My introduction to the carefully sculpted music of Daniel Kellogg came in September, when the Colorado Symphony Orchestra premiered his “Refracted Skies,” a pleasing tribute to the recently opened Denver Art Museum expansion.
On Oct. 24, I had the chance to experience the 30-year-old composer’s more intimate and adventurous dimensions in a program of seven of his chamber works written in the past 10 years.
While Kellogg’s music spoke for itself most of the time, it didn’t hurt that the free Faculty Series concert at CU’s College of Music in Boulder was performed by a commanding lineup of faculty and guests artists – from violist Erika Eckert, flutist Christina Jennings, pianist Margaret McDonald and Joan Catoni Conlon directing the University Singers to CSO Concertmaster Yumi Hwang-Williams, choreographer Viki Psihoyos and tenor Adam Sattley.
Opening with “Arise My Love” – composed on the occasion of Kellogg’s marriage to his pianist wife, Hsing-ay Hsu – Conlon drew out a forceful, beautifully projected meditation on love by the 30 or so young singers, sans instrumental accompaniment. Kellogg’s score served as a highly personal counterpoint to the joyful text from the Song of Solomon.
Then came Kellogg’s entrancing approach to poet Dylan Thomas’ “Ceremony After a Fire Raid.”
First, in unrelenting darkness, the only sensory experience was hearing the Welshman’s deeply resonant voice deliver his own mournful words in syllabic rhythm. The house lights back on, Hsu and Sattley then illuminated the words through Kellogg’s appropriately agitated score. Hsu proved herself a bold, formidable presence at the piano, punctuating Sattley’s able delivery of melodic fragments.
A winsome “Lullaby and Prayer” was delicately rendered by the Beijing-born pianist in harmony with Hwang-Williams’ lyric phrasings and silky tone. Closing the first half was “Momentum,” and Hsu again showed her artistic muscle. But the angry, often witty piano solo – a musical tongue-twister – ended short of breath, no matter Kellogg’s obvious attempt to resolve it peacefully.
While Eckert misfired in Kellogg’s Sonata for Viola and Piano, McDonald – another fine pianist – saved the day, fully voicing the work’s thick, clustered harmonies. High marks also to Jennings for her solid, spot-on playing in “Into Utter Forever,” no matter that the shrill scoring was hard on the ears.
Perhaps the most fluid and conceptually engaging selection among Kellogg’s varied and promising program was “scarlet thread,” a lush and animated work for piano and dancers.
