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CVCM: Flights of Fantasy The third program of Coastal Virginia Chamber Music's season of four offerings had an excellent turnout of seventy for this new group that revived after the Covid shutdown. New CVCM President Adelaide Coles greeted the audience and introduced the Neptune Flute Quartet: flutists Kathryn Hughes, Jake Keller, Tristan Morris-Mann, and Patti Watters. Neptune opened with Jour d'éte à la Montagne (1954) (Summer day in the Mountains) by Eugène Bozza (1905-1991). Bozza is well known in France as composer and conductor but his international reputation rests on his chamber music, especially for wind instruments. The sweet harmony of the Pastorale first movement immediately drew us into Bozza's sound. He explores the relationship of the individual player and the group, using a variety of bird-like sounds. The second, Aux Bords du Torrent (On the Banks of the River) opens with the flight of waterbugs—rushing sounds played against the flow of sound. Tristan Morris-Mann opens Le Chant des Fôrets (Song of the Forest) as soloist but it became more complex when the full quartet joined him. Eventually they all converge. The Ronde (Round) closing is joyful and humorous with many echoes and chirps sounded as they race to the conclusion. Before she played, Patti Watters introduced Fantaisie Opus 79 by Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924) and pianist Rebecca Willett. Together they performed this six minute gem. The feeling was like a cool dip in a mountain stream on a sunny, hot afternoon. The detached piano notes were in dialogue with the spirited flute playing—clear, clean and crisp with great energy. Music by living American composer Michael Daugherty (b.1954) was played by Kathryn Hughes, flute and Mr. Morris-Mann, alto flute with Ms. Willett at the piano. The nine and one-half minute Crystal is taken from Daugherty's chamber orchestra piece Tell My Fortune which visits the dark world of crystal ball gazing to tell a person's fortune. The metal chimes placed between the flautists were used to enhance a solo by one flute or the other, testing how much variety there can be in a flute duet. She plays the flute, he strokes the chimes. Then percussive piano gives way to a flute duet, with leaps and breathy tones woven in. Now a turn by the evocatively resonant alto flute. The piano offered a floor of sound that grew ever wilder. The full quartet then played Flûtes en Vacances (Flutes on Vacation) (1964) by Jacques Castérède (1926-2014). Again with four movements: Flûtes Pastorales is quite calm with some enthusiastic highlights; Flûtes Joyeuses has a rollicking sound of great complexity reminiscent of city traffic. It smoothes out but remains engaging and busy. Flûtes Rêveuses has a dreamy but haunting edgy tone; Flûtes Légères (light, as in brisk tempo), a sort of 1950s movie soundtrack with nice surprises, happy energy and catchy phrases. After intermission we retreated from twentieth-century music back to an early nineteenth-century piece by Friedrich Kuhlau (1786-1932), a Danish composer born in Hamburg. The Neptune Quartet played the one-movement Grand Quartet in E minor, Op. 103 (1829) that bridges the Classical and Romantic periods. Kuhlau actually did not play flute himself but added to his income by writing music for the new, improved flute of his day. Neptune played grand runs on standard and alto flute and exploited all possible colors in this energetic dance, each bar a bit grander than the last, rushing to what seemed the end, only to have a more intense repetition in a classical sound—think Haydn or Mozart. Ms. Willett then played L'isle Joyeuse (1904), a piano solo by Claude Debussy (1862-1918), written in a modified sonata form similar to a Chopin ballade, weaving together several dreamy themes. The lyrical second subject returns in the brilliant concluding fortissimo. Vivid playing in a very wide-open acoustic space. The contemporary, final work, A Gaelic Offering by Catherine McMichael (b. 1954) includes four Gaelic pieces: Rose Cottage, The Doubtful Wife – A Reel, Lake Solace and Describe a Circle – A Jig. Scored for four C flutes, with occasional added piccolo by Morris-Mann, it offered nostalgic, familiar melodies with delightful variety. The pieces were raw, rowdy and rambunctious when fast and achingly personal when slow. Musical lines diverged but always came together, especially noticeable in the final Circle – Jig. It is amazing to see a new chamber group begun in Chesapeake by Susan Wells in 2016, silent for two years during the Covid lockdown, rebuild an audience so quickly under the leadership of Adelaide Coles. Don't miss their last performance: Terra Musica featuring Galatea Chamber Music Players at the Great Bridge Battlefield & Waterways History Foundation on April 22nd. For more information go to https://www.coastalvirginiachambermusic.org/ Coastal Virginia Chamber Music: Moonstruck In a program titled Moonstruck - Sentimental, Dreamy, Lunatic, three of Tidewater's most in demand musicians, pianists Rebecca Willett, Stephen Coxe and soprano Kathryn Kelly, offered art songs on the theme of moonlight. Greetings and introductions were by Adelaide Coles, CVCM president of this continuing venture to bring chamber music to Chesapeake. The program opened with two of Robert Schumann's (1810-1856) loveliest songs. With Dr. Coxe at the piano, Ms. Kelly sang Mondnacht Op. 39, No. 5 (Moonlit Night) and Die Lotos blume Op. 25, No. 7 (The Lotus Flower). Both songs are beautifully descriptive nature scenes (both texts in German with English translations were furnished). Mondnacht tells of a romantic, starry night and the union of earth and sky. Repeated notes, intervals and chords are combined with a gently moving bass line while the vocal line floats calmly above. The Lotus Flower only blooms at night. Awaiting her lover, the moonlight created a mood of calm expectancy with repeated chords in the accompaniment. Later, both voice and piano gathered intensity as the flower seemed to come alive to face her lover, blooming in ecstasy. Next we heard Ain't it a Pretty Night by American composer Carlisle Floyd (1926 - 2021), from his opera Susannah. The song reveals her yearning to forsake her wilderness life, with all of the stars and quiet, and see a wider world. All is blanketed in the velvet night stitched with stars. Her longing for experience is in contrast to her desire for the security and loveliness she has in this moment. Pathos and a beautiful voice combined movingly. Two songs by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) followed. Ständchen Op. 106, No. 1 (Serenade) is the story of three students singing beneath a young girl's window. The mood is light and charming. Each man has a different instrument (zither, flute and violin) whose sound is represented by the piano. They join in the middle section, enhancing the piano interlude before the last verse. The moon illuminates this romantic garden scene. Brahms also set Die schnur, die Perl und Perle Op. 57, No. 7 (The Necklace with its Rows of Pearls) which gives voice to the necklace which lies happily about her neck and cradled on her beautiful breast! That the composer desires such a lovely experience, seems to be the message. Next we heard Apparition by Claude Debussy (1862-1918). This grand impressionist French composer demands overwhelmingly passionate singing. Debussy dedicated this song to his lady muse. All this profound loveliness and "the moon grows sad." The mood of profound sadness continues in the next song, Der Dopplegänger (The Wraith) by Franz Schubert (1797-1828). It is the tale of a man who has become only a shadow of himself from the pain of rejected love and he is so besotted with love that "the moon shows me my own form!" Clair de lune (Menuet) (Moonlight), is set by another French composer, Gabriel Fauré (1845-1924), and is one of his finest songs. The melody and harmonic structure are subtly woven together. The voice floats above like a countermelody or a descant and seems to accompany the piano, at times creating an elegant atmosphere of moonlight. A second opera aria, Song to the Moon from Rusalka by Antonin Dvorák (1841-1904), carried us to intermission. The song is known for its exquisite and inspired lyricism, here beautifully presented by Ms. Kelly and Dr. Coxe. The program could have easily been advertised as including only the most beautiful songs ever composed! After a break, Rebecca Willett raised the piano lid before she played four selections for solo piano, beginning with Clair de lune, but this time written by Claude Debussy from his Suite Bergamasque. The gentle opening created a space of its own, then filled it with a richness of sound carrying us into a magical space. Boro Budur in Moonlight by Polish-born American composer Leopold Godowsky (1870-1938), is taken from his twelve-piece Java Suite, and it evoked a mood of moonlight shining on this Buddhist monument. The program concluded with music by two connected composers, Brahms and Schumann. The Brahms was Vier Klavierstücke Op. 119, (Four Piano Pieces). The pianist Emmanuel Ax suggests that these were written for Clara Schumann to perform and their intensity and concentrated emotion are Brahms' most personal and expressive music because of his love for Clara. The melancholic loveliness of the first, and in a brighter mood, the second intermezzo was followed by a brief rollicking third. The fourth is a triumphant Rhapsody in E-flat major that sounded like a march and was played with convincing expressiveness.The closing piano selection Träumerei (Dreaming) from Kinderszenen, Op. 15 is by Robert Schumann, Clara's husband and Brahms' friend and mentor who died at age 46 when Brahms was 23 and Clara 36. The music draws you into such loveliness of sound gently enfolding you in a safe, sensual feeling for all of its two-and-a half minute length. (If you have the CD Horowitz in Moscow, it is track 13.) It was a fine ending to an excellent evening of chamber music in Chesapeake. |