There are eight vocalists, performing everything from medieval madrigals to jazz and never missing a beat – literally.  Not only maintaining the sometimes intricate rhythms, they managed to do it without so much as a snapped finger or obvious beat-keeping.  The music just flowed, in a manner of speaking.

The harmonies and the discords were exquisite with each voice contributing perfectly to the whole.  We’ve all heard a Capella groups, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard one where I there was not one misstep, not one sound of “soprano stretch” nor “basso bumble.”  It’s so unusual to hear eight very distinct voices blending into one glorious sound.

It seemed sometimes like I was listening to a full choir; other times, I heard one voice.  This is the tricky part of choral singing, and I know because I am an abject failure at it!  We learned at the post-concert dinner that there is a very extensive winnowing process for applicants to VOCES8.  Each time the word has gone out that the group is interviewing for a particular voice, they receive hundreds of applicants.  After about 14 months of getting down to two or three hopefuls, they choose someone who not only has the right voice and skills (“Can you sing madrigals?”) but whose talents blend into the whole.  The eight people we heard are the absolute best of the best.  You can tell.

The variety, the colors of the music performed perfectly suited this group and amply demonstrated their skills.  I can’t imagine how many hours were spent finding everything from the composition of Gibbons (simple, elegant) to the music of Britten (complex, rhythmically complicated and satisfying).  I wonder if, like prospective singers, they sift through hundreds of candidates.

I heard not a sound, not a rustle, not a beep or ping during the whole concert.  The audience was more than quiet; they were taken up into this incredible music.  I think “rapt attention” would describe the reaction.

I often eavesdrop on conservations as our patrons leave the Temple, and everything I heard on Sunday was positive.  The only complaint was that the concert seemed too short, and I would agree.  I could listen to this group for hours.

I hope we’ll see you at our last concert of the season.  On April 26th, we will enjoy the artistry of the Parker String Quartet.

– E Doyle

So says Google, and the definition certainly applies to this young quintet.  Okay, I admit to confusion, even bafflement when the five musicians launched into “Splinter,” but by the time they got to the fourth movement, “Cherry,” understanding was starting to seep into my brain.  I could admire the precision with which they played and their connections both to the score and to one another was remarkable.  I admired the difficulty of performing dissonance in perfect meter – selections such as theirs, very modern, sometimes atonal and often bouncing among the instruments seemingly without rhyme or reason – elicits admiration (even among the most diehard Brahms/Beethoven set).

Did you notice that the second selection ended with a movement titled,  “A Field of Reeds?”  Would that be clarinets and bassoons, was that a serendipitous selection, or was it just a reference to the Egyptian concept of paradise as a field of reeds (saxophones and oboes)?  The music certainly brought to mind the beautiful reeds bending in the wind (aided by the subtle sound effects produced by the bass clarinet).

Sorry Google, this was not my impression of “mellow” in the context of the concert performed by Akropolis.  Their version of “mellow” is the sonorous sounds of reed instruments:  totally unexpected, surprising even.   When they performed the Nina Simone, “For All We Know,” I thought of her mellow voice singing the words.  The next time I hear it, I will think of the sounds of reeds scaling the heights and exploring the valleys of that mellow sonority.

“Sprocket,” for all its devil-may-care ‘tude, was a masterpiece of timing.  The audience enjoyed the antics (as they were meant to), but I thought that, just like really good comedy, the secret of success is timing – and they never missed a beat.  I would love to hear it performed as it was written (for bicycle, of all things).  The final selection, “Homage to Paradise Valley,” had some passages of aching loss and remembrance.  We all have a paradise valley in our lives, and we miss its vibrancy and the memories it spawned.  The quintet captured this memory of a unique place in their home town.

Finally, members of the quintet did a great job of explaining what they were about.  Since the music was unfamiliar, their introductions were helpful and appreciated by the audience.

Bravo, Akropolis!  You are golden.

– E Doyle

We often speak of chamber music as being a conversation among musicians.  In order to carry on an interesting conversation there is respect one for the other, contributions from one or another that carry the conversation forward and a sense of commonality, community and harmony.  So when you are privileged to hear such a conversation rendered in music, it’s easy to imagine that this is precisely what the composer had in mind.  Such was the musical conversation we heard last Sunday, the 10th of November.  The Ariel String Quartet, augmented but never overpowered by the artistry of San Antonio Symphony Principal Clarinetist Ilya Shterenberg, performed not just intensely, but interestingly.

 The Quartet led off with Shostakovich’s Quartet No. 8.  The Program Notes said that in July, 1960, he was supposed to write the score of a film about the horrible firebombing of Dresden; instead, he composed the achingly sad Quartet No. 8 which he dedicated to victims of war.   Somewhere at the depth of this performance, I reflected on the nationalities of the artists – not something that usually draws my attention.  But the fact that they represented cultures that had been scarred by war made the music all the more poignant.  The two Largo movements, performed with so much soul (for want of a better word) were simply heart-breaking.

For the Mozart Clarinet Quintet and for the Weber Clarinet Quintet, Ariel was joined by a master of the clarinet, Ilya Shterenberg.  To the great good fortune of San Antonio, Mr. Shterenberg is a major artist in our own Symphony Orchestra and it was a pleasure to experience his magic at such close range. He has performed with the Ariel previously and knows each musician and this friendship was evident in the blending and joyful conversations among the quartet and the virtuoso.

Finally, the Ariel Quartet performed a very familiar composition, Schubert’s Quartet in D minor (“Death and the Maiden”).  They didn’t just dust if off and launch into the well-known movements; they made it their own, interpreting Schubert’s lyricism and bringing this beautiful composition to life.  The saddest aspect of this music was not the death of the young girl but the death of the composer, at age 31, shortly after this complex and masterful expression of genius was written.

Continuing this stellar season of the San Antonio Chamber Music Society, we invite you to join us for the Akropolis Reed Quintet Sunday, January 26, 2020, at 3:15 p.m.  The prize-winning Akropolis is an ensemble of five young and energetic performers whose performance has been described as “pure gold.”  You may just change your mind about the versatility and artistry of reed instruments!

– E Doyle