Search - Toru Takemitsu, Nexus, Pacific Symphony Orchestra :: Toru Takemitsu: From me flows what you call Time; Twill by Twilight; Requiem

Hauntingly beautiful music, but the programming isn't suffic

Christopher Culver | 06/18/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This Sony disc contains three pieces by the late Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu, whose untimely death in 1996 robbed the contemporary music world of one of its most distinctive figures. The first two were written during his late period, while the last is his first great work. Carl St. Clair conducts the Pacific Symphony Orchestra, with the Nexus percussion group (the dedicatee) on the first piece.



"From me flows what you call Time" (1990) for orchestra and five percussionists stands as one of Takemitsu's sure masterpieces. It might be called a concerto for percussion and orchestra, though that suggests some kind of opposition when in reality all elements of instrumentation seamlessly cooperate. The soloists' parts are very fascinating, especially when they play drums, giving a rougher tinge to the work rarely heard in the music of a composer more interested in glittery sounds. Towards the end the piece follows other works of this period ("Archipelago S.", "Ceremonial") in containing a spatial element: the percussionists play bells distantly located in various parts of the auditorium by means of coloured tape. "Twill by Twilight" (1988) was written in memory of Morton Feldman, and the title is both an allusion to Feldman's love of carpets and to Takemitsu's technique of textures that "weave" in and out of the piece, as well as a building up of the large from repetitions of the small as Feldman (in)famously did in his late pieces.



What is particularly amazing about the late Takemitsu is that he uses certain contemporary techniques, yet achieves a highly original effect different from all other composers. The pitches are generated with quasi-serialist techniques, and yet his music does not sound dry or academic, but rather highly transcendental. Timbre is a highly important element, but the result is more natural, suggestive of the outdoors, than the work of the spectralist composers. However, putting any two pieces from Takemitsu's late period together on disc is not ideal, as they are often too close stylistically and tend to dull the listener's senses. While beautiful in themselves, they don't do enough to distinguish themselves from other pieces of the same era.



The last piece is from a very different era, however. "Requiem" for strings (1957) was Takemitsu's first orchestral work and brought him to fame outside Japan when Stravinsky championed him for it. It shows him still under the influence of Messiaen and is a very moving set of incisive string figures, which can often sound quite agressive but nonetheless never break major laws of tonality. Unlike in his late period, characterized by a general evenness of dynamic, Takemitsu was not afraid here of going from the softest touches to major crescendi, although he still had not discovered the importance of timbre.



For those who have never heard Takemitsu's music, as an introduction I'd recommend the QUOTATION OF DREAM disc in Deutsche Grammophon's "20/21" series, which still has the same problem of putting Takemitsu's late works together, but which contains a whole world of interesting discoveries if you can manage to listen to each piece in isolation. Still, if you've come to enjoy the music of this singular voice in 20th century music, this Sony disc is a good find, and it's a budget purchase."