ACO shows Sufjan Stevens and Co’s links to a different musical world

Indie rock stars Sufjan Stevens, Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood and The National’s Bryce Dessner have all been influenced by Modernist composers, and Richard Tognetti and the ACO show how in their latest tour.

Richard Tognetti and the ACO performing in the Indies & Idols concert at City Recital Hall Angel Place. Picture: Christie Brewster

• Four at the cutting edge
• Oud guru bridges East-West gap
• Classical Marsalis masterclass
• Return of our Emma

The concert, branded Indies & Idols, presents the other side of musicians, away from the guitars, synthesisers and drums, and features their “serious” works alongside those of three Polish composers — Witold Lutoslawski, Krzysztof Penderecki and Karol Szymanowski — who opened new creative doors for them.

Described by ACO artistic administrator Anna Melville as a program “that’s greater than the sum of its parts”, this was a fascinating and unusual journey which, if it looked daunting to some on paper, proved to be a hit with the audience.

The orchestra as always was in immaculate form with that blend of energy, enjoyment and precision that its musicians bring to each performance.

Lutoslawski’s Overture for Strings opened the concert with the composer trying out a new musical language, though still heavily influenced by Bartok and Stravinsky.

TAPPING

Dessner’s work, Response Lutoslawski, receiving its Australian premiere, is a five-movement reaction to the Pole’s orchestral suite Musique Funebre, a tribute to Bela Bartok completed in 1958. Dessner, who studied as a classical guitarist before pursuing his rock music career, says the composer “opened a window … or pushed open a door through which I could then pass”.

The piece starts arrestingly with cello and double bass bows tapping on strings deliberately slightly out of time to create ominous off-kilter feel before violins play a slow folk-based passage with sliding notes and tremolo bowing. The serene Preludio has a Bach-like feel before the pivotal Des Traces starts with shimmering high strings and a pastoral middle section before a folk dance passage, with tapping bows and percussive effects on the sides of the cellos, leads into Warsaw Canon.

Stevens’ mainly upbeat and quirky take on the Chinese horoscope translates enjoyably into a chamber orchestra setting

This is sad and slow music, perhaps in reference to Lutoslawski’s tumultuous life — his parents were executed by the Bolsheviks in 1918 and he himself had to flee Nazi-occupied Warsaw before the 1944 Uprising.

Suite from Run Rabbit Run comprises arrangements for string orchestra by Michael Atkinson of five tracks from Stevens’ 2004 electronica instrumental album Enjoy Your Rabbit, his mainly upbeat and quirky take on the Chinese horoscope which translated enjoyably into a chamber orchestra setting.

The second half was perhaps a little more confronting with Penderecki’s String Quartet — used to spine-tingling effect as the soundtrack to the horror flick The Exorcist — still sounding new and shocking 46 years later with its extraordinary percussive, plucking and slapping effects.

His music had an enormous influence on Radiohead’s Greenwood, whose Suite from There Will Be Blood followed. Written for Paul Thomas Anderson’s 2007 film about greedy oil barons, the five episodes of the suite make use of Penderecki’s scattered sound scape combined with a quite beautiful, serene central movement depicting the character of the antihero’s child.

Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood and ACO artistic director Richard Tognetti.

The orchestra was divided into four ranks facing the audience with the lower strings at the front. This, combined with Tognetti’s precise and sometimes balletic conducting gestures made for a striking theatrical effect.

The concert finished with Tognetti’s arrangement of Szymanowski’s String Quartet No. 2, which the ACO leader describes as one of his favourite pieces.

As a bonus Satu Vanska discarded her Strad and stepped up to the microphone to sing How To Disappear Completely from Radiohead’s Kid A album.

The concert is repeated at City Recital Hall Angel Place at 7pm on Wednesday, June 26; Friday, June 28, at 1.30pm, and Saturday, June 29, at 7pm.

DETAILS

● CONCERT Indies & Idols: Australian Chamber Orchestra

● WHERE City Recital Hall Angel Place

● WHEN Tuesday, June 25