six chansons populaires séphardiques; pour chant et pianoby joaquín nin-culmell;six songs; medium...

Six chansons populaires séphardiques; pour chant et piano by Joaquín Nin-Culmell; Six Songs;Medium Voice and Piano by Charles T. Griffes; Donna K. Anderson; Seven Songs; Medium toHigh Voice and Piano by Charles T. Griffes; Donna K. Anderson; Satires (Pictures of the Past)on Verses by S. Chorny; 5 Romances for Soprano and Piano, Op. 109 by Dmitri Shostakovich;Suite nach Gedichten von Michelangelo, op. 145; für Bass und ...Review by: Laura DanknerNotes, Second Series, Vol. 45, No. 2 (Dec., 1988), pp. 394-397Published by: Music Library AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/941380 .

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NOTES, December 1988 NOTES, December 1988

lowing very slight variations." And although the music is all written on five-line staves, there are numerous places-featur- ing glissandi, free poking around on a pre- scribed axis, and the like-where pitches per se are not at issue.

Buller's sense of music is as much indebted to the Victorian world of, say, Sir Hubert Parry as it is to the avant garde, where it in fact belongs. To my ear, the former influence is a burden that Buller bears well and nearly overcomes. His sense of proportion and gesture is rooted in tradition, but his music's sheer inventiveness and energy and complexity of texture, its overall rhythmic verve, and the composer's wonderful ear for words and for the hu- man voice, make for a compelling result.

Some passages, in which so much is going on at once that the word "chaos" comes to mind, suggest the world of Charles Ives. But the differences between Buller and Ives are more compelling than any similarities. Where Ives can rejoice in chaos and just let

lowing very slight variations." And although the music is all written on five-line staves, there are numerous places-featur- ing glissandi, free poking around on a pre- scribed axis, and the like-where pitches per se are not at issue.

Buller's sense of music is as much indebted to the Victorian world of, say, Sir Hubert Parry as it is to the avant garde, where it in fact belongs. To my ear, the former influence is a burden that Buller bears well and nearly overcomes. His sense of proportion and gesture is rooted in tradition, but his music's sheer inventiveness and energy and complexity of texture, its overall rhythmic verve, and the composer's wonderful ear for words and for the hu- man voice, make for a compelling result.

Some passages, in which so much is going on at once that the word "chaos" comes to mind, suggest the world of Charles Ives. But the differences between Buller and Ives are more compelling than any similarities. Where Ives can rejoice in chaos and just let

it rip, Buller equates it, I think, with ex- treme complexity, to be shaped and con- trolled.

American instrumentalists with experience in the avant garde would have no trouble here, though Buller's vocal writing clearly has in mind the astonishing skills of B.B.C. staff singers, whose ease with dissonant pitch, non-metrical rhythm, and high-speed delivery is celebrated.

What is the music like? Virtuosic; sono- rous; flighty; energy in search of repose. It is quite free of any dissonant-consonant axis, but rooted in a sense of statement and counter-statement.

Buller, who recognizes that Finnegans Wake seeks an entirely new language, is too indebted to tradition to aspire to such a thing in musical terms; all the same, he has succeeded in an important way in "musi- cizing" Joyce.

RICHARD K. WINSLOW Antrim, New Hampshire

it rip, Buller equates it, I think, with ex- treme complexity, to be shaped and con- trolled.

American instrumentalists with experience in the avant garde would have no trouble here, though Buller's vocal writing clearly has in mind the astonishing skills of B.B.C. staff singers, whose ease with dissonant pitch, non-metrical rhythm, and high-speed delivery is celebrated.

What is the music like? Virtuosic; sono- rous; flighty; energy in search of repose. It is quite free of any dissonant-consonant axis, but rooted in a sense of statement and counter-statement.

Buller, who recognizes that Finnegans Wake seeks an entirely new language, is too indebted to tradition to aspire to such a thing in musical terms; all the same, he has succeeded in an important way in "musi- cizing" Joyce.

RICHARD K. WINSLOW Antrim, New Hampshire

VOCAL AND CHORAL MUSIC VOCAL AND CHORAL MUSIC

Joaquin Nin-Culmell. Six chansons

populaires sephardiques; pour chant et piano. Paris: Eschig (Hal Leonard), 1986. [18 p.; $16.95.]

Charles T. Griffes. Six songs; medium voice and piano. Edited and translated by Donna K. Anderson. New York: Henmar (Peters), 1986. [17 p.; $12.50.]

Charles T. Griffes. Seven songs; medium to high voice and piano. Ed. by Donna K. Anderson. New York: Hen- mar (Peters), 1986. [29 p.; $15.00.]

Dmitri Shostakovich. Satires (Pictures of the Past) on verses by S. Chorny; 5 romances for soprano and piano, op. 109. Hamburg: Musikverlag Hans Si- korski (Hal Leonard), [1986], c1982. [42 p.; $18.95.]

Dmitri Shostakovich. Suite nach Ge- dichten von Michelangelo, op. 145; fur Bass und Klavier. Text in Russ., Ger.

Hamburg: Sikorski (Hal Leonard), [1987], c1974. [Pref. in Ger., Eng.; texts

Joaquin Nin-Culmell. Six chansons

populaires sephardiques; pour chant et piano. Paris: Eschig (Hal Leonard), 1986. [18 p.; $16.95.]

Charles T. Griffes. Six songs; medium voice and piano. Edited and translated by Donna K. Anderson. New York: Henmar (Peters), 1986. [17 p.; $12.50.]

Charles T. Griffes. Seven songs; medium to high voice and piano. Ed. by Donna K. Anderson. New York: Hen- mar (Peters), 1986. [29 p.; $15.00.]

Dmitri Shostakovich. Satires (Pictures of the Past) on verses by S. Chorny; 5 romances for soprano and piano, op. 109. Hamburg: Musikverlag Hans Si- korski (Hal Leonard), [1986], c1982. [42 p.; $18.95.]

Dmitri Shostakovich. Suite nach Ge- dichten von Michelangelo, op. 145; fur Bass und Klavier. Text in Russ., Ger.

Hamburg: Sikorski (Hal Leonard), [1987], c1974. [Pref. in Ger., Eng.; texts

in Ger., Ital., 9 p.; score, 54 p.; notes on the texts, in Ger., 1 p.; $27.50. Study score of the orchestral version, op. 145a, also available; performance materials available on rental.]

First the good news about these five editions of vocal music by three twentieth-century composers: There's a marvelous diversity in style, mood, and ethnicity displayed here, so that many different tastes and technical levels may be accommo- dated. At the risk of sounding flippant, I'd rate them as follows: a B+ for Joaquin Nin- Culmell's Six chansons populaires sephardiques and Griffes's six German songs; A- for the second Griffes edition and the Shostakov- ich Satiren; A+ for the Russian composer's Suite nach Gedichten von Michelangelo. Now the not-so-good news: The Michelangelo cycle, a modern classic, is not likely, for several reasons, to be performed very often, especially in this country. And that's un- fortunate, because it deserves to be heard and studied by all serious music lovers.

There's no denying that the Nin-Culmell Sephardic songs are the slightest-or, perhaps, the least ambitious-of the five. Cer-

in Ger., Ital., 9 p.; score, 54 p.; notes on the texts, in Ger., 1 p.; $27.50. Study score of the orchestral version, op. 145a, also available; performance materials available on rental.]

First the good news about these five editions of vocal music by three twentieth-century composers: There's a marvelous diversity in style, mood, and ethnicity displayed here, so that many different tastes and technical levels may be accommo- dated. At the risk of sounding flippant, I'd rate them as follows: a B+ for Joaquin Nin- Culmell's Six chansons populaires sephardiques and Griffes's six German songs; A- for the second Griffes edition and the Shostakov- ich Satiren; A+ for the Russian composer's Suite nach Gedichten von Michelangelo. Now the not-so-good news: The Michelangelo cycle, a modern classic, is not likely, for several reasons, to be performed very often, especially in this country. And that's un- fortunate, because it deserves to be heard and studied by all serious music lovers.

There's no denying that the Nin-Culmell Sephardic songs are the slightest-or, perhaps, the least ambitious-of the five. Cer-

394 394



Music Reviews

tainly they are the most straightforward group dramatically, stylistically, and vo- cally. This is not a criticism: finding well- crafted contemporary pieces suitable for performance by less advanced singers is often a frustrating task for voice teachers and their students. But there's little point to a detailed theoretical analysis; the title gives an apt description of the cycle (which the composer states is "In memoriam omnium martyrum iudaeorum"), and there's nothing particularly innovative about the treat- ment-though written in 1982, the songs reflect the composer's life-long dedication to the conservative Spanish idiom of his teacher, Manuel de Falla. (The texts, by the way, are in Ladino, a language combining antique Spanish with elements of Hebrew that was once spoken by Jews throughout parts of southern Europe.) It would be un- fair, however, simply to dismiss this as merely an old-fashioned, albeit compe- tently crafted, effort: the melismatic vocal lines are haunting (especially "La Rosa En- florece," the third song), the harmonies are sensuously lush, and the overall effect is charmingly "soulful" throughout. Written in a medium-high vocal tessitura, the songs do not make undue technical demands on the singer (although a warm vocal sound with a bit of vibrato would be very nice), and the piano part is well within the means of most players. A sensitivity to legato line and to the inherent lyricism of the six short songs is required of both performers. A version of the piece for voice and orchestra is also available through Max Eschig.

The two Griffes compilations are edited by the well-known Griffes scholar Donna Anderson. The Six Songs are newly-published pieces dating from the composer's German period (translated into English by the editor), while the Seven Songs dem- onstrate his later, more mature (and eclec- tic) stylistic traits. The earlier works, while extremely competent examples of the late romantic Lied, are as derivative in their own way as are the Nin-Culmell Chansons. How- ever, like the Sephardic songs, the Griffes pieces, passionate and seamlessly crafted, are too finely made to be casually dis- missed. Performers looking for an alter- native to the standard German repertoire would do well to consider these in place of the "war horses" of the genre. Even better, however, are the Seven Songs, in which Griffes, ever inquisitive about the major in-

tellectual and musical currents of his time (such as impressionism and orientalism, to name just two), absorbed and assimilated these and other influences to form a musical language all his own. The composer's choice of texts shows the diversity of his vi- sion: from a traditional Rumanian folk ex- ample (the effectively spare "Two birds flew into the Sunset Glow") to the curious verse of the cleric John Tabb (three songs, including the brooding setting of "Cleopatra to the Asp"), with Oscar Wilde, Sara Teas- dale, and a Chinese poet also represented.

Some of us who came of musical (and vocal) age in the 1960s might still not be very familiar with Griffes's songs. In my own case, the rediscovery of Charles Ives and subsequent fascination with his vocal works tended to obscure the contributions of more conventional composers such as Griffes. These two collections, together with others currently available under the Henmar im- print (most edited by Anderson), should help make Griffes's excellent songs better known; they certainly deserve a hearing.

The German settings are appropriate for mezzos and baritones; the Seven Songs de- mand a higher, lighter voice. Since neither of the two editions is a cycle, vocalists can prepare these groups in their entirety or can choose excerpts to suit specific pro- gramming needs.

All the songs discussed so far are emi- nently "performable." The same is not true of the two Shostakovich cycles, though ironically, they are the most important of the works reviewed here. Not all great works are necessarily accessible to all audiences, nor are they usually easy to sing. To be sure, there are many examples of music more technically difficult than these, but added to the formidable vocal obstacles (most pressingly present in the Suite nach Gedich- ten von Michelangelo) is the necessity for both singer and pianist to sustain an almost unbearable intensity for as long as forty- five minutes (the approximate duration of the Suite). There is also a "hidden agenda" here, a requirement that both listeners and performers have some knowledge of the interrelated political-artistic problems faced by the composer in his later years. The most important idea expressed in both cycles is the struggle to be creative in a restrictive society that values conformity and medio- crity over innovation. This theme is al- luded to in both the Suite (1974) and the

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NOTES, December 1988

earlier Satiren (1960), although attempts were obviously made to hide this message by the choice of the two authors (a poet considered "pre-revolutionary" for Satiren; the Italian artist for the later work). But it was not well hidden enough, according to the Soviet soprano Galina Vishnevskaya, who in her memoirs (Galina: a Russian Story [San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984], 268-71) relates the difficulties en- countered in premiering Satiren in the So- viet Union in the early 1960s-difficulties due largely to the words of the third song, "Die Nachkommen," which was perceived by authorities to be blatantly opposed to the regime in power. The bitter verse is em-

phasized by the folk-like, intentionally rep- etitious vocal line, which builds steadily to a furious climax. It's not hard to see why authorities did not like the anger so clearly expressed in this song, which is also the

pivotal selection in the five-part cycle. That the piece was written for Vishnevskaya gives a clue to its vocal requirements; in fact, having heard a recording by another So- viet soprano of lesser ability, this reviewer feels strongly that only a singer with great flair and sure technique could do justice to the work. A sense of Russian style and a certain flamboyance are also essential, as is that indefinable trait, charm, without which the high tessitura and shifting moods of the

cycle could end up sounding shrill and arch, rather than dramatic and pointed.

The Suite presents far greater potential problems, both for performers and listeners; the lack of sustained lyrical line

might prove especially wearying to audiences. One of Shostakovich's last pieces, this

eleven-part work is infused with a bitter- ness and anger that almost overwhelm. De-

clamatory-almost operatic-in style, the

cycle requires incredible physical and emotional stamina, as well as an ability to sustain a high-fever pitch of intensity. For these reasons, only top-notch singing actors would be capable of performing this most de-

manding work. The Suite was written for (and premiered by) Yevgeny Nesterenko, the Russian bass, in the year preceding Shostakovich's death.

Both cycles, originally scored for voice and piano, were eventually orchestrated: Satiren by Boris Tishchenko, the Suite by the

composer (rental parts are available for both). Regarding the Michelangelo settings, I must admit to a preference for the

orchestral version. While the piano accom- paniment seems austere, the addition of orchestral tone colors, especially the brass and percussion in the aptly-titled "Zorn" (Wrath) and the woodwinds in the eerily- cheerful postscript, "Immortality," add an immense emotional wallop not found in the original version. The orchestration also re- moves some of the dramatic burden from the singer: the piano-vocal scoring simply isn't as much of a cooperative effort. In either version, however, the Suite nach Ged- ichten von Michelangelo is an epic power- house that can be considered among the best of the composer's late works.

In light of the difficulties faced by pub- lishers of so-called "serious" music in the late 1980s, the obvious commitment to high- quality editions exhibited by all three pub- lishers is remarkable. This is especially true of Henmar's exemplary Griffes publications (Edition Peters), which feature editor Donna Anderson's helpful program notes.

Eschig's Nin-Culmell edition is also nicely done, and includes a French translation of the texts (program notes would also have been helpful). Despite the excellence of the Shostakovich editions, it is downright mad-

dening that Sikorsky, which went to the trouble of printing the title page and pref- ace of the two cycles in both German and

English (including two versions of the com-

poser's name) and which also includes rather extensive notes on the texts of the Suiten

(quirkily, in German only, while the original Italian sonnets are included alongside the German translations!), didn't see fit to include a romanized version of the Russian text for either cycle. This is a glaring omis- sion, since the composer's text settings of both works clearly indicate that Russian is the most appropriate language for performance. Perhaps economic considerations precluded printing transliterations (or, for that matter, an English translation of either cycle). But it's still a shame, especially since the publisher, which obviously didn't mean to ignore the English-speaking sales mar- ket, lavished so much care on other facets of the editions.

No recordings could be located for the Six Chansons; however, four of Griffes's Seven Songs are included on a Musical Heritage Society recording (MHS 4678-79) which, interestingly, seems to have been issued prior to the 1986 Henmar publication date. Donna Anderson's Works of Charles T.

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Music Reviews Music Reviews Music Reviews

Griffes (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1983) contains much useful information about the composer's song output. Both the Shostakovich cycles have been recorded, although the only version listed in the cur- rent Schwann Catalog is a compact disc containing three of the five songs from Sa- tiren (Olympia OCD-143, with the Sym- phony no. 8). The orchestral arrangement of the Suite with Nesterenko issued by Mel- odiya/Columbia (M2 34594) includes both the romanized Russian and an English translation.

LAURA DANKNER Loyola University,

New Orleans

David Watkins. Folk Songs; for voice(s) and harp (or piano). London: Stainer & Bell (Galaxy), 1984. [25 p.; $8.95.]

These lovely arrangements were com- pleted in 1980, published in 1984 by Stain- er & Bell, and have only within the last year or two made their way to reviewers in the United States. The four songs-"Scarbor- ough Fair," "Barbara Allen," "Now is the Month of Maying," and "Sumer is Icumen in"-are familiar to most, and represent lovely choices for voice and harp: they are in turn light, transparent, and haunting. (I cannot support the printed suggestion that unison voices can be substituted for the solo singer-ideally a light tenor or soprano- and piano can be substituted for the harp.)

David Watkins is a British harpist who has several successful publications for the instrument to his credit, including an An- thology of English Music for the Harp, a Com- plete Method for the Harp, and the Petite Suite, a work programmed frequently on solo re- citals. His gifts here lie in his choice of ap- pealing themes readily accessible to any au- dience, set with ingenious, uncomplicated contrapuntal skill. The songs could be performed by a folk singer and an interme- diate-level harpist.

Watkins is principal harpist of the Lon- don Philharmonic Orchestra and professor of harp at the Guildhall School of Music. There can be little doubt that he works in the shadow of Benjamin Britten, whose magisterial folksong arrangements certainly provided inspiration for the present opus. The result is, however, no poor sec-



New Orleans







New Orleans





ond, and bears favorable comparison with Britten's best.

JANE B. WEIDENSAUL William Paterson College

Wayne, NJ

English Romantic Partsongs. Edited by Paul Hillier. Oxford: Oxford Uni- versity Press, 1986. [Intro., 3 p.; score, 156 p.; notes, 1 p.]

Renaissance Christmas Motets; for mixed voices a cappella. [S.I.] U.K.: Mapa Mundi (Galaxy), 1986. [Score, 38 p.; $5.50.]

In his introduction to English Romantic Partsongs, Paul Hillier reminds us that "music is a social activity before it is an ob- ject of cultural homage and critical evalu- ation," and it is with that thought in mind that this new collection from Oxford is highly recommended to lovers of the choral art. Who among us has spent many sat- isfying sessions with friends over Henry Clough-Leighter's The A Cappella Singer, yet is not always eager for new repertoire to read, sing, and enjoy?

Hillier's introduction walks us through the history of nineteenth-century English partsong, from Samuel Wesley's competi- tion piece for the 1811 Madrigal Society to the songs of Edward Elgar and his contem- poraries, with a fascinating meander past Felix Mendelssohn and his influence on the English glee tradition (hence his inclusion in this volume). Reading about the London singing societies and their encouragement of new compositions, one is reminded that amateur choruses are not really so different today: groups of "mechanics . . . weavers . . .various trades and occupa- tions" (read "lawyers . . . computer pro- grammers . . . various professions and oc- cupations") pay dues for the pleasures of music, some refreshments, and a release from the increasing industrialization (now, encroaching technology) of everyday life.

Whether or not the composers represented in this volume have been slighted on concert stages for good reason, the thirty selections encompass a wonderful variety of Victorian-age styles, and the singer can experience each in turn: the backward- looking madrigal, the uniquely English glee,



Wayne, NJ








Wayne, NJ






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