive account of her score made for a delightful and exhilarating listening experience.

The real treat, however, was the opportunity to listen, once again, to Cahill play George Lewis’ four-movement suite Endless Shout. Readers may recall that this marked the second time that Cahill had played this music for an SFCM Faculty Artist Series recital. The inspiration behind Endless Shout was the legacy of the great stride pianists from the history of the early jazz, with evocations of the likes of James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, and Willie “The Lion” Smith in Lewis’ score. Mind you, those evocations were subtle and tightly woven into Lewis’ own intricate rhetoric; so the score was far from homage to a style memorable for its rambunctious qualities. The music of Endless Shout makes it clear that Lewis can “do rambunctious” all by himself!

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