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Romanticism
alive and well

Violinist Pip Clarke and the Honolulu Symphony: 4 p.m. tomorrow, Blaisdell Concert Hall. Tickets $15, $25, $30, $40 and $55. Call 792-2000

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By Ruth O. Bingham
Special to the Star-Bulletin

Romanticism is making a comeback. Not so long ago, contemporary classical composers wrote mathematically exquisite, coolly intellectual works and barely acknowledged the "hacks" who wrote music for films. Today, contemporary classical music can be beautiful, programmatic, accessible, even emotional without apologizing, and film composers are being reassessed.

Maestro Samuel Wong opened the Honolulu Symphony's 2000 season with three works about a half-century apart: 1883, 1945, and 1993. Although composed in different styles, all three used tonality's basic unit, the third, as a foundation and embraced the romantic approach.

The concert opened with a moving dramatic work by University of Hawai'i composer Byron K. Yasui entitled "Lo'ihi: Birth of an Island." Yasui divided the work into two sections: the birth of Lo'ihi first below and then above water.

In a beautifully resonant chant, Kumu Hula Victoria Holt Takamine (unacknowledged in the program) introduced the music, which began deep in the string basses and rose slowly out of silence to coalesce into a climax at the surface of the water. Just as the music reached its apex, fourteen dancers from Takamine's hula halau Pua Ali'i 'Ilima rose out of the pit. Dressed in deep-ocean blues with lava-red accents and green haku lei, the dancers celebrated the island's birth in a stirring hula.

The birth pangs of Yasui's more dissonant first half resolved into a more consonant and peaceful second half, his melodies supported by a slower string bass counterpoint, leading into a unison close. Yasui blended Western and Hawaiian traditions in a dynamic musical tale, masterfully portrayed by Takamine, her halau, and by Concert Master Ignace Jang's extended violin solo.

The first half of Sunday's concert featured violinist Pip Clarke, who performed a concerto by Erich W. Korngold, a composer best known for his film scores. Shunned in his day for both his film associations and his astonishingly romantic style, Korngold is gaining acclaim, in part because of violinists like Clarke who promote his music. Korngold's music sweeps ashore not in waves, but in whole tides of lush, swirling sound.

Clarke bathed in the music, caressing its delicate phrasing and translucent endings. However lovely the first two movements, Clarke shone in the third, with its rollicking good humor, fiery spiccato passages and opulent climaxes.

After the excitement of the first half, a Brahms symphony could seem staid, but not under Wong. His penchant for music analysis delivered a well-crafted interpretation, with none of the mushiness that so often accompanies performances of Brahms. He delivered clearly unified themes, delicately elastic phrases, and excellent balance throughout, even on those exposed piano chords ending each movement.

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