Reviews

Irish Times writers review the Ulster Orchestra, Thierry Fischer in Belfast, Marc Copland at the Bankof Ireland Arts Centre and Ashley Wass at the Elmwood Hall in Belfast.

Ulster Orchestra, Thierry Fischer

Ulster Hall, Belfast

Bruckner - Te Deum

Beethoven - Symphony No 9.

Review by Dermot Gault

If only the steeply raked choir seats that flank the Ulster Hall organ were full, as they were in the old days.

Bruckner's Te Deum needs a choir of considerable heft; no lean, "period" sounds here! For this performance, the choral group Renaissance was joined by Methodist College Senior Choir, and together they coped remarkably well with some demanding music.

There was an assertive contribution from the organ and a creditable high C from the sopranos at the end.

The performance of the Ninth epitomised both the strengths and the weaknesses of Fischer's Beethoven cycle. The scherzo was rough and ragged; the slow movement flowed naturally and easily at a faster-than-usual tempo.

The finale was loud and lively, the slower episodes flowing seamlessly into the whole, but without much majesty in the "Seid umschlungen". Bruckner shows that the depths need to be sounded for the heights to be scaled; but Fischer is not concerned with bringing out the philosophical dimension conductors of a previous generation sought in this music, but with following the composer's directions faithfully.

He has thought seriously about period performance and has managed, to a greater extent than anyone else, to make the Ulster Orchestra feel at home in this style.

Nancy Argenta and Alison Browner were able soloists. Timothy Robinson was happier in the Beethoven than in the Bruckner, while Roderick Williams's rich bass made a strong impression in both works.

Marc Copland

Bank of Ireland Arts Centre

Ray Comiskey

Presented by Note Productions, last Saturday's concert by Marc Copland at the Bank of Ireland Arts Centre was an example of what solo jazz piano is capable of in terms of depth of feeling, harmonic ingenuity, breadth of imagination and sheer beauty.

Such a memorable concert confirmed Copland as a pianist of the front rank, with the kind of expressive touch and technique to take him anywhere he wants to venture musically.

Yet there was no reliance on empty gesture; there was nothing redundant about his long, very individual journeys into the heart of his material to find the poetry that seems to be at the core of his artistry.

No matter how far those forays took him away from its roots in the original's structure and harmonies, he always found some way of reconciling them with the material that sparked the first impetus.

He achieved this by various means; most often, he used chords so ambiguously voiced that what followed was a constant source of surprise, a fraught procedure for an improviser but one he used with a sophisticated awareness.

Another device he employed was to use simple little figures underneath either the themes or the improvisations, or both, as occasionally recurring motifs to unify his excursions or to flag a change of breath.

But talk of procedures does no more than hint at the delicacy of transformations he wrought over such familiars as My Funny Valentine and Spartacus, or, above all, the radical, totally personal approach, with its ominous undertones, to the great Miles Davis/Bill Evans tune Nardis. Nor does it get even close to the artistry that animated his own material - Round She Goes, Blackboard and Not Going Gently.

When it came to the simple, or relatively simple, interpretation, as he took on John Coltrane's Naima, the results were equally exquisite. If you like this kind of jazz and you're near the Triskel in Cork, where he plays next Wednesday, don't miss him.

Ashley Wass

Elmwood Hall, Belfast

Beethoven - 32 Variations on an Original Theme in C minor; Andante favori in F; Six Bagatelles, Op.126; Rondo a capriccio in G.

Review by Dermot Gault

Almost the last of the BBC recitals which have accompanied the Ulster Orchestra's newly completed Beethoven cycle, this recital by the young English pianist Ashley Wass was the only one to consist of music for solo piano, the composer's favourite medium.

It is in his solo piano writing that Beethoven expresses himself most freely and spontaneously. He can be at his most profound when writing for the piano, and also at his most playful.

Ashley Wass has technique, and the interpretative insight to find a steady basic tempo for the 32 Variations while doing justice to its varying moods - commanding, withdrawn or apprehensive.

He also provided plenty of charm in the Andante favori, which served as the original slow movement for the Waldstein Sonata, pacing this leisurely piece well and bringing Beethoven's subtle shifts of harmony to life with sensitive tonal shading.

He can coax a good range of sounds from the instrument, occasional hardness of tone in the upper register notwithstanding. But, above all, he has temperament and the different characters of the late series of Bagatelles were well realised.

The final E flat Bagatelle ends with a beguiling Andante amabile followed by a final outburst of temper; there should be no holding back here, and there wasn't.

There was temperament too in the entertaining Rondo a capriccio, although Wass seemed to be thinking more in terms of the probably apocryphal title "Rage over a lost penny" than over the composer's own description of it as "a light caprice".