CLASSICAL REVIEW
A vivid take on love and parenthood
Chicago Tribune
Published: March 10, 2008
By John von Rhein | Tribune critic
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Not so long ago it would have been unthinkable for Chicago to have multiple new music events going on in the same weekend. Last weekend listeners had nine high-quality contemporary concerts to choose from, several at the Music Institute of Chicago in Evanston.
One such program, presented Friday night, celebrated the centenary of French composer Olivier Messiaen, one of 20th Century music's true originals.
The concert was highlighted by the world premiere of Chicago arranger and conductor Cliff Colnot's orchestration for voice and chamber ensemble of Messiaen's 1938 song cycle "Chants de Terre et de Ciel" ("Songs of Earth and Heaven"). It shared the bill with Messiaen's 1940 chamber masterpiece "Quartet for the End of Time."
Mezzo-soprano Julia Bentley was joined by members of the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) for the songs, while institute faculty members David Cunliffe, cello, and Abraham Stokman, piano, teamed with clarinetist Christie Miller and violinist Stefan Hersh for a pungent, powerful account of the quartet.
The six poems that make up the song cycle concern the sacrament of conjugal love and parenthood.
Colnot's arrangement for piccolo, flutes, clarinets, violin, viola, cello, piano and a generous array of metallic percussion enhances the sensuous, coloristic allure of the original piano part. Messiaen gave the accompaniment (with its swirling, asymmetrical rhythms) a virtuosity and importance equal to that of the voice. Its role as a mirror of the moods evoked by the singer thus is rendered that much more vivid by Colnot's skillful and idiomatic orchestration.
Bentley, one of the city's stalwart champions of contemporary vocal music, sang the cycle from memory and did so with vibrant tone and a precision of pitch and rhythm that also informed the incisive support of her colleagues from ICE.
In all, this was a significant addition to a Messiaen celebration that will include a full-fledged festival later this year at the University of Chicago.
Copyright © 2008 Chicago Tribune
