Bright Sheng
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CD Review:
Review: ‘Never Far Away’ never far from excellence
by Valerue Scher from SDNN / The Contemporary Classical Music Community
Never Far Away
Shanghai Overture (2007)
Never Far Away for Harp and Orhestra (2008)
I. Moonlight
II. The Drunken Fisher
III. Doctored PentatonicsThe Nightingale And The Rose (2006)
Tibetan Love Song And Swing
I. Tibetan Love Song (2004)
II. Tibetan Swing (2002)Yolanda Kondonassis, Harp
Jahja Ling, conductor/ San Diego Symphony OrchestraFormat: CD / Label: Telarc B002HWUU2M / Date: Aug-25-2009
It’s not every day that the San Diego Symphony releases a CD on a major label. It’s not every year, either.
That makes the orchestra’s splendid new Telarc recording undeniably special. Released August 25, it features works by the prominent Shanghai-born composer Bright Sheng, with music director Jahja Ling conducting and guest harpist Yolanda Kondonassis serving as the superb soloist in “Never Far Away,” Sheng’s concerto-like piece for harp and orchestra.
Recorded in January at downtown’s Copley Symphony Hall, the disc is a significant achievement for the symphony, which years ago made recordings for Pro Arte and Naxos, and more recently issued two independent live recordings.
Not since the mid-1990s has the orchestra delivered anything quite like the Sheng CD — a disc produced from recording sessions. Extra cachet comes from the association with Telarc, which has a well-deserved reputation for quality.
True, the repertoire doesn’t have the kind of broad appeal that will prompt zillions of online sales or send music fans rushing to whatever record stores are still in business. Yet the recording — available at sandiegosymphony.com — will add to the San Diego Symphony’s ever-growing reputation as an ensemble with substance and ambition.
It will also expand awareness of Sheng, the 55-year-old University of Michigan faculty member who received a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant and has had his works performed everywhere from the New York Philharmonic to La Jolla Music Society SummerFest.
For proof of his abilities, you have only to hear such imaginative and expertly presented East-West fusions as “Shanghai Overture,” “Tibetan Love Song and Swing,” and the Oscar Wilde-inspired ballet score “The Nightingale and the Rose.”
The biggest attraction is “Never Far Away,” the 23-minute-long work commissioned in conjunction with the Dallas Symphony, Grand Rapids Symphony and Oberlin Conservatory of Music.
It’s quite a piece - a little like Claude Debussy meets Leonard Bernstein in China. And Kondonassis, Ling and the symphony get to the heart of the music. Rather than assume the traditional roles of soloist and accompaniment, they work as a team, emphasizing give-and-take in a way that enhances each other’s contributions.
In the first movement, titled “Moonlight Shadows,” the harp and orchestra evoke a dreamy soundscape that recalls Chinese folk music and even movie music. Though the second movement, “The Drunken Fisher,” tends to ramble, the performers know just how to play up passages that contrast fast and slow, gentle and assertive, fortissimo and pianissimo.
Nothing is more exciting than the finale, “Doctored Pentatonics.” Taking a cue from John Cage’s famous “prepared piano” pieces, the score calls for a “prepared harp,” with paper strips inserted around the strings to create a rather percussive tone quality. During the huge climaxes, powered by surging strings and winds, the harp is anything but a sweetly ethereal instrument. It’s wild and bold.
So fearless is Kondonassis’ virtuosity, and so assured is the orchestra , that a question spring to mind: Could this CD be the San Diego Symphony’s first Grammy contender?
---- Valerie Scher
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