SFJAZZ presents Sō Percussion
2015-02-03
Miner Auditorium
SFJAZZ Center, 205 Franklin St, San Francisco, CA
7:30 PM, Tuesday, February 3, 2015
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[7:30 PM lights down]
[8:39 PM lights down]
Speed across town from the marina to score a VIP parking spot in front of SFJAZZ (oh yeah!), then hustle over to Beer Hall for a quick pint of Anderson Valley Wild Turkey Bourbon Barrel Stout while waiting for Ting. Yum! Might have between a good idea to let it warm a little before guzzling it down, but time was running short before the show and we needed to squeeze in dinner somewhen, so guzzled it was. Yummy nonetheless! Thought we had enough time for a bite at Souvla, but the place was packed with a deep line out the door, so it was some non-burgers at Flippers instead: a pollo wrap for me and a Mexican omelette with extra jalapenos for Ting. Got served with just enough time to snarfle like ravenous beasts and then race walk back to SFJAZZ. Another minute or two to get tix reprinted and then we were in like Flynn, sitting next to the soundboard like usual.
So the lights go down, and instead of Randall or another emcee, the four members of Sō Percussion walk out, line up at the front of the stage, and begin playing Steve Reich's Music for Pieces of Wood without a word. Fun! Music for Pieces of Wood is simple enough that I think I should be able to follow along and distinguish all five parts, but somehow my eyes/ears always trip me up. Makes me think I should find a score or piece of analysis to help me understand it better. Trying to get a better handle on the complexity generated by the simple components of Music for Pieces of Wood, I found an interesting video on YouTube that attempts to show how the five parts interlock, but the mostly static display is slightly unsatisfying, since there's no indication to show where the beat is at any given moment. Moreover, it also does nothing to help me figure out how Sō Percussion manages to perform the piece with only four performers, since I don't see an easy way to parcel the fifth part out to the others. For now, I'm still flummoxed!
Following Music for Pieces of Wood, Jason took the microphone to back announce the opening work and to talk a bit about the program for the rest of the night. Interesting, but a poor substitute for written program notes.
The second work, Bryce Dessner's Music for Wood and Strings, was a 30 min long exploration of the aural possibilities of the Chordstick, a newly invented instrument commissioned from Aron Sanchez of Buke and Gaze. Described as a double necked hybrid of a dulcimer and a guitar, it was interesting to watch Sō Percussion run the instruments through the wringer over that half hour span. To me, much of the piece sounded like Michael Hedges' seminal explorations on acoustic guitar, such his 1984 release, Aerial Boundaries and it's 1986 follow-up, Breakfast in the Field. When the soundscape transitioned late in the piece to slide guitar-like glisses, the reference memory that immediately popped up in my head was John Fahey's Railroad, followed quickly by Bill Jackson's Long Steel Rail. Good stuff, but sure, that's just my synapses putting patterns on top of the new vistas revealed by listening to Dessner's piece.
You can listen to a recording of Sō Percussion performing Music for Wood and Strings from 2013 thanks to WQXR (If you like it, why not send 'em a few bucks; public radio doesn't exist without public support!). WQXR also offers a recording of Sō Percussion collaborating with Buke and Gaze in a few works from the same program as the Music for Wood and Strings recording. Not interested in the whole thing, but want to see a snippet on video? Adam Sliwinski posted a short HD video of the group in practice for this piece. The video gives a better look at the Chordsticks than I could make out from my seat by the soundboard … sometimes it's better to sit up close – but the quick cuts make it hard to see too much detail; thank god for the pause button! You can also find plenty of static shots of the Chordsticks on Aron's website, Polyphonicworkshop.
Following the break, we all reconvened for a performance of Steven Mackey's percussion extravaganza It Is Time. This sprawling work, written expressly for Sō Percussion, covered lots of ground, featuring both traditional and found percussion instruments. Although the players moved around, sometimes following an intricate choreography, that component of the performance seemed somewhat of a background visual aspect, much like the video montage that was projected on the screen above the band. Both served as nice distractions, but the action of the playing of the piece was generally more compelling to me.
If you'd like to hear and see It Is Time for yourself, the videographer, Mark DeChiazza, has posted a full length video from the world premiere performance on Vimeo. If you'd like to own it, Cantaloupe released a spectacular (and reasonably priced!) CD+DVD package of Sō Percussion performing Steven Mackey's It Is Time in 2011. I believe that the DVD gives much the same video presentation as was shared with us at Miner Auditorium, but I can't say whether or not it duplicates the Vimeo stream.
Overall, I enjoyed this work, but in the end, I don't feel like it amounted to much more than time spent listening to random percussion sounds: there didn't seem to be any sort of unifying aural element that grabbed me and sustained my attention. It's not that I didn't enjoy it, but like a piece of sponge cake or some other fluffy dessert, I'd classify it as a trifle to be enjoyed in the moment, and not a lot more.
Following a brief break for applause and bows, the quartet returned to the stage for an unintroduced encore of Clapping Music. As with the opener, I'm not sure how they've reworked the piece to fit a quartet: I'm pretty sure that they dodged the obvious solution of doubling the two original parts, but without any commentary (live or written), I'm at a loss to know anything better. Gerubach has posted a really cool visualization of the score on YouTube that nicely illustrates the time-shifting that makes Clapping Music so awesome. Cool beans!
Giacomo Fiore posted a fine review of the show at SFCV.
Back to the previous event! ☸ Up to the 2015 yearbox! ☸ Up to the 2015 event list! ☸ On to the next event!