Pointing Up Connections of Diverse Composers

Pointing Up Connections of Diverse Composers
 December 12, 2002
By ALLAN KOZINN

Jennifer Koh devoted her violin recital last Thursday evening at the Miller Theater to works by New York composers whose music pushes the limits of their chosen languages. At a glance the range seemed vast: Elliott Carter and Charles Wuorinen occupied one end of the spectrum with John Zorn and Steve Reich at the other, and Ornette Coleman balanced precariously between them. Ms. Koh presented the composers in that order, but instead of highlighting the distinctions between them, she accomplished the more surprising feat of pointing up connections.

She found nostalgia and lyricism, for example, in Mr. Carter's "Rhapsodic Musings" (2000) and "Riconoscenza per Goffredo Petrassi" (1984). And her reading of Mr. Wuorinen's Sonata for Violin and Piano (1998) juggled sweetly turned melodies and playful exchanges between the violin and the piano (played by Reiko Uchida) amid more overtly virtuosic passages. Ms. Koh has the technique to find and project inviting qualities in these thorny pieces without sacrificing the music's sharp harmonic edges and rhythmic complexities.

The complications were somewhat reduced in Mr. Coleman's "Trinity: Fantasy for Solo Violin" (1986), a true fantasy in the sense that it is structurally free yet presents itself as an unfolding discourse. But in highlighting gritty moments that might otherwise have been passing episodes, Ms. Koh connected it both with the Wuorinen and with Mr. Zorn's "Goetia: Incantations for Violin," a world premiere. "Goetia" begins with a wild, violent outburst and becomes only slightly more settled as its opening passages give way to vigorous, fastidiously detailed lines. But Mr. Zorn gave Ms. Koh something more than a demonstration of fast, loud playing. This suite's central movements include a slow, chordal meditation, which creates a mystical atmosphere; a perpetual-motion piece that takes a violinist all over the fingerboard; and a pizzicato movement. But in the end, assertiveness triumphs: the screaming figures of the finale recall the work's opening and seem even more untamed.

Ms. Koh closed her recital with an oldie, Steve Reich's "Violin Phase" (1967), in which a live soloist plays against several taped violin lines. By displacing beats at strategic moments, the live and taped lines move out of phase, creating slowly changing rhythmic patterns. Ms. Koh played the work with an unflagging energy that kept its rhythmic evolution in focus and helped her avoid letting the repeating figuration from becoming soporific.