The Merian Ensemble: The Book of Spells
Navona Records
In presenting nine commissioned works by eight contemporary female composers, the debut album from The Merian Ensemble, formed in 2018 by five Atlanta Symphony Orchestra players, makes good on its desire to celebrate female composers and performers in classical music. As a portrait of modern chamber material and the skill and precision with which it's performed when tackled by world-class musicians, The Book of Spells registers strongly; that it's women who are wholly responsible for its music—all of it world premiere recordings—makes it even more timely and relevant. Such efforts are especially needed when a 2022 study involving 111 major orchestras across thirty-one countries determined that only 7.7% of the works performed were composed by women.
On the release, Merian members Christina Smith (flute), Emily Brebach (oboe, English horn), Marci Gurnow (clarinets), Jessica Oudin (viola), and harpist Elisabeth Remy Johnson perform pieces by Jennifer Higdon, Nicole Chamberlain, Mary Kouyoumdjian, Anne Leilehua Lanzilotti, Soon Hee Newbold, Kimberly Osberg, Lynne Plowman, and Clarice Assad, the latter represented by two works, the three-part titular composition and Solais, performed by Johnson alone. As a title, The Book of Spells is apt, given that its pieces explore magic, folklore, metamorphosis, and other bewitching subjects. The ensemble's blend of woodwinds, viola, and harp dovetails splendidly with the character of the material, which is at times pastoral and outdoorsy and at other times magical and otherworldly.
Each movement in Assad's The Book of Spells focuses on a magic ritual enacted to achieve a particular goal, be it love, prosperity, or health. According to the composer, “hundreds of spells teach the practitioner how to prepare and perform the rites, each for a particular purpose.” The arresting combination of harp and bass clarinet casts an early spell in “Love and Relationships; The Siren's Seduction” before oboe, flute, and viola add to the mystery. The seeming sound of a coin dropping announces the onset of the comparatively macabre “Wealth and Prosperity; Spell of Summon Greed”; the spirited exuberance of the folk-tinged “Health and Well-Being; A Spell for Global Healing,” on the other hand, clearly conveys the quality of physical and spiritual well-being.
Higdon's gently uplifting The Sound of Light provides an excellent illustration of the beautiful tapestry the ensemble produces when material rich in counterpoint and polyphony is given to it. Inspired by Hereford Cathedral's large medieval map Mappa Mundi, Plowman's Small World begins with four slow phrases representative of the four points of the compass and blossoms from there. Longer lines gradually emerge and intertwine in serpentine manner until, the pace quickening, a resplendent group expression crystallizes that's fully developed across eleven minutes.
Chamberlain used Atlanta's reputations as “the city in the forest” as a springboard for Atalanta, titled after the similarly named Greek mythology figure who was known for her wilderness skills as a hunter and runner. Like Small World, Atalanta starts slowly but lunges into action quickly, in Chamberlain's case to reflect the intensity of the energized locale. An alluring textural meditation, Lanzilotti's dreamlike meridian holds special significance in referencing the ensemble's namesake, Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717), an illustrator renowned for her images of metamorphosis, and in alluding to geographical lines of longitude (think prime meridian). Whereas the panoramic splendour of Osberg's Just Another Climb was inspired by the first ‘manless ascent' of the Grand Tetons in 1939 by four women mountaineers, Newbold's soaring Alis Volat Propriis (“She Flies With Her Own Wings”) honours women more generally with a statement that breathes fresh, expansive air.
The group departs from quintet performances for two that are sonically leaner though no less resonant: Kouyoumdjian's A Boy and a Makeshift Toy, which pairs Oudin and Johnson, and the aforementioned Solais, performed by the harpist solo. Kouyoumdjian drew for inspiration for her heartfelt, rhythmically charged setting from a photo by American war photographer Chris Hondros showing a young boy at an abandoned train station, packed with Albanian refugees, waiting to be moved to another camp. It's interesting that, as dazzling as the ensemble renditions of the composers' works are, Assad's Solais, written in honour of female astronomers, makes an equally strong impact, compositionally speaking. Perhaps that's because in being performed by Johnson only the work's haunting, Satie-like melodic progressions seduce with the utmost directness. That said, as lovely as it is to hear her play unaccompanied (textura also reviewed her 2021 Albany Records release Quest, incidentally), The Book of Spells makes the powerful impact it does because of the interplay of the five members. These Atlanta Symphony Orchestra musicians are clearly kindred spirits united in their vision for the ensemble.September 2024