And while we're talking about Svoboda, here's a review I wrote some time
ago of a CD of his orchestral music. The review is at
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0000AQS7U/classicalnet
A Winner!, September 6, 2003
By
Scott Morrison (Middlebury VT, USA)
One of the joys of reviewing lots of classical CDs is the
discovery of excellent music by composers one never heard of.
That's the case here. Tomas Svoboda (b. 1939) was born in Paris
of Czech parents, spent his early childhood in Boston, but
returned to Czechoslovakia with his parents after the War and
was admitted to the Prague Conservatory in 1954. He returned to
the US in 1964, studied with Halsey Stevens and Ingolf Dahl at
USC and for many years has been professor of composition at the
Portland State University, retiring in the late 1990s. It is
fitting that this program of his orchestral music is played by
the Oregon Symphony under its long-time conductor, James DePreist.
And brilliantly played it is.
All of the music here is immediately attractive, written in a
kind of tonal neo-classic style melded with the assymetric rhythms
often associated with the followers of Stravinsky. None of the
musical language is more advanced than, say, Bartok's 'Concerto
for Orchestra.'
The earliest piece, and in its way the most astonishing, is the
Symphony No. 1, written and premiered in Prague under Vaclav
Smetacek when the composer was a boy of sixteen. It is a stunningly
assured four-movement piece of large proportions lasting 36
minutes with only occasional moments of clumsiness. It is
rhythmically alive, uses some Czech folk materials, but at moments
has the sound of America's wide open spaces a la Aaron Copland,
fitting because the symphony is subtitled 'Of Nature.'
The most recent piece here is the Concerto for Marimba, written
in 1993 for Oregon Symphony percussionist Niel DePonte, the
expert soloist here. The concerto is a three-movement (Slow-Fast-Slow)
work lasting about 26 minutes. The orchestration is masterful
and inventive. A five-instrument 'keyboard' group consisting of
piano, harp, celesta, orchestra bells and crotales placed on the
stage close to the marimba soloist contribute shimmering and
jazzy effects.
The opening piece on the CD is reported to be Svoboda's most-played
piece. Entitled 'Overture of the Season,' it was written in 1978
and, again, premiered by the Oregon Symphony. It is an infectious
celebratory 9-minute romp that introduced by raffish brass, often
playing in the overlapping medodic lines made familiar by composers
like Glass and Reich, but it has harmonic richness that mark it
as something more than minimalist. Its rhythms are as catchy as
they are complex. Its energy is a perfect concert opener and it
is played by the Oregon Symphony with all the panache the score
requires.
I am delighted to make the acquaintance of the music of Tomas
Svoboda and will look for more to investigate. I understand that
there are recordings of two piano concertos, one of them by the
composer, himself a fine pianist and listed as one of the
orchestral keyboardists for the present recording.
Heartily recommended.
Scott Morrison
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