Piazzolla Sound Fest

The concert last Saturday at the Cutlural Centre was one of the greatest surprises of this year. I was surprised that only two of my regular concert going gang were with me. They had no idea how much they should have regretted not having joined me.

The evening featured an all Latin American programme. We had works from three of the greatest composers from the anitpodean world south of the equator whose names I have previously seen only on record and CD label and jackets and apart from Piazzolla ,whose works I have never heard before. The first was Silvestra Revueltas (1899-1940).  According to the Programme Notes, he was born in a small village called Santiago Papasquiaro in Mexico just before the 20th century, trained as a violinist in Mexico and then USA and from 1929, conducted orchestras in Mexico City and taught violin at the Conservatory there, then went to join the Republican cause in Spain during the Civil War of the 1930s and upon his return in 1937, started composing again (having first started in 1930) and then died three years later of alcoholism. He was determined to revitalize Mexican music but was met in his own words by "taunts, hisses, protests, insults and the angry indignation of a public long-ensconced and of the same old critics". Whilst he did not quote directly from Mexican folk dances and melodies, his music was immersed in its tradition. He said, "My rhythms are booming, dynamic, tactile, visual. I think in images that are melodic strains that move dynamically." He loved composing for the cinema and did seven film scores. The evening's programme, called La noche de los Mayas, in lento, molto sostenuto and andante, was originally a film score, which was then converted into a symphonic suite by José Ives Limatour, premiered in 1961 and later shortened into the version heard Saturday night. It began stridently with tipanis, percussions and trumpets, then changed into a more wistful melody and then reverted back dramatically, then romantically and finally resumed it opening motif. The second movement was much slower, peaceful and meditative but in the final movement, the fast-paced drama resumed. One could not help feeling the influence of the sound and rhythms of the mariachis or of the rumba.

The second piece of the evening Astor Piazzolla's The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. Like other postmodernist works, it pays tributes to the original Vivaldi Four Season by quoting certain passages therefrom but as the seasons are reversed in the northern and southern hemispheres, the order of the seasons is a little different. It starts with Verano Porteño (Summer), Otoño (Autumn) Invierno Porteño (Winter) Primavera Porteña (Spring) (the word "Porteño" in Spanish presumably meaning relating to a port, here Buenos Aires just like the word madrileño means pertaining to Madrid). However, if one were to think that it will retain some of the baroque style of the original, one will be in for a big surprise. It's rhythm is completely South American. As Piazzolla is an Argentinian, it is difficult to see how he could not be influenced by the most famous "national" rhythm: the Tango. But as a Latino, he is full of fun. He plays around with the violin by having some unusual glissando (sound produced by the violinist's left hand finger gliding down the string) and some sound produced for rhythm by striking the string at the space between the bridge and the end hook at the bottom of the violin's sound box. As Vivaldi, he arranged the work for solo violin and string orchestra. The violin solo was played by the very young, energetic, lively and lovely Karen Gomyo, who appeared on stage with a huge pony tail and bare-shoulder evening gown. Her sound was beautiful, smooth, mature, bright but not  scratchy.I learned later that she was playing a Stradivarius! Piazzolla arranged it in such a way, like Vivaldi by having each season represented by a three-movement concerto but in tango form! A most lively piece! As an encore, Gomyo played for us another beautifully nostalgia  piece adapted from a theme which Piazzolla wrote for a film called Oblivion.

Then we had another piece from Piazzolla, this time a bandoneon concerto. Piazzolla himself is an accomplished bandoneon performer class player and has in fact played the bandoneon soloist part in the bandoneon concerto himself when it first premiered in 1979 in Buenos Aires.  According to the Programme Notes, he was invited to accompany the great Tango singer Carlos Gardel on his US concert tours in the 1930s and after taking lessons from Ginastera, he started to compose some serious tango music but was met with hostility when he premiered his concerto Sinfonia Buenos Aires in 1953. He then went to study composition with Nadia Boulanger in Paris on a scholarship but was told that his soul was with the Tango and should stick with it, which he did. One can seldom dissociate the bandoneon from Argentinian tango. Piazzolla wrote two concerto for the bandoneon, one  the Concerto for Bandoneon, String orchestra and Percussion in 1979 ,
popularly called Aconcaqua, after the name of highest peak in South
America) and the other with another popular Latin American musical instrument, the guitar, done in 1985.We had the first one. It was a three movement concerto (in Allegro marcato, Moderato and Presto) with the typical energetic rhythms of the tango, with the usual drama, abrupt change of sound and moods the exhilaration, excitement, effusive joy, and sadness and romance. The second movement was much less energetic, gentle, moody and romantic whilst the third was again quite energetic. It used a theme which Piazzolla first composed for a 1970 film Con Alma y vida (With soul and life) and ended most suddenly and without any warning at all!

The solo part for the bandoneon was played by a German bandoneon aficianado called Carel Kraayenhof, who appeared in a Chinese style black silk jacket and black trousers and who had to support the mini-accordeon style instrument upon his thigh resting on a stool because it would be too tiring to hold it up by hand as done by some bandoneon players by having both end of the hard handle-board  with stops by strapping them on to their shoulders by a leather strap. He is a wonderfully accomplished player and has  worked with Piazzolla himself in the 1987 Tango Apasionado in New York, Ennio Morricone, Yo-Yo Ma, Janine Jansen, Joshua Bell etc and Quirine Viersen and is a close friend with with another Tango maestro Osvaldo Pugliese. He performed a piece called Adiós Nonino at the marriage of HRH Prince Wilhem Alexander with HRH Princess Máxima in Netherlands in 2002, (a piece which he played for us too, as an encore.).  

Thanks to the lady conductor Gisèle Ben-Dor, a lady conductor born and raised in Uruguay of Polish parents and a champion for the music of Ginastera, Revueltas, Pizzazolla and Luis Bacalov who established the world famous and very popular Tango and Malambo Festival, I came away completely satisfied with the sound of the exciting rhythms reverberating in my head as I rode the MTR home. Ben-Dor is a rather weighty lady who appeared completely immersed in the music she conducted and throughout the concert, we saw her waving her arms, bending her body, bringing down her arms  or and swinging her them in bold energetic and decisive movements and at times almost like a wind-mill. The HKPO shone under her enthusiasm and gave us a brilliant performance.