Musical movement of time and reminiscence

Music / “Time Is A River”, Omega Ensemble. At Ainslie Arts Centre, March 4. Reviewed by LEN POWER.

DESCRIBED as a stressed movement of time and reminiscence, “Time Is A River” was the Omega Ensemble’s live performance of 4 works wherein 4 composers take care of private recollections.

The Sydney ensemble consists of David Rowden, clarinet, Peter Clark, violin, Neil Thompson, viola, Paul Stender, cello and Vatche Jambazian, piano. Jessica Oddie was a further visitor violinist for this live performance.

“Mozart Adagio” by Finland’s Arvo Pärt was composed in 1992. It was written in reminiscence of Oleg Kagan, a number one Russian violinist and pal of Pärt, whose sudden demise affected the composer vastly. “Mozart Adagio” is neither an association nor a collage. Fragments of Mozart’s Piano Sonata in F Main are balanced with Pärt’s idiomatic “Tintinnabuli” model. The ensuing work is sombre and reflective and was performed with nice feeling by cello, piano and clarinet, creating the temper for the remainder of this live performance.

The well-known “Demise and the Maiden”, String Quartet No. 14 in D minor of Franz Schubert, was subsequent. Composed in 1824 in a interval of great sickness that might finally lead to his early demise, Schubert primarily based his work on a 1774 poem about demise by Matthias Claudius. The complete ensemble gave this work an excellent efficiency with notably delicate enjoying of the second motion.

The ensemble has a mission to champion new Australian work and commissioned the following work of the live performance by composer, jazz saxophonist and Yuin girl, Brenda Gifford. “Ancestors” is a name to ancestors and nation, remembering all of these folks from the previous and their hyperlink to nation. It’s a vibrant, memory-laden work of nice magnificence the place folks and nation are enchantingly intertwined. It was performed with a transferring delicacy by the entire ensemble. Gifford attended the live performance and took a well-deserved bow with the gamers.

The ultimate work, “Time Is A River”, a 2010 work by Australia’s Graeme Koehne, was composed in reminiscence of his mom. Carried out in a brand new association for the Omega Ensemble, it was a piece stuffed with nostalgia and heat in addition to ardour and calm. The Ensemble introduced out the sense of loss and nostalgia on this work so clearly, bringing this memorable live performance to a detailed.