A Richly-spiced Palette

 

MALCOLM MILLER reports
on the world première of
a new viola concerto in Tel Aviv

 

The world première of the Viola Concerto by the young Israeli composer Yoram Meyouhas formed the centrepiece of a superbly stirring concert by the Israel Chamber Orchestra conducted by Roberto Paternostro at the Tel Aviv Museum on 28 April 2008, with the composer as soloist.

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Yoram Meyouhas has the cut and thrust of the fervent young virtuoso, and his concerto, cast in a single movement form with three main sections -- fast slow fast -- shows him relishing a richly-spiced palette and creating a sense of urgency, potency, meditation and joy. In this somewhat traditional framework the idiom reflects a freshness of inspiration that stems from his harmonic language, combining an angular atonality with a Messaien-like modality, and the idea of a unifying thematic idea stated at the outset, one which through its emphasis of dissonance, provides a referential harmonic sphere for long stretches of soloistic or tutti development.

The orchestration is one of its strengths, as in the very opening gestures, where the percussion outburst leads to the angular theme announced by unison woodwind, the full texture gradually building up to a climactic peak bolstered by harp and piano. Subsequent waves of intensity evolve with oceanic richness, embellished by harp glissandi, and some quite virtuoso marimba writing, the extended tutti interspersed by viola solos, which glimmer through the sea of sound and -- if occasionally swamped -- emerge in slacker parentheses where the momentum eases. Though there are rare dialogues between orchestra and soloist such as one interchange with horns, structurally the movement proceeds through a series of Baroque styled contrasts, where the viola either soliloquizes or joins the fray with frantic passagework.

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Especially effective was the relaxation from the galloping rhythmic impetus of the first movement (pointed up by prominent bass and side drum) to the calmer chordal textures of the reflective slow movement, where again orchestral felicities abounded, beguiling woodwind and harp, with touches of glistening sunlight in the solo violin and solo cello, over which the solo viola's initial theme reappears in a more lyrical guise; a new pizzicato variant of the theme for the strings is introduced, with sustained strands and tremolando textures by the solo viola creating an arresting canvas, which eventually picks up the energy of the faster variant of the theme. Yet it is the cadenza which forms the expressive heart of the work, announced by the tam-tam, and which showed Meyouhas' skill as a violist in three phases, a searching chordal exposition, a two part polyphonic development with some incisive dissonant counterpoint, and the final lyrical reverie, only to be gently interrupted by delicately resonant chimes and bells, awakening into a transition to the final, fast movement.

Here the initial motifs are coloured by blurry harmony and evocative gestures, such as the solo cello dialogue with viola again. The renewed energy also benefits from the jazzy influence of the dance, interspersed with more sustained sections for the viola's soloistic excursions. Here the sense of momentous tension of the work's opening is transformed into a mood of exuberance, yet the work concludes with the dissonant clash at the heart of the main motif still unresolved, in a state of suspense. It is a work which displays the well crafted aspect of the younger generation of Israeli composers, sharing with many an aesthetic concern with drama and unpredictability, and which communicates with considerable neo-romantic immediacy.

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