Search - John [Classical] Alden Carpenter, Paul Posnak :: John Alden Carpenter: Sonata for Violin and Piano; String quartet; Piano Quintet

Carpenter in a serious mood

J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 12/09/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"John Alden Carpenter, a direct descendant of Pilgrim Father John 'Speak for yourself, John' Alden, was, like Charles Ives, a businessman all his adult life; he composed in his free time. He grew up in a musical household; his mother, a singer who had studied in Europe with Mathilde Marchesi, was his first teacher. In his teens he studied piano with Liszt student Amy Fay, whose reminiscences of music in late 19th-century Europe still make fascinating reading. And at Harvard he studied with John Knowles Paine. To the extent he is known to music-lovers, it is for his three jazz-tinged and impressionistic orchestra suites 'Krazy Kat', 'Adventures in a Perambulator' and 'Skyscrapers', the latter a paean to his native Chicago. But he also wrote non-programmatic music for smaller forces, and this CD contains three such pieces, one written before his encounter with jazz, and two written after he had given up including popular-music influences in his writing. The 1911 Sonata for Violin and Piano was given its première by none other than Mischa Elman. It is a lyrical effort whose craft is neat and whose tunes are occasionally memorable; one can hear some Gallic influence in the harmonies, but overall the piece is late Romantic. The performance here by Romanian violinist Sergiu Schwartz and American pianist Paul Posnak is broad-shouldered, assured, and makes a good case for this rarely-performed piece. The String Quartet from 1927, played convincingly here by the Vega Quartet, four young mainland Chinese players who have been together since about 1990. The language is more advanced than that of the violin sonata and reminds this listener at times of the kind of thing Frank Bridge was writing at about the same time--adventuresome harmonically, highly chromatic but with impressionistic washes, and occasionally astringent. The slow movement, with its mysterious beginning opening out into an impassioned flow of melody, is particularly memorable. The playfully galumphing third and last movement uses, to humorous effect, some of the string techniques pioneered by Bartók all in a mock-Eastern European harmonic milieu. Was he making fun of Bartók, or an homage? I don't know. In any event the sardonic tone suddenly disappears with the appearance of a meltingly luscious tune for cello, soon extended on the violin, which then leads us back to the humorous opening and a precipitous ending as if to say, 'Quick, pack your instruments or we'll miss the last bus home.'The Piano Quintet (1937) is a 25-minute piece whose somewhat self-consciously serious beginning, portentously announced by low octaves from the piano, leads one to believe that Carpenter has left his earlier love affair with impressionism behind, but later in the second movement we encounter luscious whole-tone harmonies followed in the third movement by folksy dance syncopations that bring the whole thing to a toe-tapping finish. Brahms knew a thing or two about ending pieces with energetic dance music--think of, say, the last movement of the g minor piano quartet--and Carpenter couldn't pick a better model to follow. Pianist Posnak joins the Vega for this terrific performance.Once again, hats off to Naxos for unearthing and recording rarely heard American music, this time from that period before World War II that has so much music that is barely remembered but which bears airings such as this."

Wonderful Discovery

David Saemann | 12/20/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"John Alden Carpenter is an important figure whose music became somewhat lost after World War II. What we have here is a collection of beautifully wrought chamber music, that I've found grows in stature each time I've heard it. The main influence, especially in the Violin Sonata, seems to be Faure. Passages are beautifully wrought, and there is never an extreme or desperate gesture. Also, the compositions are beautifully structured--with textures that demand exceptional scrutiny and dedicated listening. The performers are no slouches. Sergiu Schwartz recorded an excellent Sibelius Concerto for Vox, and Paul Posnak did a pretty good Chopin recital for The Special Music Company. This is a very rewarding disc."