Spirit Flies, Sun Rises Reviews
Spirit Flies, Sun Rises Review 1.
Dominion Post 8th August, 2019
Reviewed by John Button
Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington
Jennifer Stumm (viola), Te Koki Trio (Jian Liu, Martin Risely, Inbal Megiddo), Music by Williams, Kurtag, Schumann and Brahms; Michael Fowler Centre.
Although this concert was built around the superb American violist Jennifer Stumm, my enduring memories will be the Te Koki Trio and, in particular, the wonderfully musical playing of pianist Jian Liu.
…But the work that made the most impression was a new piece by Michael Williams that opened the concert.
Spirit Flies Sun Rises was a commission from CMNZ to memorialise Ian Lyons, and with the additional shock of the death of his younger brother, Williams has penned a deeply moving work.
Beginning with rapid, tense string writing – a little like the work of the minimalist composers – it settles into a beautifully felt, harmonically rich, reflection of considerable emotional intensity.
Anyone who has heard his Symphony No.1 – Letters from the Front or his opera The Juniper Passion will know of his beautifully graded, conservatively tonal, style.
The Te Koki Trio played it quite superbly and I mean no disrespect when I say that their playing, led by pianist Jian Liu, upstaged the excellent Jennifer Stumm for me in this concert.
Spirit Flies, Sun Rises Review 2.
Classical Music Review 2, Middle C 8th August, 2019
Reviewed by Peter Mechen
Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington
Jennifer Stumm (viola), Te Koki Trio (Jian Liu, Martin Risely, Inbal Megiddo), Music by Williams, Kurtag, Schumann and Brahms; Michael Fowler Centre.
…Before Stumm made her appearance in the concert it was Te Koki Trio’s task to open the concert with a CMNZ-commissioned work from Hamilton composer Michael Williams for a Piano Trio, one titled Spirit Flies Sun Rises. In an eloquent programme note the composer indicated that his initial motivation for the work was an image in his mind of the scattering of the ashes of an uncle by the wind at Raglan, imparting a sense of something like “a bird in flight or perhaps a leaping deer”, a spirit becoming part of “the great all”, while for those living the world still turns and the sun rises.
The unexpected death of the composer’s younger brother just as the work was being freshly addressed after a break gave rise to an “enormously cathartic and unforgettable” experience of re-evaluation of what Williams wanted the work to say, further intensifying the idea of a spirit leaving the earth and being freed. The end result as heard in the Michael Fowler Centre on Thursday evening was something as ethereal and “liberated” in sound as were the spirits of the departed in substance – the work set long-breathed, soulful tones, perhaps of quiet mourning or remembrance, against scintillations of gossamer-like freedom.
It seemed like a kind of nature-ritual, with earthly things both letting go and reclaiming impulses of energy whose time had come to move elsewhere, or perhaps to “return”. What the musicians did seemed to transcend normal manifestations of feeling and energy – Martin Riseley’s violin and Inbal Meggido’s ‘cello intoned what felt like uplifted, trance-like responses to the happenings, while Jian Liu‘s piano created endless and enduring shafts of illumination and whole ambiences of warmth. I thought the understating of it all was ultimately the most powerful and moving aspect of the work and its performance.
Spirit Flies, Sun Rises Review 3.
Gig Review, Off the Tracks 8th August, 2019
Reviewed by Simon Sweetman
Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington
Jennifer Stumm (viola), Te Koki Trio (Jian Liu, Martin Risely, Inbal Megiddo), Music by Williams, Kurtag, Schumann and Brahms; Michael Fowler Centre.
…The opening piece was just for the trio, a Chamber Music-commission by local composer Michael Williams. Over a see-sawing frenzy of violin the piano provided graceful punctuation and the cello added its oaky-warm tone. A beautiful piece that felt filmic and seemed to take as much from ambient/minimalist composers and players (Philip Glass/The Necks) as anything from the strictly classical world, it offered a brilliant start to a diverse and intriguing program.
What a wonderful evening this was – pure musical magic.