Maya Beiser: Infinite Bach (CD Review)

 by Karl Nehring

J.S. Bach: (CD1) Cello Suite No. 1 in G major BWV 1007; Cello Suite No. 3 in C major No. 3 in C major BWV 1009; (CD2) Cello Suite No. 2 in D minor BWV 1005; Cello Suite No. 5 in C minor BWV 1011; (CD3) Cello Suite No. 4 in E flat major BWV 1010; Cello Suite No. 6 in D major BWV 1012. Maya Beiser, cello. Islandia Music Records IMR012

 

The American cellist May Beiser (b. 1963) has brought us a recording of Bach’s Cello Suites that is unusual in several ways. For example, JJP has reviewed two recordings of the complete set in past installments of Classical Candor, one by Zuill Bailey on Telarc (reviewed here) and the other by Ovidiu Marinescu on Navona (reviewed here). Both are two-CD sets, and although JJP noted some slight differences in their sonic characteristics, both were recorded in straightforward stereophonic sound. But when you remove the shrink wrap and unfold the cardboard cover, you will discover that it holds not two but rather three CDs plus a booklet with an essay by Ms. Beiser that reveals some further surprises about her approach to both the music and the sound.

 

Of her approach to the music, she writes: “Embodying the spatial universe of Bach’s Cello Suites, I move away from the solemn transmission of a tradition. I look to expand the realm surrounding the artist and instrument. With this album I offer you my living, breathing voice and that of my cello anew. I spent 2022, my 60th year of life, immersed in recording, and rerecording, deconstructing and decontextualizing, experimenting and exploring sounds, reverberations, harmonics in my converted barn in the Berkshires, Massachusetts, engaging with Bach’s Cello Suites. Having dedicated the past 35 years to creating new music, work that reimagines the cello on a vast canvas in multiple disciplines, I radically departed from the conventional classical cello sound. Yet, the Suites were ingrained in my daily practice. Even as I was getting ready to perform a new work by Steve Reich, Louis Andriessen, or David Bowie, I would still begin every day playing a movement from the Suites. Over the years I was experimenting with the process of unlearning the doctrine I was taught about this music, until last year when I took the time to relearn it anew.”

 

As for the sound, Infinite Bach has been has released it in both a spatial audio (available on Apple Music) and binaural mix (other media, including the CD release) with the goal of creating an immersive listening experience. Beiser used the acoustics of the room she recorded in to create layers of sound acoustically. She writes of the process, “I brought my longtime sound engineer and collaborator, Dave Cook, to the space and we started exploring the acoustic environment. I considered how the space itself uncovers, informs and reshapes my interpretation of the Bach Suites, feeding back the music to me as I play and record it. We mixed many microphones placed at various distances in the resonant space to emphasize nuances in overtones, reflections, and reverberations. Analyzing the multichannel recording, identifying and accentuating the natural drones and harmonics, we further reinforced the resonances and macro harmonic structure of the music. In the spatial audio mix, we aimed to bring the listening experience into the room; guiding the listener through the virtual space as the music infinitely evolves around them.” Listeners can get a sense of her approach from both a musical and sonic perspective from videos that Ms. Beiser has posted on YouTube here as well as here. To get a sense of the binaural mix, listening through headphones is the best bet. As to the significance of the water showers, well…

 

Clearly, this is not just another traversal of the Bach Cello Suites. It is a highly personal account recorded in an unusual fashion. For my own listening to Infinite Bach, I generally preferred headphones over speakers, which is highly unusual. But either way, what I heard was a large, resonant sound – a cello filling a large space with the dancing energy of Bach. It was certainly a different sound than that of Starker on Mercury Living Presence, my faithful standard in this music for many years. In comparison to the Beiser recording, the Starker recording sounds drier, more focused, more straightforward – not to say that Starker lacks energy or passion, both of which he certainly brings to the music in abundance – but the combination of Beiser’s generally slower, more overtly expressive interpretive approach, combined with the vast resonant soundfield created by the unusual engineering approach, results in a much different way for the listener to experience this wondrous music of Bach. 

Although I suppose there will be some who will dismiss this new release as overly indulgent on both musical and sonic terms, I am not one of them. I will confess that the “shower” video really baffled me, but a silly YouTube video does not mean the album itself is silly. Ms. Beiser is a truly gifted musician, she digs deeply into this music, and she offers us a different perspective on music that can unfortunately seem dry and academic if we do not give it our close attention, which Infinite Bach aims to seduce us into doing. I truly delight in both the Starker and Beiser recordings; indeed, Beiser's is the first I have come across (and I have listened to many) that I have decided to file it on my shelf next to the Starker set. It's a keeper. 

 

Nielsen: The Symphonies (CD Review)

by Ryan Ross

 

Danish National Symphony Orchestra; Fabio Luisi, conductor. Deutsche Grammophon 486 3471 (3 CDs)

 

I had high hopes for this one. Being someone who believes that concert programming, and classical music history as it’s normally relayed, are too much in thrall to Late Romantic (especially German) aesthetics, I see renewed focus on composers like Carl Nielsen as a viable way out of the morass. His highly individual, appealing music is a breath of fresh air. It emphasizes rigor, energy, optimism, and (as musicologist Daniel Grimley puts it) life-affirmation. I keep hoping we’ll more fully admit Nielsen into the classical canon as the great symphonist he was, and that our current Mahler/Bruckner/etc. obsessions will subside enough to allow this. So yes, I was thrilled to see Fabio Luisi’s and the DNSO’s new recorded cycle appear on perhaps classical music’s most prestigious label. This had to be a wonderful tool for the cause, right?

Not so much. Oh, the DNSO’s playing is good, and the sound quality is fine. It’s Luisi’s vision of Nielsen’s music that makes the venture objectionable. To be blunt: he doesn’t feel it. He’s a relative newcomer to this repertoire – someone who’s used to conducting music we’re already well used to hearing. Well, these symphonies in his hands sound too much like music we’re already well used to hearing. The result is not just mostly poor Nielsen, but also a weary accompanying realization that Mahler and Bruckner have indeed seemed to permeate everywhere, ostensibly even performances of scores by the Great Dane. 

The biggest problem here is Luisi’s lack of energy. We’ll discuss two instances for the sake of example. In the score of the Second Symphony (subtitled “The Four Temperaments”), Nielsen clearly indicates a tempo marking of eighth equals 126 at the head of the opening movement. Luisi, however, comes in at about 106 to 108. This would be weird in any case, but in a movement entitled “Allegro collerico” (indicating the “choleric” temperament), a slow pulse simply doesn’t get the job done. Luisi himself may not be of such a disposition, but he’s obligated to use the orchestra to do his best impression if he’s conducting this music. Has he met anyone who is choleric? Those folks typically don’t saunter. Maybe worse is the finale of the Fifth Symphony. Again, Luisi proceeds noticeably under the composer’s tempo marking, and in a setting where doing so similarly saps the music of its character. The whole movement is one of epic struggle; from the roiling outer sections, to the terrifying cataclysm of the first fugue, to even the slower “rebirth” presented by the second fugue, this music requires spark and momentum. Instead, the dominant impression is one of lethargy. It comes across like somebody trying to run a marathon immediately after scoffing a huge plate of spaghetti. 

Related to tempo problems are Luisi’s dynamics and phrase shaping. They’re just too steeped in late Romanticism. Nielsen’s music at times shares something with Romanticism, but there is a rather stronger Classical streak present that greatly leavens this overlap and clashes with Luisi’s apparent instincts. A good example is how he conceives the finale of the Third Symphony, subtitled “Espansiva.” Evidently Luisi takes this term to mean “expansive” as in imitating exaggerated Romantic climaxes. Instead of the open-air hymn to hard work and common rural experience (which would be consistent with Nielsen’s own remarks on this section), the tune and its supporting materials become just another Mahlerian lied, with gushy strings and overwrought arrivals. Combine these things with another slow tempo (I cannot imagine why this movement needs to clock in at 10:59!), and we’re quite far from the spirit of the work. Similar interpretive miscues hamper nearly every performance here, from the odd dynamic spasms (heard right away in the First Symphony), to poorly accentuated subject lines in fugal sections, to excessive disruptions of tempo. 

Probably the best performance in this cycle is of the Sixth and final symphony, named the Sinfonia semplice. Still the least understood work of a too-little-known composer, it is singular and delightfully strange. For these reasons, it’s probably the best symphony of the bunch to withstand the kind of interpretive “license” that the conductor inflicts upon its brethren. For once Luisi’s tempi and shaping are solid; the finale is appreciatively humorous. This is not the best performance of the Sixth available, but it will serve. Would that it could be issued on a singleton release. 

But on the whole these recordings present a missed opportunity. Even if they do become influential in spurring more performances of Nielsen’s music in the concert hall, will those performances sound like these? That’s a dispiriting train of thought. Thus motivated, I’ll lend my tiny voice to suggesting Herbert Blomstedt’s fine cycle with the San Francisco Symphony on the London label as a preferred alternative. (Schonwandt/DNSO, Salonen/SRSO, and Kuchar/JPO are all good, too.) In terms of isolated performances, Leonard Bernstein’s renderings of the Third and Fifth with the New York Philharmonic on Sony are stupendous. If you don’t know Nielsen’s symphonies, start there. Leave Luisi and Company to the collectors. 

Ralph Towner: At First Light (CD Review)

by Karl Nehring

Towner: Flow; Strait; Jule Styne, Betty Comden, Adolph Green: Make Someone Happy; Towner: Ubi Sunt; Guitarra Picante; At First Light; (Traditional): Danny Boy; Towner: Fat Foot; Argentinian Nights; Stanley Adams, Hoagy Carmichael: Little Old Lady; Towner: Empty Stage. Ralph Towner, classical guitar. ECM 2758 486 1035 

 

Long-time music fans may remember American guitarist Ralph Towner (b. 1940) from his long association with the band Oregon, a group that Towner co-founded back in 1970. Oregon went on to release a number of albums on the Vanguard, Elektra, ECM, and Intuition labels over the years. (The Oregon album Out of the Woods from 1978 is especially well worth seeking out; it is an acoustic and musical wonder.) In his liner notes for At First Light, a solo guitar outing, Towner writes about how unique it is to have most of his own having most of his own life’s work represented on one record label. He’s been an ECM artist for more than fifty years, appearing in many different contexts, one of the most important being a run of solo recordings that began with Diary in 1973, and now 50 hears later, At First Light is the newest addition to his series of solo guitar releases. “My solo recordings,” writes Towner, “have always included my own compositions in which there are trace elements of the composers and musicians that have attracted me over the years. Musicians such as George Gershwin, John Coltrane, John Dowland, Bill Evans, to name a few. The blend of keyboard and guitar techniques is an important aspect of my playing and composition, and I feel that this album is a good example of shaping this expanse of influences into my personal music.”

Towner recounts that he studied classical music composition in college while also becoming interested in learning jazz piano, having been inspired by hearing the interplay of the Bill Evans Trio. Before graduating from the University of Oregon in 1963, he discovered the classical guitar. “I found that it a very pianistic instrument,” he writes, “capable of sophisticated polyphony and myriad tone colors. I was fascinated by it. I made a major decision to travel to Vienna to strictly study the classical guitar at the Academy of Music in Vienna. My studies there involved much renaissance and baroque music which was to play a great part in shaping my writing and performance techniques.”  A fellow guitarist, Scott Nygaard, has observed of Towner that “No one else plays guitar like Ralph Towner. And while his compositions often sound ‘classical’ (combining a fondness for baroque voice leading, Stravinskian harmonies, and odd time signatures with his own strong sense of melody) that’s primarily because each piece grows organically and gracefully from an initial idea.” Listeners can get additional insight into the both the guitarist and the music on the album from this video, in which Towner recounts some of the details of his musical education and how he approaches composition and recording, focusing briefly on the album’s title composition, At First Light.

From the opening cut, his composition Flow, the majority of the music has the feeling of classical guitar music – not jazz (although jazz fans will hear a faint echo of Naima in the opening measures of Strait), not blues, not folk, but music very much in the classical guitar vein. Yes, they're a couple popular tunes and a traditional favorite included in the set list, but Towner does not play these in an overtly popular style. Instead, he plays them in more of a restrained way so that although the familiar notes are there, they blend right in with his more thoughtful, classical approach. Guitarra Piccante and Fat Foot are the most energetic cuts on the album; they might even tempt some listeners to tap their toes or even dance around a little, but should not cause anyone to get arrested. The shortest cut on the CD (1:42),Argentinian Nights, is like a miniature sketch of an imagined memory somehow captured on guitar, brief but memorable. The album ends with the reflective sounds of Empty Stage, a piece that ends enigmatically, leaving the listener longing for more. Ralph Towner was 82 at the time he made this recording, bringing a lifetime of lived experience into the studio with him to record alongside his trusted producer of more than 50 years, Manfred Eicher. The two old friends have produced a gem.