Pēteris Vasks: Viola Concerto & Symphony No. 1 "Voices"

Approfondimenti

The star of composer Peteris Vasks continues to rise, as audiences are touched by his unique blend of styles. He offers influences from minimalism, but adds traditional forms and a personal subjectivity that sets his music decisively apart from that of Arvo Pärt. This release may be a good place to start with Vasks: it pairs an early work with a recent one, and the performances are gorgeous. The Sinfonietta Riga punches well above its weight here (or perhaps the weight is beginning to be fully appreciated), with flawless string work in the 1991 Symphony No. 1 ("Voices"), which Vasks has said reflected something of the serious atmosphere of Latvia's new beginning, free from Soviet control. Sample the skittering retreat of the strings at the end of the first movement. The Viola Concerto of 2014 also has a sense of individual awakening and surveying a troubled landscape, with a marvelous first movement in which the solo viola slowly differentiates from the surrounding string texture. Violist Maxim Rysanov has both performed this work, of which he is the dedicatee, with other groups and worked extensively with the Sinfonietta Riga, and his control over the slow ebb and flow of this music, and the subtle and varied balances between the viola and the string orchestra, is superb. BIS gets crystalline sound out of St. John's Church in Riga, in one of the few situations in which a church is appropriate for non-sacred music, and the effect of the whole is haunting indeed.

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