Cherry Juliana Sudartono
HUM 101.1359
Professor Hamilton
Concert Report #2
Sudartono, 1.
Manhattan School of Music Brass Chamber Music
Various Artists
Trio in Five Movements by Daniel Schnyder
Trio for Bass Instruments by Charles Wuorinen
Daniel Schnyder is known as a composer/performer with a dynamic reputation in
both jazz and classical fields. He was born 1961 in Zurich, Switzerland and lives in New
York City. His orchestral works and his chamber music compositions have been
performed and recorded all over the world. He writes orchestral variations on themes by
non classical music icons like the Rolling Stones, Duke Ellington or Jimi Hendrix,
picking up on a 19th century tradition designing whole programs for orchestras outside
the mainstream concert format - as played by the Calgary Symphony, the Absolute
Ensemble, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Together with Ingo Goritzki he is
leading the Stuttgart Crossover Academy and gives masterclasses in composition,
chamber music and creative solutions and ideas in classical music and jazz.
Charles Wuorinen is an American composer. He was born June 9 1938 in New
York City. Being a co-founder of the Group for Contemporary Music, Wuorinen writes
serial instrumental music. Some of his pieces are influenced by fractal geometry and
Benoit Mandelbrot, while his later works feature some tonal relationships. In 1970,
Wuorinen was the youngest composer ever to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music for Time's
Encomium. He is also the author of Simple Composition, ISBN 0938856065, which he
says is, "written by a composer and is addressed to other composers - intending or actual,
amateur or professional. Thus it is similar in intent to certain older books on the subject
like Thomas Morley's "A Plain and Easie Introduction to Practical Musicke" (1597), for
instance...It outlines present practice, and while it can be used for purely didactic
purposes, it can also be employed in composing "real music."
The first movement from Schnyder’s Trio in Five Movement started in a very
mysterious and edgy feel. The tempo was fast and suspenseful. Three musicians, each
playing trumpet, French horn and trombone plays this piece. Trumpet and French horn
both started playing using mute, making the sound of trombone more prominent. This
was then followed by a solo trombone before the others joined up polyphonically.
Trombone played a major part in leading the melody. Nearing the ending of the
movement, the melody reminded me of the opening from the Flight of The Bumblebee,
but this is perhaps because both of the songs use chronicle chords and are fast in tempo.
The next movement started with a slow tempo, giving a sad opening. In this movement,
the French horn played a prominent part in leading the melody. French horn is lower in
its pitch than trombone, thus the sad feeling to this movement. Sometimes trumpet and
trombone played homophonically to accompany the melody from the French horn. The
song gather up in momentum and it then capture the suspenseful feeling from the first
movement and the chronicle chords from the first movement are heard again. All the
while, trombone helped to hold the pulse of the song. At the third movement, the piece
started out with trombone and French horn playing homophonically. This was then
followed by the collaboration of trumpet and horn. This was when the trumpet and horn
sounded as if they have a “battle” going around, as they were answering each other’s
sounds. I think this is very interesting because it gives a very new feeling of excitement
and new colour to the song. The fourth movement was marked by solo trombone. The
other brass instruments were accompanying on mute, creating a very interesting effect
where the solo trombone was very prominent. This movement was slow and gave a
feeling of sadness and grandness, something like the funeral march. And last but not
least, on the fifth movement, the scale was changed from a major (which was used for the
last four movements) into a minor scale. This gave the impression of East Asian and
Egyptian feel to this movement. This movement involved a lot of homophonic texture
among the three instruments.
One more performance from the night that I was interested at was the Trio for
Bass Instruments. This trio consists of Tuba, Trombone and the Double Bass. This was
interesting because, as far as I know bass instruments are not as commonly used as
instruments to lead or produce melodies for a song. Most of the times their functions are
to give a base or to maintain the pulse of the song. At first I thought that the trombone
would be used more to produce the melody, seeing that it has the highest pitch out of the
three instruments. However, I was surprised to see that Double Bass was used more to
produce melody, mostly by being bowed. I guess they decided to use the double bass
because the quality of the voice produced by a string instrument and a brass instrument
will be different, thus easier to recognize. I didn’t really enjoy the performance however,
I felt that the melody was kind of forced and it was dull for me to hear the same kind of
pitches being played.
Overall however, I enjoyed the night. This is because I went to watch a string
performance before, and now I get to watch a brass performance, which are quite
different. I thought they both are very interesting in their own ways, but I would have
loved to watch a full range orchestra one day and put my musical knowledge to the test.