KCMETROPOLIS.org
Kansas City's Online Journal of the Performing Arts

With the first concert of the well-attended Music Alliance Series between the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance and the Friends of Chamber Music as the final stop on their national tour, the Sphinx Chamber Orchestra and Harlem Quartet were all smiles and rightfully so. Their program of rip-roaring all-string fare was energetic, passionate, fun, and most importantly, extremely musical.

Podium-less, and mostly baton-less Damon Gupton, former assistant conductor of the Kansas City Symphony, conducted in close proximity to the orchestra. This positioning enabled him to be directly in the performers’ faces, coaxing the music with physicality. The music belayed little of this brute manipulation. Sibelius’ Andante festivo was lush if unpolished at the end. With only twenty playing members, the homogenous sound the SCO produced was simply astonishing—rich and balanced but also remarkably in-tune. The precise intonation added to the overall dynamic level and dynamism of the entire performance.

Violinists Elena Urioste and Melissa White broke out of the ensemble and performed the Allegro con brio from Prokofiev’s Sonata for Two Violins in C Major. It was energetic and caustic with forceful quadruple stops and jagged harmonies. More delicate portions, however, lacked conviction.

The ensemble was all smiles and visibly jocular for Gabriela Lena Frank’s “Coqueteos” from Leyendas. The piece was a rollicking love song replete with Paraguayian guitar techniques and a wonderfully sensuous and quite ribald violin melody. An opening duet between concertmaster Ilmar Gavilan and principal second violin Melissa White was sparkling. The unison embellishment and rubatos were deftly performed by the pair. After the piece, during the deserved raucous ovations, their firm handshake and head-tilted back laughter was a delight to witness.

George Walker’s Lyric for Strings was the most dramatic piece of the afternoon. Akin to Barber’s Adagio for Strings in its form and musical language, I found it to be a refreshing change of pace and afforded me a chance to revel in the beauty of string sonorities. Walker’s growling low strings climax was the opposite of Barber’s soaring violins. The morendo ending was performed with sublime subtlety.

The Harlem Quartet, consisting of the principal players of the Sphinx Chamber Orchestra concluded the first half with Turina’s La oración del torero and Tillis’ “Wade in the Water” from his Spiritual Fantasy No. 12. Turina’s programmatic piece—though crowd-pleasing with its toreador themes—was all surface with little depth, but Tillis’ “Wade in the Water” dealt with classical co-opting of gospel as effectively as I have ever heard. These four young players are musically connected and their talents well matched but I would be curious to hear them tackle the warhorses of the repertory. I would bet they could produce an amazing Bartók set.

Mendelssohn’s Sinfonia No. 7 in D Minor showed that Sphinx was capable of more than flashy showpieces. These devilishly difficult works of then thirteen-year-old Mendelssohn are rarely performed because of their physical and musical demands on all members. The composer’s youthful exuberance was apparent in the work and multiplied tenfold by the ensemble. Descending scales in the Allegro were fiery and the typically prissy Menuetto was more sinister Scherzo. The performance was not without its faults however. The low strings overpowered the violin melodies in the Andante and the opening moments of the Allegro molto were not entirely in sync.

The fittingly titled Allegro furioso from Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s Sinfonietta No. 1 ended the concert. Aggressive mixed meters were attacked with insistent bowing and powerful accents catapulted the audience to its feet upon the piece’s conclusion.

REVIEW:
Music Alliance
Sphinx Chamber Orchestra with Harlem Quartet
Sunday, October 24, 2010
UMKC Campus
James C. Olson Performing Arts Center
White Recital Hall
4949 Cherry, Kansas City, MO
For more information visit http://conservatory.umkc.edu and www.chambermusic.org
For more information on the Sphinx visit  http://www.sphinxmusic.org/programs/chamber_orchestra.html

By Lee Hartman

Editor-in-Chief; Traditional and New Classical Contributor

Lee Hartman holds degrees from the University of Missouri-Kansas City (D.M.A., M.M.) and the University of Delaware (B.M.). At the University of Delaware, he received a Dean's Scholar position enabling him to pursue an individually designed academic program combining music education and composition. At the University of Missouri-Kansas City he served for three years as the Assistant Director to Musica Nova, the conservatory's new music ensemble, while teaching a variety of composition classes.

In 2007 he was invited to both the Iceland Academy of the Arts in Reykjavík, Iceland and the Sichuan Conservatory in Chengdu, China to give lectures and master classes in composition. In the summer of 2009, Hartman served as an orchestra manager for the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble and Aspen Opera Theater Center for various performances. He serves on the National Executive Committee of the Society of Composers, Inc. as Submissions Coordinator. His primary composition instructors include James Mobberley, Chen Yi, Zhou Long, Paul Rudy, John Beall, and Jennifer Margaret Barker. He currently teaches music theory at the University of Central Missouri and general music classes at Park University having previously taught at UD (2007–08) and UMKC (2006–07).

His compositions can be found at http://www.leehartmanmusic.com