15 June 2009
Those older historical stops included pianist Jeremy Denk's truly dazzling performance of Charles Ives's Piano Sonata No. 1 (before a run through Bach's Goldberg Variations, a surprisingly compatible concert-mate for the Ives), and the inventively staged cerebral Saturday Night Fever of Arnold Schoenberg's landmark proto-Modernist Pierrot lunaire, circa 1910 - the then-odd chamber format of which laid the foundation for many a current contemporary ensemble, including eighth blackbird.
In the surprise-element corner, we had Friday night's ambitious premiere of Steven Mackey/Rinde Eckert's musical theater piece Slide (reviewed by Charles Donelan on page 78 of this week's print issue). Steve Reich's indisputably great minimalist piece Music for 18 Musicians made its return to Libby Bowl, 30-plus years later, on Sunday morning, and had a latter-day echo in Reich's Pulitzer-winning Double Sextet, premiered by eighth blackbird in 2008.
Another heroic figure-in-focus was Trimpin, the inimitable German-Seattle-ite junk-sound-sculptor/inventor/composer, who supplied sonic works in the park and Tigger-able gadgetry in the Bowl's trees on Sunday night (P.S. watch for the fascinating new documentary Trimpin, The Sound of Invention, which screened at the Ojai Theatre). Another festival scene-stealer was the wondrous USC-employed composer Stephen Hartke, a star of Sunday's marathon, through the vigorous ensemble blackbird-commissioned invention Meanwhile: Incidental Music to Imaginary Puppet Plays and his witty violin duet Oh Them Rats Is Mean in My Kitchen - written in 1985 for former Santa Barbarans Michelle Makarski and Ronald Copes.
2009's Ojai festival should go down as one of the finer and funner programs yet - meaner, leaner, and more audience-friendly while still clinging fiercely to the mandate of keeping the serious music torch burning.
Copyright © 2009 The Santa Barbara Independent
