Brian Cherney
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Brian Cherney. Canadian Composers Portraits. Toronto: Centrediscs, 2005. CMCCD 10405. $20.00. Two compact discs. Disc 1: Cherney documentary produced by Hele Montagna and Eitan Cornfield, presented by Eitan Cornfield (43:45). Disc 2: Like Ghosts from an Enchanter Fleeing: Six Pieces for Cello and Piano (Antonio Lysy, violoncello; Rena Sharon, piano) (15:09); String Quartet No. 3 (Lloyd Carr-Harris Quartet) (20:48); In the Stillness of September 1942 (Cary Ebli, English horn; Members of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra; Jukka-Pekka Saraste, conductor) (14:10); La princesse lointaine (Judy Loman, harp; Cary Ebli, English horn; Toronto Symphony Orchestra; Christopher Seaman, conductor) (18:22). aving tracked the Portraits Ghost Trio, Kodály’s Sonata for Solo series with some interest since Cello, op. 8, and the war in Bosnia/siege H its inception, and always with a of Sarajevo from 1992-96. (Such overt curious eye on who would be featured reference and quotation is characteristic next, I welcomed the opportunity to of Cherney, as the documentary review the Cherney set. I had heard only reveals.2) The opening measures of the one of his works previously, through a first piece reminded me immediately of recording of his Illuminations for string Messiaen and of Frank Martin, because orchestra, so I was interested to hear of the colour palette, use of ostinati, and what else has issued from the pen of an rhapsodic character. While the muted apparently introverted romantic.1 The agitation of the second piece suggests music on the present set served well to the demonic insects in Crumb’s Black broaden and deepen my view of Angels, the Bosnian debacle is realized Cherney, introducing me to four diverse most powerfully in the third, where the examples of his finely-honed cello calls to mind North African chant craftsmanship. in speech-like, ululating figurations. The two instruments act as reflective surfaces I listened first to the music on Disc 2, to each other, but the reflections are so as not to be influenced by whatever jagged and fragmented. The fourth piece might be revealed or obscured in the occupies the sound world of Ernest documentary. The six pieces comprising Bloch in his Suite for Viola and Piano the first work, Like Ghosts from an (1919), though the Cherney approaches Enchanter Fleeing (1993, for scordatura Webern in brevity and intensity. Bloch cello and piano), lack individual titles; and Eastern mysticism make another all are brief and intense, ranging from appearance in the fifth piece, with one to four minutes in length. According glissandi and sustained tones in the cello to the concise and informative liner against sepulchral interjections by the notes by the composer, they take piano. The sixth suggests one of inspiration from and even occasionally Bartók’s night-music pieces, though quote various famous works of art (not all of them musical), and refer to history; 2 Sandy Thorburn discusses eloquently the to wit: Shelley’s Ode to the West Wind, significance of Cherney’s quotation of tonal Strindberg’s Ghost Sonata, Beethoven’s music in a non-tonal idiom in “Like Ghosts from an Enchanter Fleeing: Melodic Quotations as Recognizable Signifiers in the Works of Brian 1 Performed by the dedicatees, I Musici de Cherney” (Toronto: Institute for Canadian Music Montréal, on CBC SMCD5131, 1993 (SM 5000 Newsletter, v. 1 (1, Jan. 2003); http://www. series). utoronto.ca/icm/0101a.html). 50 Cherney’s harmonic language here recording itself contributes to this remains closer to Bloch, or Britten (in impression. Made at Salle Pollack at the string quartets). McGill University, it is flatter and less warm than Like Ghosts, so benefit of the Captured live at Glenn Gould Studio doubt may be given the performers. One in Toronto in 1994, the recording is rich receives a strong impression that it is the in detail, with no brittleness in the upper hall, the microphone placement, or some registers of either instrument. The sound other extra-musical factor contributing to stage has the intimacy of the best studio the occasional sense that the performers recordings, and none of the “Saturday don’t place full confidence in the score. night at the curling rink” qualities that live recordings of art music still too From what I have learned of Cherney often have. The performers clearly gave at The Canadian Encyclopedia web site, loving and laser-like attention to both the biography available at the Canadian their individual and their shared studies Music Centre’s web site, and the of the work—everything is sure-footed Cornfield documentary on Disc 1, it and heartfelt. seems he never set about pitching himself to the world as a “Jewish- The String Quartet No. 3 (1985) is in Canadian composer,” something he arch form (three movements played might legitimately have chosen to do. segue between the parentheses of an But he turns his heritage to our introduction and an epilogue), which advantage in In the Stillness of makes a case for a conservative, September 1942 (1992), an “elegy in classicist bent in Cherney’s work. If memory of the deportation, between July nothing else, such stable and familiar 22 and September 12, 1942, of more architecture helps make this work, which than 265,000 Jews from [Warsaw] to the is perhaps the most arcane on the disc Treblinka death camp” (liner notes, p. for the average member of the listening [8]), for English horn and string public, accessible after only a couple of orchestra. At the opening, the English hearings. As in Like Ghosts from an horn evokes a voice-like shofar, as of Enchanter Fleeing, I hear orientalisms one in extremis. This persona soon reminiscent of the koto or pi’pa in the disappears, replaced by a solitary bird introduction’s pizzicati. The first overflying the Warsaw ghetto. Buzzing movement-proper features sudden shifts chord clusters in mid-register strings in the dynamic range, from violent, suggest the horrors of the survivors routing battles among block chords to around Warsaw’s Umschlagplatz. The pianissimo, semi-canonic melodies of shofar returns at the end, transcending narrow compass. Intervallic evolution— the murky, final chords in the cellos and as opposed to motivic development—is double-basses. the principal means of advancing the ideas within each discrete section, and it The recording of In the Stillness of succeeds in this work of modest September 1942, captured at Glenn proportions (about twenty minutes long). Gould Studio in Toronto by CBC Radio, invokes a middle-distance stage in a hall The performance seems at times with little reverberation. It is cautious, if technically solid and nevertheless arresting, with good accurately rendered, but perhaps the perspective maintained throughout 51 between soloist and accompanying the extant tone-poem might support a ensemble. I was not pleased by the happier reworking into a film score, harshness of the high strings, which despite the composer’s assertion that the suggests that perhaps an inappropriately piece is not meant to be programmatic. small number of violinists was multiple- tracked in order to save money. (I do not The production values, courtesy of know that such was in fact the case.) Juno Award winner Neil Crory, are higher than in the preceding work, with If the musical evidence in both Like nicely equalized voicing that permits the Ghosts from an Enchanter Fleeing and inner parts (second violins, violas, inner the last work on the disc, La princesse horn parts, etc.) to be heard as clearly as lointaine (for harp, English horn, and the extremes. The sound stage is multi- orchestra, 2001) may be trusted to dimensional, offering the listener a suggest some aspects of their spacious hall with plenty of air, light, composer’s personality, then Cherney and elbow room. Made at Toronto’s Roy would appear to be a wonderful Thomson Hall in November 2002, conversationalist. In the latter work in shortly after the completion of its particular, he displays a gift for letting acoustic renovations, the live recording two voices sound passionately and is a credit to all involved, from sometimes simultaneously, sometimes in acousticians to conductor, musicians, alternation and often in complete and production staff. disagreement, but always comprehen- sibly. As in In the Stillness of September The documentary was written for the 1942, a descending minor third (E-flat to CBC Radio Two audience (where it first C) establishes and reinforces a tonal aired), i.e., people familiar with Western centre, though it is not strictly tonal art music. It employs voiceovers of music. Harp and English horn take the Cherney’s works, including La princesse interval as subject for discussion and lointaine, and music by other composers debate and then build their own distinct whose works played a role in Cherney’s voices over the course of the personal and artistic development. We introspective, single-movement work. learn the basics: Cherney was born in The work is formally less well- 1942 in Peterborough, Ontario. He delineated than the other pieces on the played Bach and Schubert as a child, disc, and seems somewhat the weaker both of whom he later quoted in his for it. Melodic material and tone colour compositions (as noted above). George evolve little over the piece’s approx- Crumb is cited as a major influence on imately eighteen minutes, and the his interest in coaxing unusual colours orchestral interjections into the soloists’ from traditional Western instruments. He dialogue occasionally seem contrived— was greatly encouraged by his studies almost Surprise Symphony conceits in with Samuel Dolin at the Royal an otherwise serioso composition. Stasis Conservatory of Music in Toronto from and quietude are important themes in 1960-63, in part because Dolin took the Cherney’s œuvre, but inertia seems to exceptional step of employing have appointed itself their proxy in this professional musicians to interpret his instance.