Eliza Garth: Tour de Force
Albany Records

Remarkably, Sheree Clement's thirteen preludes, which constitute the greater share of this nearly hour-long collection of solo piano music, were written sporadically between 1978 and 2006, though no one would ever guess as much given how cohesive they are when performed as a group by Eliza Garth. Though the album title could justifiably have been selected with the pianist in mind, the title in fact derives from an observation made by Clement, specifically that while the thirteen preludes are effective when performed in groupings of three or four, they're a tour de force when presented as a thirteen-part set; while there's a descriptive dimension in her word choice, there's also a qualitative one that references the extreme range the preludes encompass, from, in her own estimation, “powerful and thundering to gossamer and twinkling.”

Perry Goldstein's Of Points Fixed and Fluid, a 1995 work commissioned by Garth, forms a superb partner to Clement's in countering the preludes' concision with a single-movement setting that dynamically contains multitudes yet at the same time is complementary in many ways to Clement's. Though both are demanding works that call upon the virtuosity of the performer, Garth, a faculty member at St. Mary's College of Maryland and a contemporary music champion who's premiered many new works, proves herself up to the challenge.

The pressure-free manner by which Clement's preludes came into being probably has much to do with why they seem so cohesive. Writing them on her baby grand piano, she created them, it seems, more for herself than any potential audience or with any deadline in mind, and in the absence of such determinations the self-contained explorations gradually accumulated into a set of pieces ranging from “epigrams to torrid essays.” Clement herself surmises that if there are connections between them, thematic and otherwise, it's perhaps because in writing them she was constantly drawing from a consistent creative source.

In its meditative character, the first prelude exudes a questioning quality, as if soberly contemplating possible directions to pursue. Punctuated by aggressive chords, the livelier second perpetuates the first's explorative approach though escalates the intensity level, the music blossoming confidently following the reserved first, after which the third reestablishes a gentler and less abrasive tone whilst retaining the harmonic adventurousness of its predecessor. Appearing in turn are the quasi-hymnal fourth, the ponderous fifth, the skittish sixth, the mercurial ninth, galaxies-spanning tenth, and upwardly spiraling eleventh, all of them articulated with sensitivity by the pianist. The subtlest hint of a folk song emerges now and then in these oft-unpredictable pieces, though more as a sidelong allusion than direct quotation, and chromatic lines of consonance and dissonance are crossed repeatedly though never without musicality or purpose.

April 2018