Caleb Burhans, Alarm Will Sound at Le Poisson Rouge

I had never been to Le Poisson Rouge, the Greenwich Village nightclub specializing in concerts of new and interesting music, before, and the occasion to hear Alarm Will Sound drew me out.  The concert was devoted entirely to music by Caleb Burhans, a member of the band.  Actually, Mr. Burhans performed solo the entire first half, then was joined by members of Alarm Will Sound for the second half.

To begin, I don't think it was a good idea to devote an entire evening to Caleb Burhans' music, because -- as is the case with most composers -- his pieces are probably better appreciated in the context of a diverse program.  Although they differed in terms of the instruments used, the stylistic consistency between the pieces made for some monotony over the length of an entire evening's program.  Mr. Burhans has a particular, distinctive style and voice that repeats itself throughout most of the works that were presented.

To continue, I don't think it was a good idea, lacking a printed program, to present the entire evening without any comments from the stage.  If these pieces have titles, they should be announced.  Perhaps the presenters were presuming that the audience would be intimately familiar with Burhans' work, so it needed no introduction or explanation, but I disagree.  This was my first exposure, and I can't help but believe that was true of others in the audience as well.  The normal concert format where there is no talking from the stage is fine if there is a printed program, dreadfully confusing if there is not.

Finally, as to the music and performances.  The performances seemed to be superb.  The music, as noted above, has a distinctive voice.  During the first half, Mr. Burhans presented two piano pieces that seemed very similar in style and construction.  He got a basic rhythmic figure going and repeating and repeating while punctuating from above with slow moving chordal or linear progressions.  Presenting two such pieces in a row was gilding the lilly.  Then he performed with an electronic violin connected to a computer program that would pick up whatever pattern he was playing and repeat it while he moved to another pattern, all of this building until it sounded like a virtual orchestra was playing although it was just Burhans, his violin and the computer.  The sonic combinations were interesting, but the style of the piece seemed similar to the piano pieces.  After the intermission, we had a piece for clarinet and piano, and then some pieces for the entire ensemble, conducted by AWS music director Alan Pierson.  The clarinet piece was recognizably by the same composer of the pieces in the first half, but a bit more varied rhythmically. The pieces played by the entire ensemble were relatively slow-moving, built on chordal progressions much of the time.  The music is listener-friendly in the sense that it is tonal, generally avoids dissonance, and builds on interesting rhythmic figures.  It seems to be next-generation minimalist in that it is constructed of numerous repetitions of the same rhythmic figures in a very regular meter.  As noted above, I think this music would be much more effective heard in the context of a mixed program.

Le Poisson Rouge is a good concert space, with fine acoustics and good sight-lines. The set-up is nightclub style, the menu is decent, the service is friendly and reasonably efficient.  I'll be interested in keeping up with their offerings.

Comments

[Caleb Burhans]

thanks so much for coming out to the concert! i'm sorry you weren't able to pick up on of the programs. i would have spoke between pieces, if i knew that not everyone would receive one. once again, thanks for coming out...

[Art Leonard]

As far as I could see, there were no printed programs. At least, nobody at my table had one, and I didn't see any when I came in. Nobody was handing them out, if they existed.... Was there some failure to communicate here?