swiss cultural fund in britain
März 2012 | It was a riveting, thrilling musical encounter that brought wonderful texture and dimension to the sound elicited from familiar instruments.
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The Amar Quartett, comprising Anna Brunner and Igor Keller, violins, Hannes Bärtschi, viola, and Peter Somodari, cello, performed two concerts together with pianist Benjamin Engeli.
This innovative ensemble places special emphasis on attracting new audiences with contemporary music which they juxtaposed this time in a very inspiring way with J.S. Bach. The audience enjoyed new compositions by Swiss composers Michèle Rusconi and Roberto David Rusconi, two of them UK premieres, at Edinburgh’s Reid Concert Hall and at the Jerwood Hall, LSO StLukes, in London. Michèle and Roberto studied composition and trace their origins to Ticino, Switzerland. Michèle was inspired by pop, jazz and later by the music of Edgar Varèse, while Roberto’s influences include the vocal music of Gesualdo, Monteverdi and Anton Webern. The composers attended both concerts which were introduced by Conrad Williams, author of “The Concert Pianist”. It was a riveting, thrilling musical encounter that brought wonderful texture and dimension to the sound elicited from familiar instruments.
© Ettore Causa |
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The New York Times
Juli 2010 | The New York Times
Published: July 13, 2010
Fresh Works, Played Amid the Rumbles and Chirps
By STEVE SMITH
The title of Michèle Rusconi’s “Entgiftung — ALAT (GPT) 57 U/1” refers to rage and to a specific physiological imbalance. Ms. Rusconi’s music evoked both conditions in a dazzling tour de force of explosive gestures and dyspeptic timbres.
gesamten Text lesenThe New York Times
Published: July 13, 2010
Music Review Fresh Works, Played Amid the
Rumbles and Chirps By STEVE SMITH The sounds of birds chirping merrily filled the air in the picturesque setting of the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden at the Museum of Modern Art on Sunday night. Overhead an airplane groaned across the sky, its sound magnified by the courtyard garden’s manifold hard surfaces. Outside the gate a caravan of buses rumbled past, slowly and loudly. There would soon be a more conventional kind of music as well: the first concert in the museum’s annual Summergarden series. But during the few moments it took to adjust to the humid warmth, you might also have wondered how Joel Sachs and his New Juilliard Ensemble players could compete with the sounds already in progress. (Answer: amplification.) Taking in the city’s many free outdoor concerts during the summer involves a mix of stoicism and pleasure; you shrug off stickiness, mutter incantations to ward off rain, and accept the gnats and mosquitoes as payment for brief transport and a slightly fuller wallet. And Summergarden reliably provides much to be grateful for, even if there is far less of it than in past years, when the series stretched through the late summer. There are excellent concerts of contemporary classical pieces played by bright student musicians from the Juilliard School, presented in alternation with adventurous jazz offerings provided by Jazz at Lincoln Center. Walls block some of the noise, and shade blocks some of the setting sun. And there is a bar and ice cream counter, which appeared to be doing good business on Sunday. Mostly, there is an opportunity to hear fresh works new to the city. Sunday’s concert opened with a winner: “San Francisco Night” by Reynold Tharp. The back story is almost too rich: Mr. Tharp, enjoying the last night of a San Francisco visit in 2006, recalled the music Gyorgy Ligeti was inspired to write during his extended Bay Area stay, and then learned of Ligeti’s death when he got home the next day. Elegant, airy and weightless figurations for an octet of strings, winds, brasses, piano and percussion were a stylish and fitting homage to Ligeti. The music also made you eager to hear more from Mr. Tharp — and to hear it in a setting with more natural, generous acoustics, without microphones and loudspeakers. “Number Nine,” a rambunctious quintet by Paul Desenne, mixed Gallic suavity and Latin American brio for a chameleonic dash through various subdivisions of a nine-beat bar. The title of Michèle Rusconi’s “Entgiftung — ALAT (GPT) 57 U/1” refers to rage and to a specific physiological imbalance. Ms. Rusconi’s music evoked both conditions in a dazzling tour de force of explosive gestures and dyspeptic timbres. Laurie Altman’s “Ways of Looking: At Zürich” opened with a bristling, jazzy piano solo, winningly played by Jennifer Chu, which bloomed into lively sextet interplay. But a movement honoring the Latin-jazz titan Tito Puente was oddly stiff. Another section, meant to evoke the elegant sound of the pianist George Shearing’s ensemble, was dry and cerebral. Mr. Altman’s skill at handling instruments was evident, and the playing was superb. But inspiration seemed to wear thin well
before the conclusion arrived.
The Summergarden concerts run on Sunday nights through Aug. 1 at the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Sculpture Garden, Museum of Modern Art; (212) 708-9400, moma.org.
A version of this review appeared in print on July 14, 2010, on page C4 of the New York edition.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/14/arts/music/14garden.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=r usconi&st=cse |
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