Unique, world-class music-making
Presented by Elder Conservatorium, University of Adelaide
Reviewed 28 February, 2025
Three extraordinary musicians from Ensemble Musikfabrik (Landesensemble NRW), a Cologne-based group eminent in the area of contemporary music-making, spearheaded an unique event of which the Elder Conservatorium can be justly proud. Supported by the UNESCO Cities of Music initiative, these eminent practitioners spent the last few days in masterclasses and tuition session with conservatorium students, then fronted an adventurous concert of six contemporary chamber music composition, including the Australian premiere performance of “Figure – Ground”, a piece commissioned by Ensemble Musikfabrik from Adelaide composer Georgina Bowden. Two Australians, ‘Cellist David Moran and violist Justin Julian, augmented the European trio.
The trio – Christine Chapman, in a snappy green ensemble and ponytail, plays horn. Tall, bearded, tousle-haired Florentin Ginot plays double bass. In a natty suit, the genial Peter Veale plays oboe. These are understatements. The three musicians have mastered both traditional and extended techniques on their instruments, and are exceptionally capable of the range of demands placed upon them by contemporary composers. The joy of this concert is the ease and facility with which high-end musical capability is demonstrated.
When a commissioned composition is being unveiled in its composer’s hometown, I privately wonder whether it should have been programmed first of the six pieces. I suppose the performers come to it fresh. Unfortunately, the sheer heft and breadth of Bowden’s “Figure – Ground”, as performed by the Ensemble Musikfabrik trio of Chapman, Ginot and Veale, sets a benchmark for the rest of the afternoon’s compositions which is rarely equalled and not surpassed. Beginning with a single rough horn tone and a quietly sustained oboe, the sense of space and massivity is paradoxically heightened by minuscule notes from the double bass. Horn tones edge towards a didgeridoo quality without any sense of pastiche. It sounds right. Ginot indulges in a fascinating sequence, bowing his double bass above his left hand, high on the fingerboard; it yields tiny, near-imperceptible spirit voices. Veale plays the most quietly understated sustained tones I have ever heard from an oboe. Chapman’s horn fibrillates; is she using circular-breathing technique? Then the oboe becomes pure breath-without-tone, whispering excitedly. Notes are deftly passed from one to another. Whilst Bowden’s composition demands a dizzying range of extended techniques in all three instruments, none of the trio appears extended in effort; their cohesive, collaborative style is the perfect vehicle for this music. Bowden explains to us how it feels to be standing on the ground at Uluru. This is why both the spirit and the sonics of her piece spoke eloquently to me.
Juliet Palmer’s 2024 composition, “a blur of lichens”, is a symbiosis crafted by a thoughtful and introspective composer. It contrasts well with the previous piece. Again scored for horn, oboe and double bass, Ensemble Musikfabrik build blurry-edged sounds which overlap each other, resolving into a pure oboe tone, muted horn and plucked bass which lead to percussive oboe interjections.
“Ochred string”, a 2008 Musica Viva-commissioned composition by Lisa Lim, brings David Moran (‘cello) and Justin Julian (viola) to the stage to join two of the trio. Scored for oboe, double bass, ‘cello and viola, the composer acknowledges strong indigenous inspiration and influence, without in any way borrowing elements of indigenous musics. Beginning with a suitably ‘stringy’ viola line (note title), all four instruments shimmer and gleam until a curious double bass and ‘cello duet grows into a tutti march then collapses into one tiny note on the double bass. The rhythmic tone is, by turns, viscous and translucent. With three stringed instruments, the oboe has the astringency of lemon juice, delicately cutting through the stringy buzz.
Recently revised by its Welsh composer, Richard Barrett, “codex IV” requires at least nine performers, so the Musikfabrik trio and Moran are joined on-stage by five fine young musicians (bass trombone, saxophone, violin, flute and marimba) whose names unfortunately do not appear in the programme. Fans of Barrett’s “codex” series will know that the score is more of a list of ingredients than a recipe (much like the Technical in Great British Bake-off). Performance demands utmost awareness of all your fellow musicians, together with a lively imagination and a sense of musical playfulness. This augmented ensemble fulfilled both the spirit and the musical requirements of this interlocutory composition.
“The giving sea”, by Dylan Lardelli, is scored for Ensemble Musikfabrik’s current lineup, and creates the incessant mutability of the world’s oceans with rhythmic bass bowing and intermittent foghorn and muted waa-waa effects from Chapman’s versatile horn. All this is set against faint and impossibly long curves of oboe tone.
Gordon Williamson’s good-natured new “Odd Couple” piece, entitled “The Odd Throuple”, finished the programme, giving the Musikfabrik trio a final outing. Horn and oboe compete, with Ginot’s double bass, sometimes plucked, sometimes bowed, as mediator. Veale lets fly a savage flurry of oboe notes reminiscent of Greek folk music. How will the horn answer that? Seconds intervals chase each other into faint dissonances and quietly extended tones.
We may not leave this concert hall whistling any of the musical motifs we heard, but the immensities of feeling and the virtuosic techniques enabling these diverse sonic impressions will surely stay with many of us fortunate audience.
Reviewed by Pat. H. Wilson
Venue: Madley Rehearsal Studio, University of Adelaide
Season: Ended
Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes
