Joan Tower: Piano Concerto - Homage to Beethoven
BMOP/sound

Piano Concerto - Homage to Beethoven (1986)—one of twelve concertos Joan Tower's composed and one of four presented on this recent release from conductor Gil Rose and his renowned Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP)—gets top billing on BMOP/sound's ninety-third release, but its other pieces are as enticing. While Marc-André Hamelin brings his customary flair and virtuosity to the piano concerto, flutist Carol Wincenc takes the lead on Flute Concerto (1989) and Rising (2010) (both written for her), with bassoonist Adrian Morejon featured on Red Maple (2013).

Born in New Rochelle, New York in 1938, Tower has made a substantial contribution to American music culture and received countless awards in recognition of her accomplishments. In contrast to some composers who are prolific early on but gradually taper off, she's maintained a remarkable level of productivity throughout her career, with recent years seeing the creation of a cello concerto, an orchestral work, a viola quintet, and more. Tower's an inspirational model for young composers, not just for the consistently high calibre of her work but for her inexhaustible creative energy. She's also a respected educator who's taught since 1972 at Bard College where she holds the position of Asher B. Edelman Professor in the Arts.

Many of Tower's works have been inspired by Beethoven, including her first orchestral work, Sequoia, and, of course, the piano concerto performed by Hamelin and scored for solo piano and full orchestra. It's a single-movement work, though three sections are discernible, with each working a fragment from a Beethoven sonata into its design. In the first part, Tower alternates between slow and fast pacings in a manner reminiscent of Beethoven's Sonata No.17 in D minor, Op.31 (“Tempest”). A pensive stillness permeates the opening moments, a gesture that foreshadows subsequent oscillations between hushed voicings and aggressive animation. After an abrupt shift into driving rhythms, orchestral flurries, and rapid sixteenth-note flourishes by the soloist, the music again settles into a contemplative episode. Whereas the second section's piano cadenza references Beethoven's Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111, the third section's piano cadenza quotes a theme from the Sonata No. 21 in C major, Op. 53 (“Waldstein”). Piano is prominent throughout, naturally, but Tower also gives woodwinds and percussion prominent roles, and consequently the concerto establishes itself as a fully developed orchestral expression featuring a piano soloist rather than one where the orchestra functions as mere backdrop. And though, as mentioned, three sections can be identified within it, the work unfolds like an organic, twenty-one-minute adventure punctuated by clangorous rhythmic gestures, calming interludes, and, towards the end, the pianist's oceanic swells.

While the Flute Concerto is scored for flute and full orchestra, Rising (originally set for flute and string quartet) is scored for solo flute and string orchestra. In keeping with the title, patterns voiced by the flute and strings ascend repeatedly, at times slowly and at other times at high velocity and with the two elements conjoining in changing ways. Offsetting that upwards trajectory are falling movements, and it's the contrast between the directions that lends the material (and performance) tension and drama. Dissonant harmonies emerge to destabilize and darken the mood, and once again Tower gives attention to other instruments besides flute (e.g., a solo violin in one striking passage) and generates excitement though the use of insistent rhythmic gestures. The Flute Concerto opens with an unaccompanied Wincenc inhabiting the lower register and cultivating mystery as a result. Elsewhere, she occupies a higher realm where the flute's lyrical lines hover above the orchestra and the music suffers no diminishment in its haunting character. Where an echo of Stravinsky surfaces in the piano concerto, the Flute Concerto evokes Debussy ever so slightly in slower passages that exude an impressionistic suggestiveness. That's left behind, however, during animated sections that convey militant urgency and drive.

Scored for solo bassoon and string orchestra and titled after a wood commonly used in the instrument's construction, Red Maple was, in fact, co-commissioned by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project for a 2018 concert in celebration of her eightieth birthday. While the unaccompanied bassoon intro calls to mind the opening of Le Sacre du Printemps, Tower's composition distances itself quickly from Stravinsky's when the strings enter and the piece undertakes its own melodic journey. Similar to her other concertos, the tempo accelerates and the activity level intensifies; never once, however, do the strings overwhelm the bassoon, and the clarity of Morejon's terrific performance is never jeopardized when the contrast in timbres between the two elements is so pronounced. Few are the concertos written for the bassoon, but Tower's pulsing, cadenzas-rich work shows it can be as effective as any other instrument when handed the lead.

January 2024