MUSIC REVIEW: Virko Baley's "Dreamtime" at Weill Recital Hall (04/07/96)

MUSIC REVIEW: Virko Baley's "Dreamtime" at Weill Recital Hall

by Oles Kuzyszyn

On March 18, at New York's Weill Recital Hall, one of the most highly regarded and adventuresome contemporary music ensembles in America, the California E.A.R. Unit, devoted an entire evening to a major work by an equally bold and visionary composer - Virko Baley.

The work, "Dreamtime," approximately 75 minutes in duration, is scored for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano and two percussionists. In addition, nearly all the instrumentalists performed on a virtual arsenal of assorted percussion instruments. Rand Steiger conducted the ensemble.

Dreams and dreaming have inspired composers for centuries. Most often, the resulting music is programmatic, where dreaming is portrayed as a restful, calming exercise; a soothing escape from the rigorous reality of day to day life. Schumann's "Traumerei" is perhaps the most famous example of this idyllic genre of "dream music."

It is common knowledge, however, that actual dreams are far more complex than that. Dreams bridge the worlds of the real and the surreal. Stimulated by real life events and experiences, often mundane and commonplace, they launch the human psyche into fantastic voyages (sometimes nightmares), unfettered by reason or rationalization. It is precisely this state, when the mind is most free, that Mr. Baley's "Dreamtime" explores. The result is an invigorating, rollicking 75-minute musical roller coaster ride.

Throughout the ride, Mr. Baley maintains a firm grip on the steering wheel, both at the macro level (i.e., the formal organization of the work) and at the micro level (the manipulation of the seemingly random and self-propelling sonic events).

"Dreamtime" is a bi-sectional work: part one is titled "Palm of the Hand," and consists of 13 movements, further subdivided in a 5 + 3 + 5 scheme. The remaining six movements form part two (Dreamtime) and are organized in a 1 + 4 + 1 array. At another level, a pair of tonally ambiguous chords introduced near the beginning of the first movement recur at various points later in the work (most audibly in the 15th movement), creating the effect of "harkening back" to an earlier "experience," a poignant allusion to the way events or experiences from the past race across the synapses of our own nervous systems while we dream. To my ear, the very timbre of the marimba serves as an organizational device, a musical "glue" so to speak, providing points of aural reference, and functioning as a sonic leitmotif. Ultimately, there is the conceptual juxtaposition of the real and the imagined, an ambivalence that becomes thematic in and of itself.

Undoubtedly, we have all experienced dreams in which a particular episode begins as a perfectly plausible event, and evolves into something fantastic or surreal (for example, falling off the edge of a cliff, but never hitting bottom; running as fast as possible, but never moving forward, etc.). Musically, Mr. Baley depicts this sensation by stating concrete themes or gestures and then sublimating them with conflicting or contradictory musical information. In the sixth movement (Baroque Altar), the melodic material introduced by the flute and clarinet is subdued by the persistent string figure. The "kolomyika" theme (ninth movement), or more accurately, the fragments thereof, are consistently "interrupted" by percussive "hits" and shouted "syllables." The "funeral music" in the 10th movement (Parastas), is intruded upon by droning jaw's harps.

It was, in fact, this process of "morphing" the real and the imagined that most vividly demonstrated the buoyant imagination and multi-faceted skill of Mr. Baley the composer, as well as the technical artistry of the California E.A.R. Unit as performers. In a fiendishly challenging work such as this, constantly fluctuating in texture and metrics, the temptation for lesser performers would have been to simply "get it right." This group did far better.

Playing mostly with confidence, at times with reckless abandon, but always at a high level of intensity (one can play pianissimo as intensely as double forte), the players succeeded in setting the work in motion right from the fickle opening measures. Even seemingly static sections ("The Stillness," "Manao Tupapau") felt more like suspended animation, magic carpet rides of sorts.

Some of the many highlights included Robin Lorentz's simultaneous violin playing, foot stamping and syllabic shouts in the kolomyika movement, which came across with genuine exuberance, despite the Herculean physical effort required. Erika Duke-Kirkpatrick's cello solo in "The Lunatic and the Butterfly" was unnervingly haunting against the hushed background of the other instruments. Percussion virtuoso Amy Knoles was captivating throughout.

Every composer dreams of that magical spark that occurs when the right work meets the right performer. This particular Monday night, it must have truly been "dreamtime" for Virko Baley.

Those who missed the concert need not despair. The California E.A.R. Unit has recorded "Dreamtime" on a brand new Cambria CD (CD-1090). The disc is available at Tower Records stores nationwide, through Tower's special order service by calling 1-800-648-4844, or from Cambridge Master Recordings, Box 374, Lomita, CA 90717.

| Home Page |