From Maurice Ravel to Radiohead to Astor Piazzolla and everywhere in between.
Pianist Christopher O’Riley has made a career of traversing genres with unusual grace and ease.
He’s a man of many musical voices, and several of them will be on view next week when he takes center stage in three very different programs with the Colorado Symphony.
“It comes out of the festival mentality, where you’re in a place because you enjoy being there and, ‘Hey, while we have him here, let’s do a few different things,”‘ he said from his Los Angeles home. “So it’s a different vibe. It’s a different energy.”
O’Riley opens his series of appearances Wednesday evening in the Seawell Ballroom with his first recital anywhere featuring songs by all three of the popular performers he has transcribed and recorded – Radiohead, Elliott Smith and Nick Drake.
“Second Grace: The Music of Nick Drake,” is set for release on Tuesday. It brings together 14 selections by the troubled singer-songwriter, whose fame and ongoing influence only came after he died in 1974 of an overdose of antidepressants at 26.
O’Riley already had undertaken transcriptions of works by such composers as Igor Stravinsky and Piazzolla, so it did not seem to him much of a stretch to write transcriptions of works by popular musicians that he admired and enjoyed.
“As I’ve been trained as a classical musician, I also did things like start my own rock band in sixth grade and started seguing in jazz, rock and fusion and was a big Mahavishnu Orchestra fan and had a band along those lines,” he said.
The pianist first started playing his transcriptions of Radiohead and others as “break pieces” during the public-radio program, “On the Top,” which he has hosted for eight years. It showcases some of the country’s top young classical musicians.
“People wrote into the program and said, ‘Who is this Mr. Head and where can I find more of his music?’ So it was a really good thing,” O’Riley said.
He then played a half-dozen or so of the transcriptions on the public-radio program, “Performance Today.” When some 150 rock and Radiohead websites worldwide linked to the broadcast, he realized it might be a good idea to record them.
“It’s never been a matter of, ‘Oh, the next project will be this or that artist,”‘ he said. “I don’t think in those terms. I just think in terms of what song grabs me. It’s become another part of my life.”
While O’Riley certainly has garnered considerable attention for his crossover efforts, the pianist is hardly the only classical musician drawing on rock and other contemporary forms.
Veteran composers such as Christopher Rouse led the way by incorporating popular elements in certain works, and now it is common among the younger generation of writers.
“It’s just routine for them,” said Greg Sandow, a New York music critic and composer. “They do it without thinking.”
He points to Mason Bates, whose new work, tellingly titled “Liquid Interface,” was premiered earlier this year by the National Symphony in Washington, D.C. Bates, who lives in the San Francisco area, moves easily from the concert hall to clubs where he DJs electronica.
More directly related to O’Riley’s transcription projects are efforts by groups such as the Alarm Will Sound, a 20-member ensemble which came together at the Eastman School of Music. Its July 2005 release, for example, offers acoustic arrangements of works by Aphex Twin, an Irish-born electronic music artist.
Sandow sees forays by classical musicians into the popular realm and classical efforts by pop musicians such as Billy Joel as inevitable.
“All this music coexists,” he said, “and anywhere you look in any genre of music, you see interpenetration of styles and sounds.
“The music we now call classical has throughout its history incorporated whatever sounds there are around, and it’s hard to see why it shouldn’t do this.”
Following his Wednesday recital, O’Riley will join associate conductor Scott O’Neil and the orchestra April 13 and 14 in performances of Ravel’s famed Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D major. It was written for pianist Paul Wittgenstein, who lost his right arm in World War I.
On April 15, O’Riley teams with pianist Jeffrey Lee for a family concert that will feature the two artists performing in a range of combinations, including duo pianos and four hands on the same keyboard.
Conductor and pianist Jeffrey Kahane, the orchestra’s music director, was scheduled to lead the programs and partner with O’Riley on April 15, but he was forced to cancel his appearances because of severe hypertension.
It is not surprising that O’Riley would choose to perform such a varied mix of repertoire in Denver or that the orchestra would agree to it.
“I’ve been to the Colorado Symphony more times in the last 10 years than I have with any another symphony,” he said. “We like playing together.”
Fine arts critic Kyle MacMillan can be reached at 303-954-1675 or kmacmillan@denverpost.com.
Christoper O’Riley
There will be three opportunities to see pianist Christoper O’Riley in Denver:
PIANO TRANSCRIPTIONS OF RADIOHEAD, ELLIOTT SMITH AND NICK DRAKE|Seawell Ballroom, Denver Performing Arts Complex, 14th and Curtis street; 7:30 p.m. Wednesday|$25 |303-623-7876 or coloradosymphony.org.O’RILEY, COLORADO SYMPHONY|Symphonic program including Ravel’s
Piano Concerto for the Left Hand|Boettcher Concert Hall, Denver Performing Arts Complex, 14th and Curtis streets; 7:30 p.m. April 13 and 14|$15-$67.50 |303-623-7876 or coloradosymphony.org.
PIANISTS O’RILEY AND JEFFREY LEE, COLORADO SYMPHONY|Family concert titled “One Hand, Two Hands, Four Hands, Eight Hands”|Boettcher Concert Hall; 2:30 p.m. April 15|$20 general public; $10 students| 303-623-7876 or coloradosymphony.org.
