Paul Wehage
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12/6/2006 6:33:38 AM
---- Updated 12/8/2006 6:56:29 AM
Shirvani Chalayev's 70th Birthday Concert in Paris.
Shirvani Chalayev is probably the most important living composer in Dagestan, a small republic on the Caspian Sea which is today part of the Russian Federation. Chalayev wrote the Dagestani national anthem in 1994, but he's best known for his collection and settings of Lak folksongs (he is himself a Lak). He's written an amazing amount of music in his 70 years, including operas ("King Lear" after Shakespeare, "Blood Wedding" after Lorca, among others), 25 Concerti for different instruments (Cello, Violin, Viola, Trumpet, Oboe, Pianoforte), chamber music, choral music and songs.
The Concert at the Salle Cortot in Paris on Monday organised by the Ecole Sauvage association opened with a string quartet by the Composer's son, Kamil Tchalaev. Written in 1988 and in five movements, the work explored a basically minimalist vocabulary with Tchalaev's signature style of insistence on simple gestures and economy of materials. The only part that I regretted was the performance by a young ensemble of students (young pre-teens) who performed exceptionally well for youngsters, but did not have the necessary sound to really do the work justice.
Shirvani Chalayev's 1970 string quartet was performed admirably by the all-female Isis quartet. This four movement neo-classical work owes much to the Debussy Quartet and also used elements which were obviously derived from folk music. This work deserves to be heard much more often.
The ten movement Choral "Poem" "The Intiation" (texts by Pouchkine and Lermontov) is for a six-part choral ensemble a cappella. It was performed by 14 voices of the Ecole Sauvage choral under the direction of Kamil Tchalaev, the composer's song and a well-known singer and musician in Paris. This work was specifically cited in the Composer's State Music Prize of the Russian Federation in 1999 and is highly regarded by scholars of Russian Music.I felt that this work, dating from 1986, a bit less sucessful than the string quartet, in spite of obvious qualities. This could also have been due to lack of rehearsal time to put this huge work together, as well as perhaps my own difficulties in relating to this extremely Russian work. There were some effective solo passages using Mezzo and Tenor voices, as well as some very well conceived passages for the lower male voices at the beginning and the end of the work. I would like to hear this work again, especially by an ensemble that has had more time to digest this musical monument.
The last part of the programme was dedicated to the composer's 1968 "Seven Lak Songs" for voice and Orchestra (actually a small chamber ensemble of ten instruments). This was the strongest work of the evening and was admirably sung by the composer. Although the version the composer made with piano just after the composition of this work is better vocally, it was obvious that this age and experience of the composer brought new insight to these very stark texts which speak of the Lak ideal of living in the Mountains, solitude, love, death, and the meaning of life; As in Azeri music, the Lak melodies are at once very expressive, yet have a great dignity to them. The instrumental ensemble provides a contrasting harmonic and orchestral texture to the rough, peasant-like aspects of the voice, which is sung, at times shouted, at times whispered. This was one of the most sincere works that I have heard in quite a while and is clearly the composer's masterwork.
All of these works were performed for the first time in France. It was a very important event which was organized admirably well. Special admiration is reserved for Kamil Tchalaev, who was present in almost all of the works, playing viola in the first quartet, directing the vocal ensemble and singing the lowest bass notes in the choral works, directing and playing percussion and doublebass in the Lak Songs, as well as serving as Master of Ceremonies and Stage Manager! All in all, a good night's work!:
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