June 12, 2019

REVIEW: Albany Symphony, Sing Out! New York


Albany Symphony, Albany, NY
May 30 – June 9, 2019
by Michael J. Moran

David Alan Miller
The Albany Symphony and their longtime (1992-) Music Director David Alan Miller have a reputation for adventurous programming of contemporary American music, making them ideal curators of the annual American Music Festival for the past 20 years. This year’s theme is “Sing Out! New York,” which celebrates the state’s “leading role in championing equal rights” by observing the centennial of the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote, and the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising. Two June 1 programs paid notable homage to this theme.

An evening concert by the orchestra in Troy’s breathtaking EMPAC concert hall featured music by three living composers, including one world premiere and two major revivals. The world premiere opened the concert: “Knit/Purl,” in which recent Yale Music School graduate Tanner Porter declaimed a libretto by Vanessa Moody which draws on texts by leaders of the American women’s suffrage movement. Porter’s soprano voice was amplified to blend with the music she wrote for a percussion-rich ensemble, producing a dense but often diaphanous sound mix. Her vocal virtuosity and the orchestra’s fluid performance made a powerful impression.

This was extended by John Corigliano’s fiery 1968 piano concerto, whose technical difficulties were handily mastered by rising British soloist Philip Edward Fisher. The brilliantly orchestrated piece is, in the composer’s words, “basically tonal [with] many atonal sections [including] strict twelve-tone writing.” Fisher’s total commitment and the orchestra’s virtuosity brought the concerto to vivid life and earned him a standing ovation by the appreciative audience.

David Del Tredici
The concert closed after intermission with a riveting account of “Pot-Pourri,” the earliest among several major works by David Del Tredici based on Lewis Carroll’s “Alice in Wonderland.” The composer calls the atonal piece, also written in 1968, “a kind of Cantata of the Sacred and Profane,” setting texts from “Alice” and Carroll’s “Jabberwocky” alongside a “Litany of the Blessed Virgin” from the Catholic liturgy of his childhood, and a Bach Chorale. In addition to the orchestra, it calls for a rock band, soprano soloist, and 16-member mixed chorus. The predictably wild-sounding result was transfixingly rendered by all forces, particularly redoubtable soprano Hila Plitman.      

The jovial Miller gave often humorous introductions to each piece and invited Del Tredici up from the audience to speak before “Pot-Pourri.” After bounding to the stage, the amiable 82-year-old composer read his droll manifesto “A Composer’s Ten Commandments.” The substantially full house showed that Miller’s enthusiasm for new music has built a loyal following. His announcement that these performances of the Corigliano and Del Tredici pieces would be recorded for commercial CD release was a tribute to his ensemble’s distinction. 

Del Tredici was also the subject of the engrossing 2018 documentary film, “Secret Music,” by New York-based pianist and music educator Daniel Beliavsky, shown in EMPAC’s theater after the concert. Examining the composer’s stated goal “to create a gay body of music,” the film included much interview and performance footage of Del Tredici, Beliavsky, and other musicians.

It was revealing for this writer, sitting by chance beside the composer, to witness his firsthand reactions to various candid scenes in the film, including a compelling performance by Beliavsky, soprano Chelsea Feltman, and baritone Michael Kelly of his incongruously gorgeous setting of Allen Ginsberg’s “S&M” poem “Please Master” (Del Tredici even cracks a small whip in the background). The filmmaker led a lively post-show discussion.

Only an hour and a half from greater Springfield, the American Music Festival is a resourceful annual destination for all lovers of contemporary American music.