I haven't yet met anyone calling it by its full and official title,
but everybody concerned knows that the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary
Music has always been a bastion of, yes, new music.  Cabrillo's unbroken
line of modernity since 1961 was well sustained at the season-opening
concert Saturday - all three composers featured being "contemporary"
enough to attend in person - but something was off the unbeaten path
this time.

With some justification, new classical music has a reputation of being
difficult, challenging, not always "easy to take." There was none of
that on this occasion in the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium.  Music director
Marin Alsop conducted the brilliant festival orchestra in a program that
was accessible to a fault. Now, surely, lack of dissonance, atonality,
surprising turns in the progression of music should not be cause for
unhappiness, and I don't mean to give the impression of complaining.
These are just the facts, ma'am.

The program of Kevin Puts' 2004 "Vespertine Symphonies," Julia Wolfe's
2003 "My Beautiful Scream," and Aaron Jay Kernis' 2001 "Color Wheel"
unfolded without a single instance of daunting complexity.  It was all
pleasant, with varying degrees of obvious substance underneath, nothing
beyond the ken of a musical neophyte.  (The trend to "simplify" new music
at the festival started some time ago, but until now, there was usually
a mix - for each nice Christopher Rouse opus, more gritty music by John
Adams or a Einojuhani Rautavaara symphony with real bite; and the blessed
one-man blend of James MacMillan's transparent complexity - not a
uniformity of "sing me a simple song.")

Wolfe's work, written for the Kronos Quartet and orchestra, was intriguing;
Kernis, as always, provided luminous substance, but Puts this time came
up with something only pleasant and no more.  At 31, Puts has already
made a name for himself with the California Symphony and commissions in
the US and Europe, and "Vespertine Symphonies" is truly in the mode of
the pop star who inspired it.  That would be Iceland's Bjork, the young
woman who showed up dressed as a swan at the Academy Awards.  (Was that
a Tchaikovsky quote in Puts' music, a reference to a certain lake?  No,
I didn't think so.)

Puts promised "garlands of sound," and he delived them, sound meandering
aimlessly, in a skillful, pleasant work, with a throwaway second movement,
a more meaningful third, that provided fine development, and an impressive
crescendo - the festival orchestra performing with a dedication and
excellence that would have befitted great music, not only this nice (if
somewhat vacuous) piece.  "Garlands of sound," even when percussion and
the brass greatly impress, not memorable music make.

Memorable in its concept and execution, Wolf's 23-minute "Scream" was
more noteworthy than the Bjork tribute, and yet still (too?) well-behaved
music.  Of the unusual "concerto for string quartet and orchestra," the
Kronos, said the young composer before the performance, was to speak of
"the intimate human side," the orchestra, on the other hand, of "the
violent outer world." Why a scream? To represent Wolf's view of life
as "incredibly beautiful and terrifying."

I didn't hear either in the music, but what there was did impress.  The
"Rheingold"-like slow, deep, suspenseful pedal-point opening made the
audience sit up and pay attention.  The quiet, "atmospheric" background
is then interrupted by startling unison exclamations, but the actual
scream is a long way off.  In the interim, there are some massive insect
sounds alternating with hushed passages, only brief use of ostinato
reminiscent of Philip Glass (Kronos violinists David Harrington and,
especially, John Sherba working their hearts out), and a fine balance,
favoring the discreetly amplified quartet.  The orchestral scream, just
before a resigned/accepting resolution in the finale, provided an excellent
bridge to the final work, by Kernis, whose Second Symphony end with what
may well be the loudest, angriest scream in all music (a late response
to Vietnam, but with angry immediacy.

Nothing loud or angry in "Color Wheel," the work commissioned from the
Philadelphia-born (now part-time Mill Valley resident) composer for the
opening of Philadelphia's grand new concert hall in Kimmel Center.  He
has bouts of synesthesia, Kernis told the Santa Cruz audience, "hearing
colors," and the result is a beautiful work, regardless of what you may
see in it.  Except for the bright yellow of the A major finale, the
composer said, he himself had trouble distinguishing between possible
colors represented by the rich mixed chords of the work's opening.

Written as a series of variations (on a simple four-note theme) played
without pause, in a deliberately continuous fashion, the music breathes
seamlessly, phrases blending into one another.  There is nothing novel
or challenging about "Color Wheel," but the first five minutes in itself
is the kind of music you'd want to hear again - giant chords calming
down for a glorious lyric passage, the work leading into a playful,
bright scherzo.  There are jazzy sounds, Bartokian shadows lurking in
the background, a nonpareil orchestral balance, and continuous forward
motion...  it's Kernis at his typical best.

Alsop has done consistently good work in Santa Cruz over the years, but
now she seems to get what she wants from the orchestra (which is a lot)
without any visible or, more importantly, audible effort.  Cabrillo is
a small festival with a grand partnership between an outstanding music
director and her "favorite orchestra," in her words, in fact of
accomplishment.

Janos Gereben
www.sfcv.org
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