RICHARD DOVE is carried away by music

On my first listen to Kenneth Hesketh’s Hände Music for Piano (Paladino Music) I could not get the image of a river out of my mind. Not just any river, but the River Dove as it winds through Dovedale in Derbyshire. There are fast flowing torrents, shallow rapids, gently flowing over rocks and around stepping-stones. On consulting the excellent sleeve notes, I see that Hesketh has composed Uncoiling the River. Clearly, flowing water is an influence on his compositional style. It rumbles, splashes, ebbs and flows. The pieces are performed by Hesketh’s friend and collaborator, Clare Hammond. There is both virtuosity and empathy evident in the playing, with subtle use of pedals and piano strings to add to the palette of sounds.

I listened with my study windows open, and birdsong floated into the pauses sand silences. Chorales and Kolam is a particular highlight with composer and performer seemingly merged in harmonic unison.

“Both Hesketh and I share a certain frenetic mental energy,” says Hammond. Quite so, but there are profound contemplations amidst the frenzy. Hesketh and Hammond are a formidable pairing. A symbiotic, sonic experience.

In contrast to the fast flows and gentle streams is Vibrant Rhythms, with Bolivian pianist Jose Navarro-Silberstein demonstrating the full range of South American rhymes and rhythms. Argentinian composer Alberto Ginastera’s Suite de Danzas Criollas sets us on a South American journey making extravagant use of zamba, chacarera and malambo folk dances alongside Bartok and Stravinsky. An exciting mix of cultures and styles.  The playing is assured without being flamboyant.

We travel across regions of Brazil in Heitor Villa-Lobos’ Cicolo brasileiro. If one can imagine Debussy playing a samba you get the sense of this particular sonic landscape. Tiny rhythms seem to dance in the sultry air in these virtuosic movements.

The real highlight for me is the interpretations of fellow Bolivian composer Marvin Sandi, where folk tunes meet polytonality. These four short pieces seem to belong to a sound world of their own. Sandi gave up music for philosophy eventually. On the evidence of these pieces he really could have combined both disciplines to great and lasting effect.

The CD closes with the precise waltzes of Robert Schumann, where wild and impulsive pieces give way to dreamy singing. There is a balletic tonality which encouraged me to go en pointe in my well-worn slippers.

The Devil’s Dream is a new release on the Metier label by Irish composer Sean Doherty. It is an outstanding work exploring Donegal fiddle traditions where “the tunes are as stark as the bogland and the bowing as jagged as the cliffs,” according to the accompanying notes. This is vast, swirling music for a dense and dowdy landscape – the music of quiet resistance and brutal victory. Somehow there is both defiance and acceptance. It is both uncomfortable and deeply inspiring. Do yourself a favour and spend an hour immersed in this stunning performance by the Sonoro Quartet and the wonderful soprano, Dr. Sylvia O’Brien.  

Kenneth Hesketh, Hände – Music for Piano, Clare Hammond, Paladino Music, PMR0137

Vibrant Rhythms, Works by Ginastera, Villa-Lobos, Sandi and Schumann, Jose Navaroo-Silberstein, Genuin, GEN23845

The Devil’s Dream, Chamber music by Sean Doherty, Sonoro Quartet, Metier, Mex 77135