GRYPHON TRIO AT RICHARDSON PERFORMANCE HALL
A mood of hushed excitement permeated the vast Richardson Performance Hall at Del Mar College as hundreds of students prepared to listen to the Gryphon Trio’s student outreach performance Friday morning, January 22, 2016. The trio members, Jamie Parker, piano; Roman Borys, cello; and Annalee Patipatanakoon, violin, were visiting from Canada, where they are artists-in-residence at the University of Toronto and have been performing together twenty-two years.
The silence was quickly followed by the first notes played by the Gryphon Trio, a contrast of spritely and mysterious sounds. Changing moods ensued in beautiful music of Beethoven. Suddenly an unexpected pause!!! Two strings of the cello went out-of-tune, another type of rapid change, this time brought on by the difference in climate between Canada and Corpus Christi!
Soon it was back to playing—this time a portion of the Dvorak ”Dumky Trio”, which began with a lyrical cello solo followed by the violin taking the lead, with a response again from the cello. Piano arpeggios and cello led into a fast-moving and exciting passage.
Jamie Parker, who introduced the music to the students before each piece, explained and demonstrated the term “motive”. This led into a selection by Lalo which continued the idea of motives, this time rhythmic motives. At this point students were asked to imagine a visual scene as they listened. Two students were then questioned as to their “imaginings,” created from what they had heard.
A quiet, haunting piece by Debussy which later sang a lovely melody led to a discussion of and examples of trills.
As the Trio is quite interested in showcasing new music from around the world, they followed the Debussy with “Love Triangle” by the Sri Lankan native Dinuk Wijeratne. This piece includes innovative uses of the piano. From motives played by cello and piano, the piece grows in complexity, with one, then another taking the melody. The original motives are interwoven among the other instruments as the melody is played. This compositional style heightened the listener’s interest. The music concluded with fists on the piano!
As is often done in an outreach program, the Trio provided time for questions from students. The questions were mature and well-thought- out and demonstrated careful listening by the audience.
To close the program, the Trio played a tango by Astor Piazzolla. This piece was a typical tango in rhythm and style until midway, when a heart-melting cello solo entered, followed by the violin, leading back to all three instruments in tango style playing the grand finale. As always, the hope is that the listeners’ lives have been enriched and expanded by participating in this musical experience performed by world-class musicians.