Last night in St. Mark’s Lutheran Church, Voices of Music (VoM) presented its annual Holiday Celebration concert. This year, however, none of the selections were directly related to any of the religious holidays taking place this month. So, considering the date of the performance, the occasion was better suited to marking the solstice, the exactly moment of which happened to occur while the performance was taking place.
One might say that the change of season was honored by a “changing of the guard” of sorts. A generous selection of opera arias and concertos provided a platform in which a new generation of soloists were performing alongside founding members of VoM. Thus “veteran” violinist Carla Moore and cellist William Skeen were joined by two “rising talent” violinists, Alana Youssefian and Rachell Ellen Wong. The other soloist was countertenor Christopher Lowrey, who has begun to build an impressive résumé, particularly in Europe.
The one “meeting of the generations” took place at the conclusion of the concert with a performance of Antonio Vivaldi’s RV 565 concerto in D minor for two violins (Moore and Wong), cello (Skeen), and strings. This is the eleventh concerto on Vivaldi’s Opus 3 collection of twelve given the title L’estro armonico (the harmonic inspiration). This particular concerto has an opening movement with two tempo changes, followed by a thoroughly engaging Siciliano and a vigorous Allegro for the conclusion. The violin soloists engage in both exchanges of thematic material and blended duo settings of several of the passages. As in most Vivaldi concertos, the Allegro passages are brisk and light-footed; and Skeen’s account of them deftly matched the violin solo work. Skeen was also featured as soloist in the RV 407 cello concerto, also in D minor. Since the full ensemble consisted of only two cellos, Skeen’s solo offering left it to Adaiha MacAdam-Somer to give the cello account of the continuo, joined only by VoM harpsichordist (and co-founder) Hanneke van Proosdij and David Tayler (the other co-founder) on archlute.
These reduced resources served up crystal clarity in all of the ensemble work of the evening, consistently matched by intonation perfectly suited to the repertoire being performed. These virtues were evident from the very beginning of the evening, which opened with an instrumental arrangement of the Sarabande (fourth) movement from George Frideric Handel’s HWV 437 keyboard suite. They were then reinforced in providing the accompaniment for Lowrey’s selection of opera arias, three from the operas of Handel in the first half of the program and the other three from Vivaldi operas. The Handel selections were more familiar, since they were taken from operas whose music has been given at least moderate attention here in San Francisco, Rodelinda (HWV 19), Giulio Cesare (HWV 17), and Partenope (HWV 27). (That last will be given a revival performance by the San Francisco Opera this coming June.) The Vivaldi selections were equally engaging; but the sources were probably new to most of the audience: Farnace (RV 711), Teuzzone (RV 736), and La Silvia (RV 734).
Finally, the first half of the program featured solo work by Youssefian. She played the final concerto in Pietro Locatelli’s Opus 3 collection of twelve concertos entitled L'arte del violino (the art of the violin), featuring a capriccio known as the “Harmonic labyrinth.” This featured a barrage of devilish solo passages fraught with ambiguities of dissonance that challenge even the most attentive listener to avoid losing his/her way. Youssefian’s execution could not have been more solidly focused on rising to every challenge that Locatelli set before her; and the results certainly made for the most eyebrow-raising occasions of the evening. There was definitely nothing like such a stimulating assembly of compositions and their interpretations to make the shortest day of the year cause for celebration.
No comments:
Post a Comment