Howard Sandroff: Tephillah; Pierre Boulez: Dialogue de l'ombre double; Rami Levin: A New Leaf.(Review)

Compact disc, 1997, Koch International Classics 3-7088-2 H1; available from Koch International, 2 Tri-Harbor Court, Port Washington, New York 11050, USA; telephone (516) 484-1000; electronic mail kochna@kochint.com; World Wide Web www.kochint.com

Compact disc, 1999, Virgin Classics CDC 7243 5 45351 2 3; available from Virgin Classics, 304 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10010, USA; World Wide Web www.virginclassics.com

It is a welcome luxury to find more than one recording of a piece by a contemporary composer, particularly one involving computers or signal processing. Howard Sandroff, of the University of Chicago, has had the good fortune of seeing his work for clarinet and live signal processing, Tephillah, performed and recording by two top-notch players and released on two major record labels.

Tephillah consists of three connected movements, "an abstraction of the seemingly disordered and spontaneous manner in which a service is conducted by Orthodox Jewish men of the Ashkenazic tradition." The signal processing of the clarinet involves MIDI-controlled delay, reverberation, and mixing, aiming to create an extension of the live instrument rather than to engage in a dialogue (in obvious contrast to the Dialogue de l'ombre double by Pierre Boulez, included on the Koch disc). The piece was written in 1990 for John Bruce Yeh, clarinetist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Having collaborated on developing an alternative signal-processing system for the piece by Mr. Boulez (otherwise presentable only by means of IRCAM-exclusive technology), the composer-performer duo decided to work toward a full concert of works using the same gear. Along with Tephillah, the work by Rami Levin, A New Leaf (1990), for basset clarinet and four pre-recorded clarinets, was intended to fit into the program, even though its electronics are much less ambitious.

Mr. Sandroff has created a focused, lyrical work, in which the clarinet is tastefully supported and extended by the electronics. The additional sonorities are only occasionally elaborate, most often sustaining held notes, echoing, or undergoing various forms of delay. There is, nonetheless, a general tendency over the course of the piece toward greater complexity and involvement of the signal processing. This organizing factor may reflect the "disordered" element the composer took as inspiration, the gathering intensity of the Ashkenazic men in their worship. In all other respects, the music is strongly directional and coherent. Of the two performances, that of Mr. Yeh is slightly more expansive, but the signal-processing ...