Phil‟s Classical Reviews Atlanta Audio Club October, 2020 “Allegro io son,” Arias of Donizetti and Kaleidoscope: Beethoven “”Of Love and Longing: Piano Music of Transcriptions - Mari Kodama, piano Bellini – Lawrence Brownlee, tenor; Franz Liszt – Jerry Wong, pianist (Pentatone) Constantine Orbelian, Kaunas City (MSR Classics) Symphony (Delos) Once she had finished her critically American pianist Jerry Wong is at it celebrated cycle of the Beethoven Lawrence Brownlee is a renowned again, exploring all the delicious and sonatas for Pentatone Music, where opera singer who didn‟t start out with compelling ways harmonic changes, was pianist Mari Kodama to turn next? opera in mind. An Ohio native who strong rhythms and powerful dynamics One answer, as interesting as it was grew up singing gospel music, he can affect our response to the music of unexpected, is found in Kaleidoscope, didn‟t discover the classics until his Franz Liszt. Wong‟s take on Liszt puts an album devoted entirely to piano student days at Anderson (SC) the composer in perspective as one transcriptions of and by Beethoven. University and the Jacobs School of who pushed the envelope in all these Aided by Kodama‟s flawless keyboard Music at Indiana University. matters, and whose impact continued technique, we have the surprisingly to be felt long after his own lifetime. He is now a resident of Atlanta, but we exciting opportunity to get a closer don‟t get to hear him much in these understanding of some of the Still among the best-loved pieces by parts because he is usually flying off to composer‟s greatest music. Liszt are a selection from the first year engagements at the great opera (Suisse) of his collection Années de I say “surprisingly” because keyboard houses of three continents. For he is Pèlerinage (Years of Pilgrimage) which transcriptions of this sort have never universally recognized as the tenor of recall the experiences he shared in been regular concert fare. The original choice when the subject is the Switzerland with runaway Countess purpose of the transcriptions of demanding Italian operatic style known Marie d‟Agoult. First, heroic music Beethoven string quartet movements as bel canto. emanates from the depths of the tomb by Saint-Saëns, Mussorgsky, and of the Swiss national hero in Chapelle Balakirev that we are given here was Several years ago, Delos released his de Guillaume Tell, a call reminding us undoubtedly the closer analysis and premiere album of Rossini arias (see of the ongoing struggle for freedom. Phil‟s Classical Reviews, October study of the originals they permitted. 2014). What I said about him then That they should end up affording the Au lac du Wallenstadt, recalling the goes double for this latest album of pleasure and spiritual refreshment that natural beauty of the Wallensee, was arias by the other two great figures in Kodama realizes here is all the more prefaced by a quote from Lord Byron: bel canto, Gaetano Donizetti and welcome for being unexpected. “The contrasted lake with the wild Vincenzo Bellini: “This artist has a world I dwell in is a thing We begin with the second movement, voice as liquid as golden honey but it which warns me, with its stillness, to Allegretto vivace e sempre scherzando is capable of rising to the peak of his forsake earth's troubled waters for a from the first “Razoumovsky” Quartet, range and intensity on the shortest purer spring.” Its opening melody Op. 59, No. 1, in Camille Saint-Saëns‟ notice. His High D seems deceptively stretches out peacefully over a semi- transcription. Beethoven seems to effortless, while his High F takes a little Impressionistic accompaniment of have fashioned this movement from a more effort to achieve, but is still within arpeggios supported by a tonic pedal. mere rhythmic scrap, yet its repeated his capability.” As the accompaniment flows between scherzando plus trio structure is really tonic and dominant harmonies like quite complex in a way that serves to The present program does not often gentle waves on the surface of the keep the listener‟s expectations off- call upon Brownlee to rise above High lake, the melody rises and falls balance. In Saint-Saëns‟ transcription C, but otherwise it tests his versatility gracefully, its sounds conjuring up the of the Adagio from Quartet No. 6, Op. in choice arias from some of his image of bright sunlight reflected on favorite operas. They include the 18, we have a movement seemingly the water. Even the turbulent middle buoyant “Allegro io son” (Happy as a clothed in innocent beauty but with section fails to dispel the peaceful ebb finch, happy am I) from Rita, Ernesto‟s strange octaves and unexpected and flow which returns at the end. delightful serenade with guitar “Com é accents and silences that Kodama gentil” (How soft the April night is) from takes care to delineate. Les cloches de Genève (The Bells of Don Pasquale, and the sighing aria Geneva) capturing he overlapping “Seul sur la terre” (Alone upon earth, in There follow bold transcriptions by the sounds of church bells heard from afar my misery I have nothing) from Don Russians Mily Balakirev and Modest on a calm evening, requires the light rd Sebastien, all by Donizetti. Mussorgsky. First, the 3 movement, sensitive touch that Wong applies Allegretto maggiore, from the here. A more complex piece, Vallée We are then given four arias by Bellini, “Razumovsky” Quartet No. 2, Op. 59, d’Obermann, is not the simple exercise including the glorious “Son Salvo” in which the contrapuntal treatment of in landscape painting that the title (Safe am I, safe at last) from I Puritani, the theme as it passes from one string might suggest, but the dark detailing of in which the cavalier Arturo takes his instrument to another is replicated so a young man‟s struggles with life and cue from a troubadour song sung from stunningly in the piano transcription, love, inspired by a French novel of the within a nearby house by his beloved particularly given Kodama‟s assured same name. As such, it would have Elvira (here, the lovely, warm voice of performance, that we are often in had a strong appeal for someone with soprano Victoria Miskunaite, which doubt as to whether we are listening to “the complex trajectory of Liszt‟s makes us long to hear more of this a solo keyboard artist or a team of creative life” (Wong). Of interest is a singer). duo-pianists. descending scale figure, informing every page of the score, which The program concludes once again The Cavatina from Quartet No. 13 in undergoes harmonic and chromatic with arias by Donizetti: two each from B-flat, Op. 130, follows in a Balakirev changes that parallel the mental L‟elisir d‟amore (including the tender transcription that gives us some idea turmoil of the novel‟s hero. Those “Una furtiva Lagrima” (a secret tear) of its somber, melancholy expression perturbations include a tumultuous and from La fille du régiment, ending and profundity but does not give us an tremolo passage with octaves flying with the exultant mood of the scene in impression of its true breadth. Kodama about with the fury of a caged animal. which Tonio wins the consent of the does the best she can with this At the end, Liszt takes pity on his hardened veterans, who have a transcription that fails to capture (for tormented hero by harmonizing the fatherly stake in the matter, to wed me at least) the exquisite sadness of descending scale figure and Marie, the “Daughter of the Regiment.” the original, for which the timbres of transforming it into a melody that offers the original strings are essential. warmth and consolation. Note:This review is a reprint. It originally Mussorgsky follows with transcriptions I‟ve talked at length about Liszt‟s nd of the 2 movement, Vivace, and the “Swiss” pieces because they are the appeared in Phil’s Classical Reviews for rd January, 2017. 3 Lento assai cantate e tranquillo ones that appeal to me the most. But (rather relaxed, songlike and tranquil) don‟t ignore the really progressive from Quartet No. 16, Op. 135. This pieces that Wong presents for us to was Beethoven‟s final published work chew on. Nuages gris (dark clouds), in any genre, and for many scholars it for instance, reveals the experimental contains his last thoughts on a lifetime side of Franz Liszt with its use of an spent contending with the problems of augmented triad of striking sonority to sound and silence. That includes the help create a haunting sense of remarkable outburst in the midst of the beauty. Funerailles (funeral ode) and otherwise serenely untroubled Vivace. La lugubre gondola (the funereal Kodama handles all the vicissitudes gondola) evoke feelings of desolation inherent in these movements with the and grief, the former wih left-hand greatest composure and assurance. tremolos and ostinato octaves in the bass, and the latter with unresolved For the sheer fun of it all, we are lastly diminished sevenths and unfinished given Beethoven‟s own transcription of phrases that remind us this piece was the Allegretto with variations from intended as a memorial to the recently- Mozart‟s Quintet in A major for Clarinet deceased Wagner. Add in the rarely- and Strings, K581. Based on a performed Unstern! Sinistre, Disastro delightful theme of almost childish (dark star, sinister, disastrous) with its simplicity, the variations come across darkly glittering sonorities, and you as an exercise in pure joy in Mari have enough gloom to satisfy any Kodama‟s performance. necrophile (or challenge the keyboard prowess of even a Jerry Wong!) Hiller + Schumann: Symphonic Beethoven: The Opus 18 Quartets Coleurs sonores.