Digressioni modali for Tenor Saxophone and Pianoforte
Review of the ‘Crosscurrents: Noah Getz’ CD (Albany Records, Albany, NY, USA)
Noah Getz – tenor saxophone; Jeffrey Chappell – pianoforte
“In an era of digital smoke and mirrors that makes musical superheroes out of average talent at the click of a mouse, it is refreshing to hear Noah Getz playing music I can personally attest to having heard him perform impeccably at Carnegie Hall, Stella Adler School, and Manhattan School of Music. With his first-ever release, Crosscurrents (Albany Records), Dr Getz, an Artist-in-Residence at American University, blows onto the scene with tremendous depth of feeling, robustness of tone, and technical bravado that is sure to inspire musicians and saxophonists of all interests and backgrounds. Among this set are potent presentations on tenor, alto and soprano saxophones, with adroit and sensitive collaborations from pianist Jeffrey Chappell, all offering ‘a diverse exploration of contemporary classical repertoire containing a variety of jazz elements.’ To this end, one could not ask for a better ambassador on the horn than Noah Getz.
The opening Digressioni modali (Modal Digressions) unveils an expansive and accessible texture, immediately reminiscent of the ECM jazz label, which at times had me thinking I was listening to the more famous tenorman who shares Noah’s namesake. Don’t take my word for it: the comparison of timbre is clearly evident, especially when taking into account Andrián Pertout’s intent in “portray[ing] a sense of free improvisation within a strictly notated form.” Explorations of the melodic movement through the seven modes are both rich and rewarding, with harmonic shifts arriving at highly intuitive moments, which ultimately makes this finely crafted composition a genuinely satisfying experience...”
Dr. James Noye
La flor en la colina for Flute, Clarinet, Violin, Violoncello and Pianoforte by Andrián Pertout
Performance at the XXIX Foro Internacional de Música Nueva ‘Manuel Enríquez’, 2007
31 May, 2007, Sala Blas Galindo, Centro Nacional de las Artes, México City, México
Onix Ensamble: Alejandro Escuer – flute; Fernando Domínguez – clarinet; Viktória Horti – violin; Edgardo Espinosa – violoncello; Krisztina Deli – pianoforte
“La flor de la colina, del chileno Andrián Pertout, es una pieza enérgica y potente, trabajada a velocidades diversas (a veces consecutivas, a veces simultáneas) y con la sólida presencia del piano a la manera de un ostinato. Hay aquí, apenas, unos instantes de respiro, y la conclusión de la obra es, a la vez, fogosa y fugaz.”
Juan Arturo Brennan, La Jornada, Sábado 30 Junio, 2007
La flor en la colina for Flute, Clarinet, Violin, Violoncello and Pianoforte by Andrián Pertout
Performance by the Sonic Art Ensemble
Saturday, 1 April, 2006, Music Workshop, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Sydney, Australia
Sonic Art Ensemble: Marshall McGuire – Artistic Director; Christine Draeger – flute; Margery Smith – bass clarinet; Rowan Martin – violin; Adrian Wallis – violoncello; Bernadette Balkus – pianoforte
“Sydney's Seymour Group (formed in 1977) has been re-named the Sonic Art Ensemble and newly launched, opening with an engaging program, Southern Stars, focused on work coming out of Central and South America. Artistic director Marshall McGuire told his audience that the program was in part inspired by work he had encountered on his Churchill Fellowship travels in the USA, hearing the music of American Mason Bates, cuban-born Tania Leon (he'd enjoyed a whole evening of her music with its Cuban Rhumba swagger), and Argentinian Osvaldo Golijov. It was Golijov's Passion of St Mark heard at a Sydney Festival that first alerted McGuire to the composer. The work had been conducted by Anthony Fogg, founding conductor of the Seymour Group.”
“...Melbourne-based composer Andrián Pertout comes from Chile, born to a Slovenian father ('There are 100,000 Dalmatians in Chile', he quips). The Slovenian heritage is important for Pertout. He asks the flautist to play the key tune from the work for us 'at real speed', explaining that it will be much slower when we next hear it. La flor en la colina (The flower on the hill, 2003-04) has the surging power of a suspenseful movie score with a driven piano underpinned by a humming cello over which flute and violin dialogue, furiously together and apart. A spacious slow movement follows, violin and rumbling piano miles apart, a lyrical reflective realm soon made turbulent, a veritable romantic wind storm that settles into a minimalist pulse before shaking itself loose again and simply stopping. This demanding work warrants more hearings, its folk origins much less prominent anchors than in the Golijov and Bates.”
Keith Gallasch, RealTime + OnScreen, Issue 73, June-July, 2006
Echoes from the Past for Flute by Andrián Pertout
Performance by the Society for Chromatic Art (SCAnyc)
Tuesday, 31 May, 2005, Christ and St. Stephen's Church, New York, NY, USA
John McMurtery – flute
“Composers James Romig and Edward Taylor responded proactively to the challenges facing emerging composers by founding Society for Chromatic Art, a new music ensemble that is now entering its eighth season of presenting concerts featuring young, but highly accomplished, performers. Flautist John McMurtery and pianist Ashlee Mack performed nine pieces by up and coming composers at Christ and St. Stephen's Church, an intimate venue on the Upper West Side that is a friendly haven for young classical musicians seeking a New York performance space.”
“... Many composers on the program employed an impressive array of extended techniques for flute. Sun Mi Ro's Summer's Dream used glissandi as an idee fixe throughout, which served as a punctuating device amid long, arching and extremely wide-ranging melodic lines. Derek Charke, a composer as well as a flutist himself, presented a well-composed flute part in his duo Distant Voices. While the language of the piece was attractive, Distant Voices suffered from a lack of editorial restraint – it could have easily been more effective at half the length. Andrian Pertout's Echoes from the Past, on the other hand, played with a large array of extended flute tricks – glissandi, multiphonics, percussive attacks, vocalisms – while maintaining an integrated and compelling formal design.”
Christian Carey, Splendid Online Music Magazine
Sonus dulcis for Piano Trio by Andrián Pertout
Performance at the SCI (Society of Composers Inc.) Region II Conference, 9-10 April, 2004, Geneseo, New York, USA
Saturday, 4 April, 2004, Wadsworth Auditorium, State University of New York, School of Performing Arts, Geneseo, New York, USA
Vladimir Pritsker violin; George Macero violoncello; Steven Heyman pianoforte
“This aptly named work for piano trio provided an opportunity to hear Pritsker, Macero, and Heyman perform music that is squarely in the Western tradition of writing yet based on gestures and materials far removed. The composer has built the piece on the Japanese In scale and the opening ideas of the work suggest, without copying, links to the traditions of high art styles in Japanese music. The musical ideas are developed and expanded in fairly rapid succession building in complexity and rhythmic complexity. The relatively quiet style of the opening appears periodically to divert the momentum of the piece only to be pushed on a few moments later. Ultimately, however, the work subsides quietly. Mr. Pertout has written a work that is both emotionally alive and musically rewarding to hear.”
John G. Bilotta, SCI Newsletter, May-June, 2004, XXXIV:3
