- Avner Dorman
Spices, Perfumes, Toxins! (for two percussion and orchestra) (2006)
- G Schirmer Inc (World)
- 3(afl,pic,bfl)3.3(Ebcl,bcl)3(cbn)/4.3.2+btbn.1/timp.perc/hp.pf/str
- 2perc
- 27 min
Programme Note
Composer note
The title Spices, Perfumes, Toxins! refers to three substances that are extremely appealing, yet filled with danger. Spices delight the palate, but can cause illness; perfumes seduce, but can also betray; toxins bring ecstasy, but are deadly. The concerto combines Middle-Eastern drums, orchestral percussion, and rock drums with orchestral forces – a unique sound both enticing and dangerous.
Spices, Perfumes, Toxins! is a result of years of collaboration with PercaDu. While we were still students at the Rubin Academy of Music in Tel-Aviv, Tomer and Adi asked me to write a piece for them. All three of us aimed at a piece that would be markedly Israeli and would reflect young Israeli culture. The process of composing the piece involved working closely with PercaDu on my ideas and testing them on the instruments long before the piece was done. In hindsight, I believe that the most important choice in making the piece sound Israeli was the use of four Darbukas and Tom-Toms in addition to the Marimbas. The piece, Udacrep Akubrad (PercaDu Darbuka spelled backwards) became one of PercaDu’s signature pieces and my most performed composition and is the basis for the first movement of the concerto.
Spices - the first movement draws its inspiration from the music of our region (extending its boundaries to the east as far as the Indian sub-continent). The piece is largely based on Middle-Eastern and Indian scales and uses the Indian system of Talas for rhythmic organization. I use these elements within a large-scale dramatic form and employ repetitive minimalism as it appears in the music traditions of the East and in the works of Western minimalists of the past forty years. Approximately at the movement’s golden section there is a cadenza that precurses the last movement of the concerto.
In Perfumes, the sonic world changes as one of the percussionists leaves the marimba and plays on a vibraphone. In Perfumes I use what I call multicultural polyphony. The opening theme of the movement (in the marimba) is reminiscent of Baroque arias. The three flutes that accompany the melody (regular, alto, and bass) echo the ornamental nature of the melody and transform it into lines characteristic of Middle-Eastern folk music. At the same time, the bass line borrows its sound from the world of Jazz. Each part of the texture contributes the “soul” of its genre, so to speak, in an effort to create a humanistic whole that express the diversity of our time and culture. As the movement progresses the soloists and orchestra embark on a colorful journey from the seductive to the dangerous.
In Toxins! the soloists use the entire variety of percussion instruments at their disposal. The movement is based on alternation between an aggressive rhythmic pattern (played on drumsets) and passionate outbursts in the orchestra. It swings like a pendulum between extreme joyous ecstasy and obsessive anxiety, pain, and delusions. As the movement develops, the music becomes increasingly fanatical until the final outburst of catharsis and death.
— Avner Dorman
Solo batteries
1
Marimba, Vibraphone, 2 Darbuka (hi and low), Tom-tom, Drum Set, Medium Tamtam, Wind Chimes,
Drum set extras consists of:
10" Tom
8" Splash
10" Splash
Metal strip
Metal crasher
Arabic tambourine
2
Marimba, Glockenspiel, 2 Darbuka (hi and low), Tom-tom, Drum Set
Drum set extras consists of:
16" Floor Tom
10" Splash
Crash cymbal
Metal Strip
Taiko drum (or unison floor and bass)
Cowbell
Bongos
Media
Scores
Reviews
Symphony Silicon Valley's program was the second in a row in which the orchestra has explored exciting new repertory. Last month, it was jazz master Paquito D'Rivera's "Cape Cod Concerto" for clarinet, piano and orchestra, featuring charismatic soloists Jon Manasse and Jon Nakamatsu. With Lemmon and Hearn, "Spices" set loose another pair of outrageously loosey-goosey virtuosos, racing between their percussion stations, setting up liquid ostinato riffs, practically infusing the theater with perfumed wafts of colorized sound.
Dorman's piece -- which spans faux belly-dance tunes, In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida rock-outs and Spanish-tinged Miles Davis jazz -- was performed by these same two soloists in 2009 at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music in Santa Cruz, with Marin Alsop conducting the festival orchestra. So Lemmon and Hearn know the territory, as does Carolyn Kuan, this weekend's guest conductor, who is Alsop's associate at Cabrillo.
Throughout the 30-minute piece, but
especially in its first movement, the 75 members of the orchestra hit rough patches; they sounded stiff, not at home with Dorman's idiomatic grooves, and, here and there, just mixed up. But Lemmon and Hearn were so fluid and focused, so inside the material, that -- like jazz horn players expertly pulling a hesitant rhythm section into their orbit -- they led their colleagues by example into the guts and romance of the piece.
The best moments of "Spices: Allegro," the opening movement, found Lemmon and Hearn wafting the exotic marimba riffs that underpin and thread through the score.
They floated through Dorman's adaptations of East Indian rhythmic cycles, sometimes playing with a pair of mallets in each hand, and sometimes finger-drumming the wooden bars. At times the strings rose like smoke behind the soloists, or escalated the main melodic theme to a near-cacophony, like a snake-dancing version of the Beatles' "A Day in the Life." During the big crescendo, the soloists thunder-drummed on their trap drum kits, evoking memories of -- dare we mention that scorned band of yore? -- Iron Butterfly.
"Perfumes: Adagio," the slow second movement, was dangerously beautiful. I don't know if Dorman is a Miles Davis fan, but the combination of low flutes and the casually elegant romance of Hearn's marimba melodies carried echoes of Davis' "Sketches of Spain," arranged by Gil Evans. Lemmon switched to vibes here, setting more colors and scents drifting through the theater. And when Hearns quietly whistled along with a nostalgic theme, the music tumbled into a timeless place -- and conjured Davis' "Little Church," from the early '70s.
By the time "Toxins: Presto energico," the finale, reached its boiling pinnacle of screeching "Psycho" strings, crashing cymbals and valiant brass -- all coloring a variant on that snake-dancing theme from the first movement -- the audience was ready to jump out of its seats.
Dorman's work, following the traditional concerto's fast-slow-fast form, sings with seductive grace between the two infectiously rapid-pulsed segments. This composer made full use of the two soloists -- ingeniously intertwining and overlapping their parts to augment the capabilities of their array of pitched and non-pitched instruments.
There was a sense of living on the edge in the outer movements of the concerto, played with impressive energy by the virtuosic PercaDu musicians.
The first movement, “Spices,” is based on Middle Eastern and Indian scales that are played on two marimbas, interwoven with excerpts of boisterous rock drumming and jazzy interludes. “Perfumes,” the sensual second movement, opened with an evocative theme on the marimba, first accompanied by three flutes and reminiscent of the slow movement of Rodrigo’s “Concierto de Aranjuez.” In the rhythmically exuberant finale, “Toxins,” PercaDu’s drumming alternated with colorful orchestral outbursts. An enigmatic interlude with piano and marimba both played in the upper register preceded the jazz-hued conclusion. At times the entire orchestra played second fiddle, overshadowed by the fiery percussion.
The performance was rewarded with a boisterous ovation.
Discography
Spices, Perfumes, Toxins!
- LabelARS Produktion
- Catalogue NumberARS 38 234
- ConductorMarkus Huber
- EnsembleNordwestdeutsche Philharmonie
- SoloistAron Leijendeckers and Daniel Townsend, percussion
- Released1st October 2017
Live Recordings 1963-2006
- LabelHelicon Classics
- Catalogue Number029625
- ConductorZubin Mehta
- EnsembleIsrael Philharmonic Orchestra
- SoloistPercaDu
- Released8th February 2011