Anthony Marwood / Berliner Philharmoniker, Sir Simon Rattle / Chamber Orchestra Of Europe, Thomas Ades / The National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, Paul Daniel
Adès: Tevot; Violin concerto; Three Studies from Couperin; Dances from 'Powder Her Face'
Wholenote Discoveries - May 2010
This tremendous CD of recent orchestral works by the English composer Thomas Adès offers convincing proof that, while contemporary composers may have difficulty gate-crashing the standard repertoire, their efforts deserve - and reward - our fullest attention. Born in 1971, Adès is clearly a composer with ‘something to say’. There isn’t a weak or unconvincing track here, and the orchestration is outstanding. Tevot, written for Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic in 2007, is a live recording from a Berlin concert the same year. The haunting Violin Concerto, Concentric Paths, written in 2005 for Anthony Marwood and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, is a live 2007 performance by them at London’s Barbican Hall, with Adès conducting. The same concert included the UK premiere of Three Studies from Couperin (2006), fascinating re-workings of Couperin keyboard pieces that retain the same number of bars as the originals as well as the same rhythms and harmonies. Finally, the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain under Paul Daniel gives us the richly decadent Overture, Waltz and Finale, the suite that Adès made in 2007 from his first opera, Powder Her Face, although this time using full orchestra instead of the original 15 instruments. It’s tempting to play the ‘sounds like…’ game – here’s Britten (Adès was artistic director of the Aldeburgh Festival from 1999 to 2008); there’s Janacek; that’s Ravel – but there is no doubting that this is an original and accomplished individual voice. Terry Robbins
Distance, deception and enchantment are all qualities of Thomas Adès's music that have become ever more apparent in the last decade. These four recordings survey that period, and each take the listener on their own journeys, from intimate Couperin recompositions to the most spacious orchestral recreation of the Ark.
Tevot (2007) was commissioned by the Berliner Philharmoniker and Carnegie Hall. In Hebrew, Tevot means “arks”, as in the Ark of the Covenant or Noah’s Ark. It can also mean box or vessel, like the cradle in which the baby Moses was placed among the reeds. Another meaning of Tevot is the bars in a piece of music. Tevot is scored for the largest orchestra that Adès has ever composed for. “I was thinking,” he says, “writing for the Berlin Phil, that what you have is one huge organism made up of hundreds of brilliant individual players. They move together; they play with their bodies, especially in the case of the horn section. They are like paragliders, or people who have just jumped off a cliff wearing a bit of rope. They are very fearless, and they have to be. Watching the orchestra play Tevot feels a bit like watching people on a boat, as the music is being thrown from one side of the orchestra and smashing into the other side, almost as if it is going to capsize – but I don’t think it does.“ This may well be thanks to Simon Rattle who “has an almost supernatural ability to know what my music is and how to produce it in the orchestra.”
The Violin Concerto ‘Concentric Paths’ (2005), was commissioned by the Berliner Festspiele and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. It is dedicated to Anthony Marwood and scored for a Beethoven-scale orchestra plus two percussionists. The Times reviewer wrote of the concert performance recorded here, “Anthony Marwood gave an exuberantly committed performance of a work which is surely set to be a much sought after new classic of the violin repertoire.” Concentric Paths, released as a digital download in 2007, appears here for the first time on CD.
Three Studies from Couperin (2006) was commissioned by the Basel Chamber Orchestra. Adès has long been fascinated by the compositions of the 18th Century French composer François Couperin. In this work Adès adapted three of Couperin’s keyboard works, colouring them with contemporary instruments and ideas. The studies Les Amusemens, Les Tours de passe-passe and L’Âme-en-peine are scored for two string ensembles with added woodwinds, brass and a percussionist with bass marimba, two small metal bars, bass drum, five roto-toms and three timpani to hand.
Overture, Waltz and Finale from Powder Her Face (2007): Powder Her Face began life as a chamber opera in 1995 about the colourful life of the Duchess of Argyll. It has had more than 30 international productions since then. This re-orchestration “transforms the original’s sparse textures into a pointillistic phantasmagoria, its exuberance finally collapsing into shards of disillusionment. It is a fine showpiece.” (The Guardian)
