The second week of the musical marathon that is the
Tuckamore Festival is upon us. But
before week one fades from our memories I wanted to salute the soprano talents
of Suzie LeBlanc. Whether it was
for her varied programs, Music From the 45th Parallel North or the lieder the
following night, she completely charmed the audience. LeBlanc has an enthusiastic way of inhabiting the music that
is infectious and pulls the audience in as if they were co-conspirators along
with Robert Kortgaard on piano or her other fellow performers. Suzie had said that in preparation for
the late night concert she was selecting some of her favourite pieces to
perform. It was only after she
reviewed her list did the geographic denominator of the 45th Parallel become
apparent.
It could be suggested that another theme was possible–and
that would be the complimentary nature of opposites. It was there in the call and response that she coaxed the
audience into, the interspecies dating of "l'alouette et poisson",
the bittersweet of "si dolce, il tormento" and the American
celluloid, blue-eyed doll that is alternately loved and then hated. And what better role for music than to
convey the seemingly impossible, to stretch beyond the logical and
literal? And if you can, as
LeBlanc did, give us a lesson in Canada's own musical heritage from Acadia all
the better.
Jamie Parker of the Gryphon Trio has a similar way of making
music approachable, of knocking the stuffing out of classical music
repertoire. The audience warmed to
his comments that likened Mendelssohn's Piano Trio No. 2 in C Minor, Op. 66 as
to "a Mission Impossible half an hour" complete with a car chase,
romantic hotel scene, a trademark quasi presto and concluding with the special
effects of a Bach chorale quote that ranged from the pious to the flashy and
heroic.
What was striking was that whether it was Debussy or the
compositions of our very own Andrew Staniland the Gryphon Trio has an
unusually, cohesive sound. Never
do you hear one lead instrument with a back up of two others. Rather, it is one integrated
sound. Staniland was represented
by two selections: 14 Seconds from
the Dark Star Requiem and the Solstice Songs. 14 Seconds started without fanfare but became more insistent
and grew more urgent. The composer
in his opening remarks told the audience that he wanted us to be left with a
feeling of hope in the face of the world's disasters (the title was sparked by
the statistic that at one point every 14 seconds someone had died of a
HIV/AIDS).
Given the program notes that described Solstice Songs by
Staniland as "lively, dance-like" the audience might have expected
something pleasantly common.
Instead, we were delighted with a composition that ascended and cascaded
with vigor, tumbling and at times turbulent! How many memorable evenings can our memories accommodate?
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