Music Moves

The festival’s main contemporary music concert took place last Wednesday evening at the Canadian Museum of Civilization. On the program were well known groups such as the Gryphon Trio and the Penderecki String Quartet, as well as a much publicised collaborative performance between Canadian composer Omar Daniel and violinist Erika Raum.

It was clear from the outset that this concert would be about pushing the boundaries: not just contemporary music, but 21^st century contemporary music. It was also clear that the concert would be Canadian. In fact, of the 19 artists who performed on stage, all were Canadian (it might also be added that they all came from the GTA, but that’s another story). On that front, the artists and organisers deserve our most sincere congratulations. There is nothing more important than encouraging innovation in music, and if it can happen in Canada, all the better!

It is possible, however, that the artists went too far in their creative exploration. Every work that was performed last Wednesday had at least one wonderful element. It could be an interesting choreography, an innovative use of digital playback, or, in the case of the first work, plain old good music. Unfortunately, that single wonderful element was systematically masked by a plethora of entirely useless distractions. The most glaring was the decision to amplify the Gryphon Trio’s performance of “Memory, Distance and no time for Dances” when the hall was small and the music free of any digital sound effects… but there were others. In the much hyped performance of “The Flaying of Marsyas”, for instance, composer Omar Daniel hung by his ankles in a tubular metal cage to control, through a series of cables and wires, the volume and sound effects of the violin performance of Erika Raum. The music was great, once again, but the sight of a half-naked composer hanging upside down in the middle of the stage was not an example of profound symbolism, but a truly unwelcome distraction from an otherwise wonderful violin performance.

It’s better to innovate too much than too little. However, in the future, it would be preferable if the audience left the concert feeling that boundaries had been pushed, not for the sake of pushing, but to create a better work of art.