Nice to celebrate a dude while he can still lift a champagne flute with ya. Or in this case, stroke a piano. In tribute to Ran Blake's half decade on its faculty, New England Conservatory assembled a 47-minute program that sketches the major Third Stream composer accurately and, more important, emotionally.
Since every Blake note contains a universe, it was essential that the arrangements of his tunes leave space, hence the decision to devote most of the nine selections to duos or solos. And the NEC's performers understand every aspect of Blake's music -- the timbral adventure, the precision, the dense harmonies, the playfulness, the melodiousness, the intimacy.
Watch Emily Mitchell's closed eyes as she sings and plays guitar on "Short Life of Barbara Monk," teasing out carefree Brazilian moods with her fragile picking. It was an astute choice to let Griffin Woodard interpret "Wende" on solo bass clarinet, where we can hear the song's almost poppish loveliness at its richest and most distinct. We get to absorb "Scene From 'The Pawnbroker'" via the exquisite spiritual anguish of Delfina Cheb Terrab's voice and the interiorized percussion of Joey Van Leewen while viewing Rod Steiger's concentration-camp flashbacks in the actual 1964 Sidney Lumet film. The septet on "Realization of a Dream" makes us confront four octaves of intense doom and twisted wistfulness, with each instrument holding its own territory yet caressing the others.
The set closes with a solo medley by Blake himself. His wizened face and frosty locks poking forward from a coarseknit hoodie, Blake extends his fingers nearly flat, Monk-style, and works his spell, the notes tumbling forth like bones of augury. We feel shapes in his phrases, see ghosts in his condensed dissonances. Although peering from an academic world often ruled by abstraction, he never places a finger unless it will resonate with our base humanity.
At the end, as the light fades, Blake seems to require no breath. A final chord decays, suspended yet resolved. His face does not move, but he has moved.
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Watch "Portrait of Ran Blake" here and also listen to his typically concise (7 minutes) verbal commentary. He's got some good film picks.