Anastasia Tsioulcas
«Conga-Line in Hell»
Dear Roberto,
This review just appeared on the classical music website Classicstoday.com
Performance: 10 / Sound Quality: 10
«Conga-Line in Hell» is one of those rare discs that not only makes thematic
sense but also happens to be hugely enjoyable from beginning to end. The
disc’s somewhat alarming title is taken from the delightful opening piece
from 1994, the Uruguayan Miguel del Águila’s sly conga that layers Latin
American dance rhythms over a repeating piano figure (think Philip Glass,
but with a sense of humor). Don’t let the title (or the cover art) put you
off: this is a great sampler of new and 20th-century music from the
Americas, an area that has long been of interest to Joel Sachs, who is
probably best known for his work in New York directing two new-music groups,
Continuum and the New Juilliard Ensemble. His conducting on disc, as in live
concerts, always is sharply articulated and well-thought-out. The Camerata
de las Américas is a top-notch group of players who sound as if they’ve been
playing this repertoire forever (showing incredible tightness and focused
sound), but also as if they are still completely entranced by the many
charms of this music.
And so they should be; it’s a terrific program. The Mexican composer Arturo
Márquez, whose early works were heavily influenced by Messiaen and Berio,
eventually turned to the music of his youth for inspiration. 1988’s Danzón
No. 4 is one result, in which the melody is sinuously carried by the oboe,
flute, and saxophone, fed from a spring of strings and percussion. Conlon
Nancarrow, the American who left for Mexico and who perhaps is the
best-known name in this group of composers, is represented by 1943’s First
Piece for Small Orchestra, a rhythmically piquant but tonally blues-flavored
work. The Puerto Rican composer Roberto Sierra’s 1997 piece Cuentos (Tales)
spans three evocatively-titled movements: the explosive shrieks of «Lenguas
desconocidas (Unknown Languages)»; «Lo que pasó en las nubas (What Happened
in the Clouds)», reminiscent of Messiaen’s shimmering textures; and
«Batata-Coco», a wild mambo homage to the great bandleader Pérez Prado.
Another composer to make use of Caribbean dance sounds is Nadia Boulanger’s
Cuban student Alejandro García Caturla, whose First Cuban Suite from 1932
draws as much from the son, comparsa, and danza styles as it does from
Stravinsky. (Listen to the ominous opening of the movement titled «Comparsa»
and compare it to the first sounds of the Rite of Spring.) Another piece
from the ’30s rounds out the program: 1937’s Flôr de Tremembé (Tremembé
Flower) by Brazilian composer Mozart Camargo Guarnieri, which starts out in
something of a fugue propelled by Brazilian percussion, then blossoms into a
festive whirl of color. The sound is great: wide, but still very crisp.
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