No.2 Rather Than World Première: That Was Given Three Years
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46 No.2 rather than world première: that was given two from the United Arab Emirates, three from three years previously in Germany, where Clarke Germany, two from France, one Chinese, one has been especially well-received). It would be Italian and one British (BBC World). This listing good to hear more works from this highly origi- speaks for itself. On the other hand, Azerbaijan nal composer performed within these shores, still has very strong ties with Russia, and also very as he attempts to reconcile his freshly cleansed important connexions with the Arabic world, palette from the Untitled pieces with more intri- particularly Iran. All Iranian poets, including the cate, fiery material as encountered in his recent Sufi, Jalal ad-Din Rumi, are listed as ‘national’ Second String Quartet: the incorporation and ones with their portraits displayed in the central working-out of these two extremes within future square in Baku. Indeed it is hard to draw a distinct single compositions should make for some excit- cultural or even geographic ‘border’ between the ing, unpredictable results. two countries. Religiously and culturally (despite Paul Conway the difference in languages), they are much clos- er than Azerbaijan is to Turkey, and hundreds of thousands of Azeri people traditionally live in North Iran. Baku: Qara Qarayev Festival At present Baku is home to several important festivals (including the International piano festi- When you arrive in Baku today, many things val/competition and the Rostropovich Festival). impress you immediately. Even five years ago A new, beautifully designed concert hall is being the city was still very much a ‘Soviet’ one, with built for the next Eurovision Song Contest, which numerous buildings half-destroyed or not very is to happen in Baku. The Philharmonic Hall is well-appointed. The Muslim culture was chaoti- rather small, but truly beautiful and acoustically cally coexisting with the heritage of Communism. perfect. This hall was the main venue in April for Soviet-style areas were found next door to new a recently re-established Festival in memory of skyscrapers designed by fashionable Western the greatest 20th-century Azeri composer, Qara architects, including Norman Foster. Today Qaraev (or, in traditional Russian transliteration, the range of building works in the city is simply Kara Karaev). Qaraev (1918–1982) was one of incomparable with any other country. The old the most interesting Soviet composers, a friend town is well preserved and excellently redecorat- and a pupil of Dmitri Shostakovich; he spent his ed, but the old districts, full of the flavour of 1930s late years in Moscow. In his last compositions he life, are gradually disappearing: if you want to see attempted to bring together traditional values of them, you should make your trip to Baku immedi- national identity and Western idioms and aesthet- ately. Soon this will be one of the most luxurious, ics. He is remembered for composing the very and probably most expensive, world capitals. first Soviet Symphony with explicit dodecaphonic Today Azerbaijan is one of the richest countries technique – then forbidden in the Soviet Union of the Muslim world, and one of the most cultur- – his Symphony No. 3. ally aware; it is certainly the richest of all former Qarayev’s son, Faradzh Karaev (b. 1943), one republics of the Soviet Union. Its cultural orien- of the most significant contemporary Azeri com- tation has two clear directions. Looking West, posers, runs this music festival in memory of his Azerbaijan is trying to attract Western specialists, father. The festival was originally established in designers, experts and investors. Looking east, it 1988, but was later abandoned for more than 20 tries to define and to preserve its national identity. years. It is good to see it re-established and at a full Azerbaijan does have a very complicated cul- steam now. tural history. A typical Arabic country of the 19th Faradzh Karaev (who is half- Russian) lives and century, with Persian characters in use until the works in Moscow. He is a professor at the Moscow 1920s, it became a part of the Soviet Union in the Conservatoire, but is often in Baku where he 1920s. The Cyrillic alphabet and Cyrillic translit- is the artistic director of the State Chamber eration were the norm for the seven decades of Orchestra. His music has been performed widely the Soviet era, until the 1990s. From the moment in Russia and in the West. When you listen to it, of the collapse of the Soviet Union and up to you will hardly recognize any national Azeri idi- now, Azerbaijan has been using the Latin alpha- oms. Karaev’s aesthetics – in line with his father’s bet, not least in order to get closer to the Western ideas – goes further west. His favourite com- world. But the language itself is typically Turkic, poser is Alban Berg (Karaev’s version of Berg’s very similar to Turkish. Links with Turkey are Violin Concerto for violin and chamber orches- very strong. The TV programmes list 12 Turkish tra was brilliantly performed at the festival by channels, nine Russian, six local Azeri channels, Swiss violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja). Karaev’s 47 arrangement of Schoenberg’s Erwartung for London: St George’s Church, Bloomsbury: chamber forces is often performed. James Joyce, Benjamin Ellen’s ‘Siksika’ Samuel Beckett, Emily Dickinson, Gyorgy Ligeti, and George Crumb have inspired his own com- Wailing chants of the Siksika, or Blackfoot Indian positions. Karaev’s style is a perfect example of a tribe in Canada formed the musical inspiration new universal language rooted in both national for a striking new Viola Concerto, Siksika, by the traditions and in Western aesthetics without too British composer Benjamin Ellin, which received direct a demonstration of any particular stylistic its European première by Rivka Golani on 15 priorities. His latest work – a Violin Concerto, March 2011. The concerto formed the centre- premièred in Switzerland a year ago – shows his piece of an imaginatively-conceived programme stylistic orientations very clearly. A long and entitled ‘Postcard From …’, which explored the intense composition, it develops from a ‘toy’- interaction of traditional/regional and contem- like, multi-stylistic world of various quotations porary/ international elements in music from (Haydn, Mendelssohn) to extreme intensity, with Australia, Poland, Estonia, the UK and Hungary, a long climax at the end based on the energy of all of it beautifully performed concert by the String very gradual organic changes typical of Azeri Ensemble of the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of (and Arabic) Maqam. This brilliant piece was per- Music and Dance, a student orchestra conducted formed by its dedicatee, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, by Nic Pendlebury, to a capacity audience at St with the Azerbaijan State Philharmonic orchestra George’s Church, Bloomsbury. The richly reso- under its Music Director Rauf Abdullayev. nant acoustics of this, one of Hawksmoor’s six The week-long festival included several orches- London churches, enhanced the String Ensemble’s tral and chamber concerts with the programmes vivid sonorities, whilst the complex and demand- alternating Azeri contemporary music (Qara ing contemporary programme underlined their Qarayev, Faradzh Karaev, Arif Malikov, Hayam professionalism and enthusiasm. Mirzazade, Firudin Allahverdi, Rufat Halilov, Benjamin Ellin composed his concerto Siksika Elmir Mirzoev) and contemporary Western for Rivka Golani who premièred it at the Fort music, presented by the Freiburg Percussion Macleod International Festival in Alberta, Canada Ensemble (Nicolaus Huber, Steve Reich, in 2010. (A new commission was in preparation Emmanuel Sejourne, Javier Alvarez) and by the for the next festival in May 2011, which also fea- ‘Reconcile Vienna Modern’ ensemble directed by tured a world première by Stephen Montague). Ronald Freisitzer (Gerard Grisey, Manuela Kreger, The ravishing colours, rhapsodic lyricism, the Alexander Wagendristel). The Ensemble Ascolta contrasts between inwardly poetic moments and from Germany, conducted by Tutus Engel, played dramatic sections, searing clashes between solo film music from movies of the 1920s and 30s by and orchestral harmonies, all reflect what the René Char, Hans Richter, Oscar Fischinger and composer explained as his three sources of inspi- Luis Bunuel. The 20th-century classics includ- ration connected to the Blackfoot tribe: namely ed works of Webern, Berg, Messiaen, Xenakis, its geography, heritage and history. First, the Takemitsu, Lutos�awski, with special events vast expanses of Canadian landscapes, with their dedicated to the music and the ideas of Karlheinz aspiration to a more individual spirituality, are Stockhausen. conveyed in the contrast between sustained har- Two orchestra programmes (conducted by monic textures, at times coloured with an almost Rauf Abdullayev and Vladimir Runchak) fea- Wagnerian richness, and the soloist’s mainly high, tured works by two major Russian composers of chant-like melodic lyricism in the first section. today: Alexander Raskatov’s Xenia and Vladimir Second, the musical styles of indigenous chants Tarnopolsky’s Cello Concerto Le vent des mots (absorbed from field recordings) permeate the qu’il n’a pas dits (soloist Alexander Ivashkin). Both entire musical discourse: the three sections gather compositions show new directions of post-Soviet impressive momentum through Ellin’s economic music (similar in Russia and in Azerbaijan) in a manipulation of three thematic and harmonic search for de-contextualisation of the simplest ideas, introduced in an eloquent initial meditation elements of musical language, without clear pri- for viola and subdued strings: these are, in turn, orities for any particular stylistic identities. a rising seventh gesture, a chromatic falling motif This second Qara Qrayev festival in Baku was based on the augmented second and a rising minor a most stimulating forum, enhancing our knowl- third motif. The three elements appear to gener- edge about the diverse cultural life of this dynamic ate much of the material within an engaging and post-Soviet country, with its own old and rich varied sound-tapestry, full of changes of mood, Muslim traditions.