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The Kansas City Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Bruce Sorrell has been a reliable source of outstanding chamber music performances in Kansas City for over twenty years. On March 10 the group performed a strings-only concert with music by the four B's, Beethoven, Bach, Belmont and Britten (well, Kansas City composer Jean Belmont now goes by "Jean Belmont Ford," but it was too good a coincidence to pass up).

The Beethoven Grosse fuge, Op. 133 is one of the master's final compositions and has puzzled generations of musicologists ever since. It is unlike virtually anything else he wrote, and strikes notes of clashing dissonance that are more typical of 20th century music than anything from the Romantic era.

True to its name ("Grand Fugue"), the music is both a fugue and large in scale. Beethoven utilized several key themes, introducing them constantly throughout the piece, and then setting them up against one another, doing musical "battle," as it were, often producing angular tones and striking dissonances. All of this is very difficult for a conductor to control, and Sorrell's pacing was metronomic, which is probably the only sensible way to approach this piece.  Just keeping the players together takes real effort, as the music tends to want to fly away in all directions, without control.

The middle section produce soft and flowing tones, sounding about as traditional as Beethoven allowed himself to get. There, Sorrell conducted more expansively, allowing the strings to wax and wane with soft and flowing melodies. For the final section, however, it was back to clashing themes, painted more brightly and airily this time, with surprising stuttered stops and starts showing a syncopation that we are not used to hearing in Beethoven.

The section playing was outstanding and altogether the orchestra gave the piece a solid reading, making a case for one of Beethoven's most challenging compositions.

Jean Belmont Ford's Remembrance is a setting of three poems by Rossetti and Tennyson, sung by a mezzo-soprano with string accompaniment. The singer of the evening was Krista River, whose floating tones expressed the music well, although much of the time the melodic interest seemed to be more in the orchestra than in the vocal writing. 

Belmont displayed a flair for rich string sounds, with clean and angular music that, to these ears, sounded Coplandesque at times. The second song, "Remember me when I am gone away," seemed to be the thematic and musical heart of the piece, with sweeping melodies and pizzicato accompaniment at times.  The final song, the Tennyson, featured a middle section that was majestic in scope and sound, but ended in quiet resignation, unlike much of what had gone before.

Bach's justly renowned Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 rounded out the first half of the program with its familiar musical themes batted back and forth like a tennis ball among a reduced force of only ten string players plus harpsichord. The rapid pacing and brilliant bow work produced a technical tour de force, undoubtedly what the composer was after, although at times it seemed to be almost out of control.  But sometimes that is what is most appealing about the Brandenburgs, and Sorrell's forces, so familiar with this music, carried it out with panache.

The second half of the program was devoted entirely to Britten's Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, written by the young composer to honor his teacher and mentor. At times, as with many "variations" compositions, the original melody was lost in the midst of the variations, but the brilliant string writing was captivating all the same.  

Consisting of an introduction and theme, then ten separate movements, the piece offers a startling contrast of styles. It opens with an adagio, moving on to a brilliant march (well, as brilliant as a march can get without the brass), a waltz, a stirring Italian-style dance complete with strumming violas and cellos, and a beautiful centerpiece for solo violin, played attractively by concertmaster Tony DeMarco.
Britten's waltz variation includes sections both the traditional 3/ 4 time and in 2/4 and other timings, oddly interspersed to produce a staggered syncopation, with hints of dissonance reminding one of Richard Strauss.  A short "perpetual motion" movement found the entire orchestra playing rapid sixteenth notes up and down the strings, a sort of an all-orchestra "Flight of the Bumblebee." 

Other variations included a funeral march, complete with apocalyptic sensations punctuated by a repeated three-note figure in the bass, an eerie and otherworldly "chant," and a finale consisting of a fugue in which various themes were separately introduced and then interwoven together, ending with a solid major chord, repeated (Beethoven-like) several times as if to bring us "home" again after the many journeys upon which the piece had taken us. In each of these sections the Chamber Orchestra sounded expressive and sure of itself in this often difficult music.

The Chamber Orchestra concert ended, as it had begun, with a fugue, which was appropriate enough for this evening, which wove together an impressive variety of different musical themes and styles.


REVIEW: 
Kansas City Chamber Orchestra
String Masterworks
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Village Presbyterian Church
6641 Mission Rd., Prairie Village, KS 
www.kcchamberorchestra.org 

By Don Dagenais

City Classics Music and Dance Columnist; Classical Contributor

A lifelong classical music fan, Don Dagenais is a frequent preview speaker for the Lyric Opera of Kansas City and has taught classical music and opera courses at several Kansas City venues. He has served on the boards of directors of a number of performing arts organizations including the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, the Lyric Opera Guild, UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, Opera Volunteers International, the Civic Opera Theater of Kansas City, Inspiration Point Fine Arts Colony, Octarium, and the Friends of the Symphony.  He has been the past president of most of these organizations and is current the president of the Friends of the Symphony. 

Dagenais co-authored a history of the Lyric Opera of Kansas City, published on the occasion of its 50th anniversary (2007) and has written books on the histories of both the Lyric Opera Guild and Opera Volunteers International, as well as an introductory book for opera novices (Your Passport to the Opera).  He has received several local and national awards for outstanding volunteer work for the arts, including a lifetime achievement award from The Coterie Theatre in 2000, the Kansas City Musical Club's annual award in 2001, a Partners in Excellence Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2002, a Bravo Award from Opera Volunteers International in 2004 and a community service award from the Daughter of the American Revolution in 2008 honoring him for his community service to the arts.

In addition to his music interests, Don is president of the board of directors for the Metropolitan Ensemble Theater and has served on the boards of The Coterie Theatre and the Heart of America Shakespeare Festival, serving as president of each organization.  He publishes newsletters for seven arts organizations.  When not involved in the performing arts, Don is a senior real estate attorney with Lathrop & Gage LLP in Kansas City, Missouri, where he has practiced law since 1976 after graduating from the Cornell Law School.