JAVS Summer 1997

75

T his attractive suite consists of four movements in a conservative twentieth century style making thorough and consis tent use of baroque string techniques. The explanatory preface states that it was original ly written in 1985 for Rivka Golani as an homage to Bach on his 300th birthday. Golani recorded it, but it has been revised for this 1993 edition. The movements have baroque names: "Sinfonia," "Capriccio," "Lamento," and "Giga." They are unified by key relationships, so it could be presented as a four-movement work, or the movements would stand alone, rather like the concert etudes of Palaschko. The rhythmic vocabulary is baroque, using a few meter changes, but with regular pulses. The work is thoroughly tonal, and extreme registers, difficult double-stops, or awkward leaps are avoided. In a word, it's H ere is a work for solo viola firmly entrenched in unmistakable 20th-cen tury idiom. It is utterly atonal (until the last notes of the last movement, which are a somehow-unsettling C-major triad), with an absolutely pulseless slow movement and clev erly syncopated fast ones. If one begins to feel a phrase or melodic idea or a cadence approaching, Mr. Taub does something to be sure that it's stopped. There are four move ments, and the title page shows a duration of about 14 minutes, but that may be on the short side. Dynamic, articulation, and tempo indi cations are copious. Some are ambiguous: above the staff "N." (often followed by a broken line), "S. T." and "S. P." are encoun tered frequently, but there is no legend to explain what these mean. Perhaps parts of the bow, but these are not standard mark ings. Harmonics are indicated simply with a

"playable," some fast metronome indications notwithstanding. There are no bowings or fingerings, and all page-turns except one are well thought out. Following good baroque custom, some pre-existent musical elements are found. The "Capriccio" uses the D-minor two-part invention by Bach in a clever and obvious way, as well as the b-flat, a, c, b-natural signa ture motive Bach used occasionally. The "Lamento," which may be the most successful movement, is based on a theme by Bruchner, as is acknowledged in the preface. All four movements would make the piece just over 15 minutes long. Essentially it is happy in mood, and with much contempo rary music so tortured in spirit, and vastly challenging technically, it might be a pleasant and useful change to indulge in some faux baroque music well written for viola alone.

circle above a pitch, leaving the way the pitch is produced up to the player. At least this appears to be the system used; there is no