{"id":5020,"date":"2013-04-27T21:16:48","date_gmt":"2013-04-27T21:16:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennethwoods.net\/blog1\/?p=5020"},"modified":"2013-04-27T21:16:48","modified_gmt":"2013-04-27T21:16:48","slug":"cd-review-fanfare-magazine-jerry-dubbins-of-galkrasa-complete-string-trios","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennethwoods.net\/blog1\/2013\/04\/27\/cd-review-fanfare-magazine-jerry-dubbins-of-galkrasa-complete-string-trios\/","title":{"rendered":"CD Review- Fanfare Magazine, Jerry Dubbins of Gal\/Krasa Complete String Trios"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new review of the Complete String Trios of Hans Gal and Hans Krasa from\u00a0Fanfare Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n

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G\u00c1L\u00a0Serenade in D,\u00a0<\/b>op. 41.\u00a0Trio in f<\/b>T<\/b>,<\/b>\u00a0op. 104. KR\u00c1SA\u00a0Tanec\u00a0<\/i><\/b>(Dance).\u00a0Passacaglia and Fugue<\/b>\u00a0<\/i>\u009f Ens Epomeo \u009f AVIE 2259 (67:08)<\/p>\n

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Buy here from MDT UK<\/a><\/p>\n

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\"Epomeo<\/a><\/p>\n

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Hans G\u00e1l has been receiving some well-deserved, if belated, attention on disc lately. Just a couple of issues back, I reviewed a must-have recording by cellist Antonio Meneses performing G\u00e1l\u2019s very beautiful cello concerto. And now, here on the present release, we have what is advertised as the complete string trios of both G\u00e1l and his close contemporary, Hans Kr\u00e1sa. Though born only nine years apart\u2014 G\u00e1l in 1890 and Kr\u00e1sa in 1899\u2014 G\u00e1l was fortunate to escape the advancing Nazi forces into Austria, fleeing to the U.K. in 1938 and eventually settling in Edinburg, where he died in 1987.<\/p>\n

Kr\u00e1sa was not so lucky. He was deported first to the Theresienstadt concentration camp and then transferred to Auschwitz where he was killed in 1944. Given Kr\u00e1sa\u2019s much shorter life, it\u2019s understandable that his output is considerably less than G\u00e1ls\u2019s. Neither composer, however, apparently devoted much effort to the string trio, since the contents of this CD are said to be the extent of it.<\/p>\n

The two G\u00e1l works are recorded here for the first time, and, in terms of scale, they\u2019re both major additions to the literature, each lasting over 25 minutes. Written in 1932, before the serious trouble began, the Serenade lives up to its title, in name, if not strictly in form. The piece is in four movements in what I would describe as a nod to the Baroque and Classical periods as reflected through the lens of an easygoing, listener-friendly modernist style that teases and tickles the ear with fractured and fragmented references to familiar pieces. Throughout the first movement (Capriccioso), for example, you\u2019ll hear the distinctive three-note pattern that permeates the first movement of Bach\u2019s G-Major Brandenburg Concerto.<\/p>\n

While I wouldn\u2019t want to push the analogy too far, I\u2019d say that to a degree G\u00e1l\u2019s Serenade reminds me of some of Hindemith\u2019s\u00a0Kleine Kammermusik<\/i>\u00a0pieces. G\u00e1l\u2019s score is mostly busy, breezy, and boffo, perhaps more in the manner of a divertimento than a serenade.<\/p>\n

Just as long, but in only three movements this time, the Trio in FT Minor is a much later work, dating from 1971, after the trouble was over. The piece was commissioned by the London Viola d\u2019amore Society and originally scored for violin, viola d\u2019amore, and cello, but G\u00e1l made this version for traditional string trio at the same time. The mood is now introspective, brooding, and perhaps a bit bereft. If there\u2019s an analogue here, I\u2019d have to say that the Trio seems to look back to the highly chromatic, freely tonal style familiar to us from works of the late 19th- and early 20th-century Viennese composers before they succumbed to the siren of dodecaphonism. In other words, G\u00e1l\u2019s Trio is a nostalgic soak in a muddy pond. But mud baths are supposed to be therapeutic, and this one left me with a nice, warm glow.<\/p>\n

The Kr\u00e1sa pieces are considerably shorter\u2014six minutes for\u00a0Tanec<\/i>\u00a0and just under 10 minutes for the Passacaglia and Fugue.\u00a0Tanec<\/i>, or Dance, was composed in the last year of Kr\u00e1sa\u2019s life. With its strong rhythmic thrust, ostinato figure in the cello, and Hungarian folk flavor, the music is at first suggestive of Bart\u00f3k, but as Kenneth Woods\u2019s note indicates, the piece is meant to be evocative of trains, with the obvious reference to the boxcars that transported Kr\u00e1sa and the millions of others to the death camps. To quote Woods, \u201cthe atmosphere ranges from eerie nostalgia, to barely contained menace, to explicit violence,\u201d and ends in a series of manic shrieks.<\/p>\n

Written later that same year (1944), the Passacaglia and Fugue is Kr\u00e1sa\u2019s last completed work. It\u2019s difficult to describe this music of broken spirit and soul. Initially, Shostakovich comes to mind in a frozen soundscape benumbed by cruel and forbidding cold. But slowly, the music rises to a pitch of bickering and physical altercation.<\/p>\n

The recording at hand represents the Ensemble Epomeo\u2019s disc debut. Named for the Mediterranean volcano, Mt. Epomeo, the group was founded when the three players\u2014Caroline Chin, violin; David Yang, viola; and Kenneth Woods, cello\u2014came together at the Festivale di Musica da Camera d\u2019Ischia in Italy on 2008. It\u2019s always difficult to judge an ensemble in unfamiliar repertoire, but I think I can say that the Epomeo\u2019s musicians are more than up to the technical task of their business and that they sound intensely engaged in the emotional worlds of these two composers and their music. I would now look forward to hearing the ensemble in something more familiar, like Mozart\u2019s great Divertimento in EI Major, K 563, or the Beethoven string trios. Meanwhile, this new, excellent recording is strongly recommended.<\/p>\n

Jerry Dubins<\/b><\/p>\n