GETTING IN THE SWIM WITH CABRILLO’S MODERNS
SANTA CRUZ, CA—A crazy idea back in the 1960s, starting up a symphonic music festival studded with living composers not yet household names. But while many arts-center orchestras shy away from music less than a century old, the Cabrillo Festival has thrived on the unlikely formula, filling most of the 900 seats every August for contemporary fare. The ink of the scores may not have dried complete yet, but they offer the listener discovery—like a bracing swim in the chilly ocean here, in effect, as against lolling in your warm hometown pool.
The knot of some 18 composers featured this year are in their 40s on average, mostly on the way up, representative of the new wave in the classics. And the Aug. 4 concert had three women composers, no less—a sign of the times.
The second season under Music Director Cristian Macelaru follows a generation’s worth of leadership here by Ms. Marin Alsop, who could probably write volumes about the glass ceiling on the major arts-center podiums of America. The Romanian-American follows similar programming, but with a pronounced humanitarian bent and a consistently tonal structure. In conducting, his sensitive side emerged in the Aug. 4 concert, improving on the workmanlike image of the opening night.
His most soulful moments emerged in the slow movement of the William Bolcom Violin Concerto, then in a Frank opus dealing with migrations. Yes indeed, Virginia, conductors and composers alike do have souls and sensitivity!
The most dazzling skills at orchestration the first weekend emerged in “Walkabout” by Gabriela Lena Frank of Berkeley. Her return to her mother’s homeland Peru was teeming with mixed emotions, from somber to exuberant. The many musical shifts of moods and colors were impressive, from the feistyness of the opening string quartet to the festive outbursts of the finale which seemingly conjured up the old Inca emperor with entourage.
This 27-minute piece is episodic, telling various stories—relaxed reveries, uneasy transitions, somber lyricism, jagged exuberance, emotional intimacy. I liked the restlessness of her orchestra, always ready to surprise and bolt away, like a young colt.
William Bolcom, 80, is one of the grand old figures among our composers. His 1984 Violin Concerto is largely neoclassical, changing moods in the finale to jazz in the Joe Venuti manner. The Andante is one of his most moving ever, to the memory of friend and N.Y. Philharmonic pianist Paul Jacobs, struck down in 1982 by AIDS in mid-career (a significant figure in contemporary music I had the good fortune to interview circa 1980). The trumpet solo was brought off with heart by Lauren Eberhart.
The finale’s flights of fancy are loaded with blues notes and syncopation, where violinist Philippe Quint showed his versatile chops tellingly.
Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music, come-as-you-are orchestral concerts at the Santa Cruz (CA) Civic Auditorium Aug. 2-12. For info: (831) 420-5260 or go online. www.cabrillomusic.org
