BY STEPHANIE ESLAKE
Monteverdi and Cazzati were composing their masterpieces long before the saxophone was born. But according to early music ensemble Camerata Antica, the instrument suits music of the 17th Century rather well. The musicians have commissioned Elena Kats-Chernin and Alice Chance to compose two new works for soprano saxophone, cornetto, viola da gamba, and harpsichord in this traditional style and will host the premiere in a free concert this Saturday night.
It’s a “project of firsts for Camerata Antica,” cornetto player Matthew Manchester says. Along with commissioning works for the first time, Camerata Antica has started up its first Pozible campaign with plans to record and release the new pieces. The musicians have already raised more than $800 of their $2500 target and hope to share the music in festivals across the country. Matthew tells us what it’s been like to work with two of Australia’s most talented composers.
These two composers are at wildly different stages in their careers. Alice Chance is young and emerging, and Elena Kats-Chernin is well established. Tell me what this means to you as someone commissioning their music?
It’s interesting that you point that out. There’s a lovely parallel between the old and the new repertoire, and the veteran and new composers. I’d love to say we planned it that way, but we were more interested in identifying composers who would understand our instruments and historical performance sensibilities, and would write music that is both clever and approachable.
All of us have enjoyed performing works by Elena at various stages of our careers. She really knows how to write a good tune, but her pieces constantly twist and turn away from where you might expect them to go. ‘Black Tie’, the piece Elena wrote for us, is no exception.
Alice is a viola da gamba player and singer herself, so she understands word-setting and historical performance and we thought she would be the perfect person to write a piece that would tie in with the rest of a 17th Century program and be playable on historical instruments. She has a feel for writing extraordinarily haunting and beautiful music that doesn’t end up sounding predictable or twee.
How do their works fit together on the same program?
In both cases, we met with the composer early on in the process and played various 17th Century duets and vocal pieces to give them an idea of the capabilities of the instruments and the stylistic approach we were going for. Interestingly, there are some striking similarities between the two works. They are very melodically-driven, and take advantage of the particular capabilities of each instrument. Despite being composed completely independently, the second movement of the Chance setting of Keats’ poem ‘Ode on Melancholy’ has a similarly manic and rollicking feel to the Kats-Chernin Palm Court Orchestra waltz. Elena’s work ‘Black Tie’ uses the voice as an instrument equal to the soprano saxophone and cornetto, employing vocalise rather than setting text. Alice’s work beautifully brings to life the Keats poem, tying in the 16th Century instruments with 19th Century text and 21st Century music.
The voice is the one instrument in this program that serves as a connection between music separated by so many centuries. We are very lucky to have Anna Sandstrom in the ensemble and her astonishing vocal skills bring the old and the new texts to life. While instrumentation is obviously the unifying feature of the works and the program as a whole, the stylistic contrasts between the two works are testament to the variety that is possible with an ensemble that you would normally expect to be confined to a particular genre or era. It is also exciting to see modern instruments such as the saxophone playing alongside the older cornetto, viola da gamba, and harpsichord. It takes composers of particular skill and sensitivity to create music that allows the different technical strengths and limitations of the instruments to work together.
You’re somewhat of an early music specialist yourself. So what’s it like to commission and perform brand new works?
This is new territory for me, and for Camerata Antica. I’ve never commissioned new music before, and certainly not for historical instruments playing in a group that was formed specifically to explore historical performance practice. The cornetto was hidden in obscurity from about 1680 until 1950, and only resurrected as part of the Early Music movement of the late 20th Century. As such it is largely used to play the repertoire of its own time and has not been viewed as a vehicle for new music. It is a wonderfully expressive instrument, with a hauntingly beautiful vocal-like sound. It bridges the divide between woodwind and brass and has great potential for composers. I’m not aware of any Australian works that have been written for cornetto, and I’m almost certain the soprano sax and cornetto combination has never been explored compositionally anywhere in the world. It has been great fun to see how far I could push the cornetto out of its comfort zone, and experiment with stylistic ideas that I have not had to put in to practice since my early days as a modern trumpet player.
Soprano sax, cornetto, and harpsichord aren’t instruments you’d normally hear together. What’s the sound like and why does it work?
Soprano sax and cornetto are a fantastic combination. There are times when it is very difficult to tell the two instruments apart. There’s an effortless fluidity in the soprano sax that I find myself trying to emulate subconsciously. The really interesting stuff happens when you add voice and viola da gamba to the mix. The sound for the early repertoire is at once familiar and slightly alien. For the modern repertoire, it feels like the saxophone is taking the rest of us on a voyage of discovery. Again, it takes the right combination of composers and players to take what could easily sound very disjointed and make it blend seamlessly.
Camerata Antica will perform this Saturday at 6.30pm, Recital Hall West, Sydney Conservatorium of Music, free entry. To find out more about the Pozible campaign go to www.pozible.com/camerataantica.
Image supplied.
