Reviews

Mike Hall, Trombone & Stephen Coxe, Piano
Chandler Recital Hall, September 13, 2016
Review by John Campbell

One need look no further then the brass music composers to find innovative, entertaining 21st century music. Mixing contemporary pieces for trombone and piano written in 2012-2016 with selections from Debussy Preludes for piano, written in 1909-1913, made for a very satisfying experience.

The opening, Debussy's Danseuses de Delphes (Dancers of Delphi), was a stately stroll on the piano by Coxe. We heard a slow, hypnotic sarabande with multiple layers of parallel chords in unusual five bar groupings. The sound was glorious on the grand Steinway.

Mike Hall joined Coxe in Three Miniatures Op.71, written in 2015 by Christopher Gable who teaches music theory and composition at the University of North Dakota. There was an underlying hint of anxiety in these very short pieces. Each piece ends just as you are ready to hear it develop. For Hall it represents how modern media's rapid-fire sound bites provide no time for understanding to develop. The titles are Miniature Emergency, Expediency and Deadline.

Sonata (2016) by violinist Philip Wharton was commissioned by a consortium of America's leading trombonists of major orchestras and universities, including Mike Hall of Old Dominion University. When Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra trombonist Timothy Smith contacted the composer, Wharton wondered why they chose him, a violinist. Smith and others liked his flute sonata. “I [Wharton] was intrigued, since I knew little of the alto trombone...After listening to a few recordings, I was totally taken by its sound and began to learn more about the instrument."

The four movements are Clamor, Evensong, Prank and Friday Night. The piece opens with fast, energetic music that ends with a slow growl in the trombone. A mellow, second movement offers a short anthem paying homage to the history of the trombone, specifically its predecessor the sackbut, used only in the church during the Baroque era. The third movement was unfolding when we heard the sound of metal parts being dumped off stage and a wheel rolled on stage before it fell over and stopped. Prank indeed! Friday Night celebrated the trombone's lyrical possibilities with its trumpet-like brilliance.

Back to Debussy for Préludes Book 2, Hommage à S. Pickwick, Esquire, P.P.M.P.C. after a Dickens character, personified by echoes of an English music hall and a quote of God Save the King. This brief piece took us to intermission after which we heard Préludes, Book 1, Les collines d'Anacapri honoring the hills on the Isle of Capri, a lively scherzo in tarantella rhythm. Bell-like tones offered an imitation of an Italian folk song to brilliant effect.

Whimsical Pieces, written in 2016 by a composer of 84 years, Armand Russell (b.1932), offered quirky music for both instruments. Russell was born in Seattle and educated at the University of Washington and holds a doctorate from Eastman School of Music. He taught theory and composition at the University of Hawaii from 1961 until he retired in 1994. He has written a wealth of music that is both modern, lyrical and accessible with clarity of line and prominent textures. The titles of the six movements are self-explanatory: Problematic Prelude, Developing Dance, Introspective Interlude, Diverting Departure, Intrepid Intermezzo, Robust Rondo. Problematic Prelude had Hall tapping on the trombone's mouthpiece and blowing air gently over it whistling and Coxe tapping on the top of the piano in rhythm. Intrepid Intermezzo had a lyrical, muted trombone over lots of quick piano notes. Robust Rondo was busy and brief.

The evening closed by dipping into the trombone's past, offering Sonata (Vox Gabrieli) from 1975 by Croatian composer, violinist and conductor Stjepan Šulek (1914-1986). His style, a union of Baroque polyphony and Romantic expressiveness, offered structural clarity and great intensity of feeling. Sonata featured an aria-like trombone solo over a vibrant and complex piano part informed by Rachmaninov—passionately performed!