Christina Petrowska Quilico: Retro Americana
Navona Records

Text accompanying this excellent recording by pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico identifies her trademark as “rivetingly acuminous interpretation.” While the claim is borne out by the performances on the collection, Retro Americana is distinguished as much by its inspired curation. Quilico, a Full Professor of Piano and Musicology at Toronto's York University (where she has worked since 1987), is fully conversant with the North American piano repertoire of the past century, including classical and jazz. To that end, Henry Cowell and George Gershwin rest comfortably on the recording alongside Frederic Rzewski, Art Tatum, Bill Westcott, and Meredith Monk. All of the material was recorded in Toronto, some at the Glenn Gould Studio and the rest at Humbercrest United Church and York University.

A member of the Order of Canada, the Ottawa-born Quilico has appeared on more than fifty records and was this year added to CBC Radio's “In Concert Hall of Fame,” which celebrates the greatest Canadian classical musicians of all time. After sharing the top prize with Murray Perahia in a concerto competition at the age of fourteen, The New York Times dubbed her a “promethean talent,” praise greater hard to imagine. Her recordings encompass traditional and contemporary classical, with Chopin, Liszt, and Mozart in the former and Ann Southam (five titles to date) the latter. Her recordings have championed Canadian music, with four receiving JUNO nominations, and works by women composers.

Six Ings by Cowell provides a fascinating entry point, even if its components are miniatures. They're not so brief, however, that a distinct impression isn't established when each explores a contrasting musical texture. Titles hint at those differences, with the delicate, suspended quality of “Floating” far unlike the cat-like “Frisking,” rambunctious “Scooting,” and incandescent “Fleeting.” Rzewski's Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues follows, its single-movement design standing in marked contrast to the blink-and-you'll-miss-it character of Cowell's. Exuding a primal power, Cotton Mill Blues begins with dense tone clusters swelling into tsunami-like waves that gradually give way to a less engulfing juxtaposition of rollicking patterns and melodic figures. Gershwin-like episodes emerge alongside blues and folk passages before the expressive, wide-ranging travelogue ends.

Gershwin himself is represented by a thoroughly endearing suite that features some of his most beloved tunes: “The Man I Love” is handled affectionately by Quilico (the pianist even working a few moments of stride into the treatment), “Oh, Lady Be Good!” is playful, “I Got Rhythm” exuberant, and “Somebody Loves Me” blues-drenched. As different as Gershwin and Cowell are, there is a connection between them, the former having taken private composition lessons with the latter. During her performance of Westcott's suite, his long-time interests in ragtime and blues piano assert themselves, particularly in “Wannabe a Rag,” though the slightest hint of “Promenade” from Pictures at an Exhibition also arises in the eloquent rumination “Suite-Prelude.” Perhaps the best argument on behalf of the Toronto-based composer is made by the elegant meditation “Ballade,” however.

While material by Gershwin, Rzewski, and Cowell is often included on piano-themed recordings, Tatum and Monk are less commonly featured, which makes their inclusion here all the more pleasing. Monk's well-known for her innovative vocal works (including the magnificent opera Atlas), but her solo piano pieces are as emblematic of the composer. All of the selections are instantly identifiable as Monk creations, from the ebullient Windows in 7 and Railroad (Travel Song) to the brooding St. Petersburg Waltz.

The brief closing selections, two popular tunes of the '30s and '40s, weren't written by Tatum but are performed by Quilico in arrangements by the jazz legend to give an indication of the titanic force he was at the keyboard. “I'll Never Be the Same” is abundant in trills and cascades, while the Ellington-penned “Don't Get Around Much Anymore” caps the release with no small amount of charm. By album's end, it seems conceivable that a formal concert performance by Quilico of contemporary classical works might be as likely a possibility as a nightclub set featuring Ellington, (Thelonious) Monk, and Gershwin. Either scenario would be as satisfying for the attendee.

October 2021