How Many Miles to Babylon?: Pavilion, Dún Laoghaire. Derek Chapman's new adaptation of Jennifer Johnston's novel is a faithful and sensitive affair that, like its source, eschews overt drama in favour of an introspective study of its characters.
This gives the work a muted effect, not without some penetration and interest, but lacking in theatrical excitement. The background of Anglo-Irish gentry and family life, moving into the first World War and its barbarity, also seems remote; a foreign country where they did things differently.
The pre-war half is set on the Wicklow estate of the Moore family, introducing us to a cold, dowager mother, an ageing father and young Alex.
He is growing up devoid of any experience of life, and makes friends with stable-boy Jeremiah who knows a bit more. His parents, when they learn of the relationship, disapprove of it on grounds of class. War breaks out, and his mother, for complex reasons, wants Alex to join up. He enlists, and so does Jerry.
The second half sees them in the British army, Alex an officer and Jerry a private. Here again authority disapproves of their friendship, inappropriate from a military perspective. The cold, professional Major Glendinning determines to suppress it, and tyrannises them both. When Jerry is refused compassionate leave he goes missing and, when he turns up, is sentenced to death. Alex is appointed to command the firing squad, which leads to tragedy for them both.
Despite the ambience of war and its inhumanity, the focus remains intimately on the characters and their thoughts. Attempts to create a couple of surreal set-pieces in which past and present overlap do not work effectively. The whole moves evenly forward to a dying fall, an understated ending.
There are few highlights in the acting, because the dramatic material is simply not there. The strongest role is that of Glendinning with his controlled ruthlessness, well taken by Andrew Lummis. Anthony Mannion is a convincing Alex, always learning after the event, and Seamus Quinn's Jerry is a born victim robbed of life.
Jason Gilroy is a likeable fellow officer; Kevin Flood and Gay Murphy are authoritative as the parents and Patrick Brennan is a credible sergeant.
Not every novel makes a play. This is a worthy attempt, but no cigar.
• Ends tomorrow
By Gerry Colgan
Lynda Lee, Alison Browner, Robin Tritschler, Nigel Williams OCC/Geoffrey Spratt
St Ann's Church, Dublin
Cantatas 42, 158, 145, 85 ..................... J.S. Bach
The fifth in the Bach Cantatas series was conducted by Geoffrey Spratt and the Orchestra of St Cecilia played with great liveliness, and feeling.
Particularly memorable was the alto aria in 42 where the wind trio (two oboes and bassoon) was contrasted with the body of strings, but each of the Cantatas had wonderful moments. In 158 the aria for bass, over which the soprano sang a chorale melody, was accompanied only by violin and continuo, but what a violin part. It had the exuberance of a virtuoso improvisation and blended exquisitely with the singers; in 145 the violin had a similar role, this time accompanying tenor and soprano.
In 85 the two oboes accompany a soprano chorale in a ravishing setting of Der Herr ist mein Getreuer Hirt (The Lord is my True Shepherd) backed by continuo (Gillian Smith, organ and Niall O'Loughlin, cello). The combination was beautifully realised.
The chorales for choir were on this occasion sung by the soloists, one voice to a part, which gave a feeling of intimacy, but could not provide the sense of congregational fervour that can come from a choir with several voices to a part. Bach's own preference in this matter is still a subject of debate and likely to remain so.
By Douglas Sealy
François-Frédéric Guy
Millennium Forum, Derry
Sonata in A flat Op 26 .......................Beethoven
Sonata in C Op 53 Waldstein ............ Beethoven Sonata in B flat Op 106 Hammerklavier ............. .....................Beethoven
The opening of the Millennium Forum has provided, among other things, an important new venue for Derry's Classical Music Society. The main auditorium's moveable ceiling can convert the hall from a medium-sized space suitable for chamber orchestras to a 376-seater recital room, well suited to the intimate quality of François-Frédéric Guy's piano playing.
From the first note to the last, Guy coaxed a beautiful sound from a less than ideal instrument, with pearly, even fingering and subtle gradations in tone. In the opening A flat sonata one would ideally have liked more projection of dynamic contrasts, which are all the more important for not being especially marked.
There was greater awareness of contrast and a deeper involvement with the music in an account of the slow middle movement of the Waldstein which was almost self-consciously searching, and in a virtuoso, but never merely virtuosic, finale.
The most rewarding performance was, however, of the Hammerklavier, replacing the advertised Liszt Sonata in B minor. Guy set a fresh, challenging tempo for the opening movement but still found room to shape every phrase, and caught the scherzo's mercurial changes of mood without exaggeration.
In the slow movement the music always knew where it was going, the natural flow of the phrases being underpinned by a firm grasp of the structure. The unearthly stillness of the final page of the Adagio and the expectant quality of the opening of the finale were captured memorably and Guy clarified every strand of the notorious concluding fugue.
By Dermot Gault
Susan Doyle (flutes), Benjamin Dwyer (guitar)
Bank of Ireland Arts Centre,
Dublin
Romanian Dances .................................... Bartók Epilogue ................................... Raymond Deane
The Voice of the Devil ................ Ramon Humet
Histoire du Tango ................................. Piazzolla
for guitar and flute duos has come a long way since a light-and-frothy heyday in the late 18th century. Two works in the Bank of Ireland's Mostly Modern concert were transcriptions; but as with all really good transcriptions you would never have known.
Flautist Susan Doyle and guitarist Benjamin Dwyer played Arthur Levering's arrangement of Bartók's Six Romanian Dances with springing rhythm and mutual responsiveness. Raymond Deane's Epilogue was composed in 1973 for piano and flute, but has since been heard in a variety of versions for different instruments.
This arrangement seemed ideal for the music's carefully thought intimacy.
The duo's change of fortune is epitomised by Piazzolla's Histoire du Tango, which was originally written for flute and guitar and has since been transcribed for many other combinations.
Piazzolla has done for the tango what Chopin did for the waltz; and this fascinating music thrives on characterful playing, which was what it got on this occasion.
However, the main interest lay in hearing the winning work in the Mostly Modern/AIC International Composers' Competition.
Ramon Humet was born in Barcelona in 1968, and has acknowledged an enduring interest in Caribbean music. An interest in tight compositional practice is suggested by his choice of teachers, who include Helmut Lachenmann and Brian Ferneyhough.
Tightness is self-evident in The Voice of the Devil. Inspired by the extreme contrasts of William Blake's poem of that name, it shows a striking ability to control rhythm and the development of material. It is one of those pieces which, rather than making an immediate impact, draws you in and arouses your curiosity about this composer.
• The Bank of Ireland Mostly Modern Series continues at the Bank of Ireland Arts Centre, Foster Place, on Thursday February 28th at 1.15 p.m., with poet Macdara Woods and guitarist Benjamin Dwyer. Admission free.
By Martin Adams
