Armenian News Network / Groong November 25, 2012 Enterrtainment Wire By Sahan Arzruni NEW YORK, NEW YORK Joel Sachs, the indefatigable champion of contemporary music, presented a concert on November 9, 2012, at New York's Lincoln Center showcasing Music of Latin America. The performance was part of Carnegie Hall's Voices from Latin America festival and featured the New Juilliard Ensemble. Sergio Kafejian, one of the six composers highlighted, was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, to Armenian parents. His Sabre Paranambucae, composed in 2010 for chamber ensemble received its U.S. premiere at Alice Tully Hall. Consisting of two sections, the composition gives voice to a primeval approach to music: its bold dissonances providing a backdrop of nature sounds and Brazilian folk music with recorded bits of `frog lagoons, typical Brazilian music brass ensemble rehearsals, crickets on a lagoon border,' and the sound of rabeca (a kind of Brazilian fiddle) peppering the performance. The striking brief work would be well described as a deconstruction of musique concrete. The program also included works by Cuban composer and conductor Guido Lopez-Gavilan. The rather diffused Sonotropic presented `a changing variety of expressive contrasts and a grand rhythmic richness,' according to the composer's liner notes. Mexican Hilda Paredes's Demente Cuerdo, for solo harp, was described as `a journey of discoveries, which led me to make choices for the instruments used in this piece.' As with Sonotropic, this first audition of Demente Cuerdo lacked cogency for me, but I was impressed by the suave harp soloist, Caroline Bembia. Argentine composer Alejandro Iglesias Rossi's Ritual concluded the first half of the program. Soprano Lara Second-Haid deftly handled its otherworldly vocal line. The middle section of Ritual - based on the music of the indigenous Incas, and full of verve, aplomb, and assurance - was simply exhilarating. The concert ended with works by Hebert Vazquez and Paul Desenne. Mr. Vazques's work was perhaps the most successful of the evening, unfolding like a balletic score. Paul Desenne, the best-known Venezuelan composer in the U.S., was presented through his well-crafted Sinfonia. As founder and director of New Juilliard Ensemble, Joel Sachs has done another invaluable service to the city, introducing new music to New Yorkers and offering young composers a golden opportunity in this cultural capital of the world. -- Master pianist Sahan Arzruni enjoys an international career, and is also known as a composer, ethnomusicologist, producer, teacher, lecturer, writer, recording artist and broadcasting personality.
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