A brooding orchestra vs. sparkling young singers/ Aries Caces in 'Quattro'

A concert presented by the French Embassy the Alliance Francaise de Manille, Rustan’s and the CCP featured French Conductor Michael Costeau wielding the baton over the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra in Franck’s ‘Symphony in D Minor’.

With tonal clarity, Costeau delineated the composer’s cyclical form through the frequent recurrence of the beautiful melodious themes in the movements, creating ingenious inter-relationships.

Costeau further depicted Franck’s well-known characteristics of serenity and mysticism, his dark brooding spirit through the lugubrious strings, particularly in the slow, extended pianissimo passages. Among the orchestra’s stylistic devices were the staccatos of the first violins in the opening of the second movement dramatically complementing the strings’ lushness in the opening of the third movement.

Further, Costeau eloquently manifested widely diverse dynamics, ranging from very soft pianissimos to thunderous but controlled tuttis. The composer won admirers through Costeau’s imminently impressive baton-wielding. The orchestra ostensibly came up to his expectations, he having expressed immense satisfaction with the PPO when he first conducted it three years ago.

After the Franck symphony came the arias interpreted by young singers — three sopranos, two tenors and a baritone. They had just attended a master class conducted by Paris Conservatory Professor Florence Guignolet, and most of them were still finishing their vocal courses in local institutions.

They rendered arias from the operas ‘La Vie Parisienne’ by Offenbach, ‘Don Giovanni’ and ‘Cosi fan Tutte’ by Mozart, ‘Carmen’ by Bizet and ‘La Traviata’ by Verdi.

Filipinos being generally inhibited by nature, Guignolet must have been extremely challenged by the young singers’ inhibitions and reservations.

After Guignolet’s working and succeeding with inherently gifted and talented students, what marvels followed! With creative imagination, Guignolet had conjured arresting entrances and exits for the singers which immediately tickled the risibilities of the audience, comic gestures executed with spontaneity and spirit leading to even louder guffaws.

In some arias, the women would be sprawled on the floor as they went through their hilarious antics, the men quickly following suit. The stage movements devised by Guignolet were not like anything one saw in actual operatic presentations. But they added a lively quality, an emotive dimension that was wholly infectious and irresistible.

Quite apart from the acting, how was the singing? It was highly gratifying and engaging, the voices firm, the high notes floating securely. With their persuasive acting and impressive singing, sopranos Maria Krissan Manikan, Myramae Meneses, Jade Riccio and Elaine Marie Vibal, tenors Ivan Niccolo Nery and Emmanuel de la Rosa, and baritone Jilbert Chua face an auspiciously promising future.

During the concert, with the excellent accompaniment of the orchestra under Costeau, the singers could concentrate fully on their performance, feeling no anxiety over orchestral tempo or volume going against their own.

The overwhelming audience response should lead the concert organizers to present a “repeat” of “Symphony and Songs”.

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Another event explains my having missed “Quattro” in early March at the Philamlife Theater. Featured were international pianist Aries Caces, Swiss-Austrian flutist Raphael Leone, Japanese violist Rui Hashiba, and soprano Minette Padilla.

Caces studied in Graz and Vienna, obtaining his diploma under the eminent Paul Badura-Skoda. Winning the auditions at the Hochschule for Musik, he performed Rachmaninoff’s “Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini” with the Hochshule Symphony Orchestra in Vienna’s Golden Hall.

Caces obtained his “Diplom” in conducting under Prof. Unos Lajovic, and his Master’s Degree in Piano Performance under Roland Keller. A recipient of several scholarships here and abroad, he has concertized extensively in Europe and the USA.

Caces has the distinction of having performed the five piano concertos of Beethoven, for which he functioned both as soloist and conductor of the UST Symphony Orchestra. Currently, he is a faculty member of the University for Music and the Performing Arts in Vienna, Austria.