Search - Bruno Maderna, Ex Novo Ensemble, Aldo Orvieto :: Chamber Music

Wonderfully profound readings of a remembered master

scarecrow | Chicago, Illinois United States | 08/01/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The Ex Novo Ensemble is from Venice,where Maderna was born and lived.So they unquestionably bring a deep sensitivity to his music, knowing whenever a creative agenda had changed or remained static in his eventful life. Maderna had died surprisingly in the mid-Seventies, a shock to most who knew him,leaving a wife and three daughters, a man who had lived life to the fullest, and love was brought and nurtured in his music.You may recall Boulez's "Rituel",a colorful,yet dirge-like work in remembrance of Maderna. Maderna was not prolific,yet his profound works all touched some problematic aspect of contemporary expression.Even his corrosive last work "Satyricon", an opera buffa on the transgressivness of the post-modern world was a necessary statement.He had an early fascination, as most of his generation, with Webern. (Prior to this he was hired to editing the pre-classic composers as Monteverdi) but subsequently with his friends at Darmstadt,(Berio,Nono,Stockhausen) where he learned conducting, he had premiered countless contemporary works, and continued a brilliant career as conductor until his death. This CD has a wonderful agenda, the works selected here reveal Maderna's penchant for the experimental, yet deeply focused on the lyrical,the directedness of the voice as a metaphorical means toward writing purely instrumental music. His linear materials,"sempre legato"and melodic writing kept this anxiety-ridden voice throughout his life, post-Webern lines yet with a more impassioned demeanor,quite directly expressive.He never found sustenance in avant-garde fashion as the import of popular or world music forms.The "Quartet" here is a primary work also "Widmung" or (dedication) with more modest dimensions here for violin solo is one example of this, with passages remaining in uncomfortable positions brutal attacks,and nasal thin harmonics.Throughout his life he dedicated pratically everything he wrote to a friend, a virtuoso,and the incredible oboist, English hornist Lothar Faber was a beneficiary of this oeurve with numerous "Concertos for Oboe",and the "Aulodia per Lothar" here reveals this deep sense of friendhip with brooding impassioned lyricism. "Dialodia" was well,is a duet,of modest aims. Frequently Maderna's work has a sketch-like quality,where he wrote without any particular instrument in mind, or desired to retread leftover sketches from another work. Many of these pieces resemble this workshop demeanor.Maderna's relation to the post-war avant-garde is seen in his fascination with notational experiments, with indeterminate means or aleatoric renderings through graphics,or where the conductor directs the entrances and exits of the ensemble,sometimes encompassing the large forces of an orchestra as his "Quadrivium", a Chicago Symphony commission.Maderna never developed a graphic hand however as Sylvano Bussoti,Cardew or Cage, so his graphic incidents displayed here are fairly one-dimensional and functional. The "serenata per satelite", is a playful excursion,two graphic pages, implying an ensemble of your own choosing. I've heard some incredible readings from this work. It is always much more musically focused as the Ex Novo imparts here. They remain fairly close to Maderna's written controlled music. The director Claudio Ambrosini, a wonderful playful composer in his own right directs this music beautifully."