Tubalaté’s
Professional Expertise
Move ASC Recordings CS CD21
This
CD’s well worth looking at, as it’s a rather unusual mixture of items for this
kind of ensemble, all of them performed with professional expertise. It opens
with a skittishly jolly march, Frot, by Simon Kerwin, and this seems designed
to astound us with the group’s facile virtuosity, but it’s basically an
‘oompah’ piece. Don’t be misled by this, however, as there’s nothing more of
this kind in the whole programme. More than half of it indeed is either
‘contemporary’-style or jazz-based.
Howard
Skempton’s succinct Rest and Recreation is self-explanatory except that in the
second part the rhythms are frequently interrupted by deliberate stumblings.
Then Pascal’s Victim by Frederick Naftel is an ingenious suite of some
substance, the thematic material for which is drawn from Gregorian Chant, but I
found this quite up-to-date and convincing æsthetically.
The
most uncompromising of these ‘contemporary’ pieces, however, is undoubtedly
Move by Matthew Davidson. This is best described by the composer himself –
“Before leaving Brighton, I collected together thoughts I had written in a
little book” (and these are spoken at various junctures in the music). He
further explains that “whenever I walked past a pub or car playing loud music,
I would note down the bass-line. This piece…creates an emotional space that
resonates with these fragments of memory”. It is fascinating to try and decode
this strange kaleidoscope and I immediately recognised quotes from Lay that
pistol down and September in the Rain, which again is plainchant influenced and
makes a very soothing ‘night-cap’.
Michael
Forbes writes superb jazz-pastiche and his two arrangements – (1) based on
Primrose’s St. James Infirmary (an early standard) and (2) Just a Closer Walk
are excitingly self-expressive showpieces. I loved the stylishly growing
euphoniums in the first one. There’s also a very accomplished rhythmic and
bluesy set of Negro spiritual arrangements by timothy Moore, and the group are
very much ‘at home’ in this genre.
There
are also two skilfully transcribed classics. Whilst Bach’s Fugue in G minor,
BWV 542 is presented in a questionable up-tempo manner, I found Gasparini’s
Adoramus te Christe most engaging. Then there’s a pleasant folk-song
arrangement, Aija Zuzu (by Latvian composer Plakidis) which exploits the
players’ smooth cantabile skills, and finally a comparatively conventional tuba
quartet, The Basics, written specially by Roy Newsome. I enjoyed the extrovert
fun of the outer movements and found the gently romantic central piece
something I should like to listen to quite often.
Vernon
Briggs (Brass Band World Magazine June 2001)