Most young instrumentalists are too preoccupied with conventional concert careers to consistently learn the latest works. And it’s even riskier for a coterie of them to band together and devote all their time to the newer works. Yet, this is precisely what eighth blackbird has been doing since it was formed four years ago by six recent graduates of Oberlin College and the University of Cincinnati.
In that short span, this sextet (named after a Wallace Stevens poem) has won comparisons to the Kronos Quartet for their ingenuity, hip exuberance and rapport with listeners; and composers in their age bracket are eager to write for them.
Last fall, partly on the recommendation of pianist and new-music champion Ursula Oppens, they began a three-year residency at Northwestern University. Shortly after, the University of Chicago appointed them as part of the Contemporary Chamber Players.
Friday night in Mandel Hall, these players–Molly Alicia Barth (flutes), Michael Maccaferri (clarinets), Matthew Albert (violin, viola), Nicholas Photinos (cello), Matthew Duvall (percussions) and Lisa Kaplan (keyboards)–made their Chicago debut by kicking off the Contemporary Chamber Players’ 37th season.
None of the works on the eclectic program is more than 2 years old, with one exception–Frederic Rzewski’s 1972 “Coming Together.” And four of the five composers represented were, like eighth blackbird members, born in the 1970s and products of academic training (Yale, Michigan, Eastman). Small wonder that the sextet seemed perfectly suited to the role of interpreter of some of their generation’s common experiences as expressed in music, from a return to faith (Daniel Kellogg’s “Divinum Mysterium”), to a car trip through America’s Southwest (Kenneth Eberhard’s “The Road to Las Cruces”), to postmodern love (Kevin Puts’ “Obsessive Nature”).
Of the shorter pieces, Variations by David Schober struck me as a conscientiously crafted exercise in mid-20th-Century academic idiom: it opened with isolated quasi-oriental gestures–flute flutters and string plucks–then gradually morphed into a joyous display of camaraderie.
Also less than 10 minutes in length, “Las Cruces” evoked the desolation and wonders of a journey down a desert highway, with the piano and other percussions providing an insistent pulse and the winds darting like mysterious flares. The performance of each was energetic and nearly precise, marked by the fluid teamwork of players obviously on the same wavelength.
Puts’ semi-autobiographical “Obsessive Nature” started off with a series of loud shrieks–think of Bernard Hermann’s score for “Psycho”–that was overtaken by a long stretch of woozy romantic postures–“Vertigo” here–which then segued into an Wagnerian idyll. There were also echoes of Michael Nyman, as the unrelenting madness returned. Ultimately, for Puts, love hurts like a throbbing headache–and the music ended with louder and louder anvil thwacks. Percussionist Duvall put in a flawless workout.
And he was just as brilliant and forceful in “Divinum Mysterium,” which, in its half-hour length, chronicled the creation narrative in Genesis. For almost half of that time, from the opening fusillades of drum beats to the primordial soup of sounds, it reminded me of “The Rite of Spring.” And the programmatic nature of the piece was underscored in the finale when a hymn was repeated interrupted by percussive rumbles hinting at temptations. The whole thing could have been shortened by 10 minutes, but the performance was riveting enough.
In “Coming Together,” violinist Matthew Albert was the narrator, reciting sentences the politically minded Rzewski had excerpted from the diary of a man who died in the Attica prison riots. The sentiments of anger and resolve remained fresh three decades later in this revival, although Albert’s delivery was a bit callow. The instrumental accompaniment from his colleagues conveyed immediacy and theatrical vividness, in another demonstration of the sextet’s affinity for the new.
