GYÖRGY KURTÁG PORTRAIT CONCERT
MARCH 7, 2011 | 7:30 PM
Time Out New York eagerly awaited this concert, naming it one of five critics' picks for best music event of the week (see image, right). Performed by David Shively (cimbalon) and Jennifer Choi (violin) from the contemporary music ensemble Either/Or and Aaron Baird (double bass), as well as soprano Tony Arnold, the evening offered an opportunity to experience the music of György Kurtág. Having been influenced by Bartok and Webern, Kurtág is one of the most dazzling composers of our time and defies easy classification. Being an heir to Webernian expressionism, Kurtág favors concentrated miniatures, exploring a wide range of human emotions.
Either/Or is a compelling new contemporary music ensemble based in New York City. Their concerts have included numerous world and New York premieres, ranging from major works of emerging American experimental music to classics from the European avant-garde. Either/Or focuses on new works for unconventional chamber ensembles and soloists rarely heard elsewhere. Rather than working from a fixed instrumentation, Either/Or is completely mobile and draws upon its pool of regular soloists who are all active as new music specialists in New York while simultaneously performing as improvisers, sound artists, and in other interdisciplinary settings. No wonder the New York Times has called Either/Or "an ensemble that plays by its own rules."
Zachary Woolfe attended the concert, and reviewed it for the March 8, 2011 issue of The New York Times:
"Mr. Kurtag turned 85 recently, the occasion for a recital of his work, the Gyorgy Kurtag Portrait Concert at the Austrian Cultural Forum on Monday evening. [...] in these focused, committed performances you got a succinct yet complete sense of his style: his visceral power and surprisingly tender core. [...]
Each work on the program used the cimbalom, the traditional Hungarian hammered dulcimer, which can sound pianolike or twangily percussive and was played heer with gorgeous nuance by David Shively. [...] The soprano Tony Arnold brought remarkable felxibility, sensitivity and warmth to the keening, sometimes despreate vocal lines. The double-bassist Aaron Baird added subtle undertones to the 15 short "Scenes From a Novel" that closed the recital; the violinist Jennifer CHoi played with intensity"
Read the review in it's entirety at the New York Times' website.
Audio recordings from the event:
In Memory of a Winter Evening, p. 8 (1969, NY premiere)
Four fragments after poems of Gulyás Pál
Scenes from a Novel, op. 19 (1961)
Photos of the event (click to enlarge):
