The Mozart Festival, 21-28 January, Perth
January 27 of this year marks the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth and the Perth Concert Hall is celebrating this occasion with a week long festival. From 21st to the 28th of January, the Concert Hall precinct will be the setting for a very innovative birthday bash for one of the world’s greatest composers. Full details available here>
The Australia Day concert has particular relevance for jazz fans as it features the unique line-up of jazz quartet and string quartet. The string quartet is being led by Paul Wright while the jazz line-up includes, Mike Pignéguy (drums and percussion), Jamie Oehlers (sax), Grant Windsor (piano) and Sam Anning (bass).
The event will showcase a range of new arrangements of Mozart’s work by jazz arrangers/composers Mike, Pignéguy, Grant Windsor and Mike Nelson. Mike Pignéguy has also been commissioned to write the signature work, Two Quartets.
The aim here is to marry the music of Wolfgang Amadeus with jazz by combining two ensembles that are quintessential to the small group form of each musical genre. The intended result, according to Pignéguy, is to enable the audience “to hear Mozart as well as hear jazz.”
Oddly, perhaps, Mozart has not been prominent in jazz music. Whereas Bach has been the subject of jazz interpretation, notably through the work of the Modern Jazz Quartet and Jacques Loussier’s Trios, Mozart has featured only intermittently in jazz music. The stand-out example is Dave Brubeck’s Blue Rondo à la Turk which apparently was influenced by the music of the master from Salzburg. It is intriguing to ask why Mozart and Jazz have been such rare bed fellows.
Pignéguy says that the music of the Baroque and especially of Bach is more in sympathy with the essential characteristics of jazz. The rhythmic layering and weaving of lines in Bach’s music lends itself naturally to jazz. And of course, Bach was a great improviser.
However, the Classical form, which reached its pinnacle with Mozart, is far more sectionalised and structured and places a strong emphasis on dynamics. It is, perhaps, more difficult to find common ground with jazz. Yet, Pignéguy says that writing Two Quartets enabled him to see exciting connections.
“For a start, Mozart’s music is so virtuosic and idiomatic for the instruments for which it is written. When Mozart writes for strings, for example, you can see why string players love performing his music. You can compare this with bebop where high virtuosity is also required. Jazz musicians love bebop because of this opportunity to display virtuosity. Also Mozart’s music is highly rhythmic with elements of syncopation. This provides another ready connection. My major concern is to find the right blend of the two particularly in regard to dynamics.”
In writing the piece, Pignéguy found out quickly that he did not want to try and emulate Mozart’s style of composition. “I did not want to dance on his grave by writing ‘Mozartesque’ music.” Instead he took themes from some major works – the Overture from The Marriage of Figaro, the second movement from the Symphony no 41 in C Major ‘Jupiter’, an Aria from Figaro and, especially, the G Minor Symphony, No. 40. The G Minor Symphony he found particularly to be a natural jumping off point to interpret Mozart in a jazz setting. Pignéguy says that the minor key allows for a more brooding atmosphere, perhaps redolent of the blues.
Pignéguy is fast developing an impressive body of work that attacks the divide between classical and jazz music. His major 2004 composition When Worlds Collide directly addresses this divide as did his wonderful and atmospheric C.Y. O’Connor Suite premiered in 2003 at the now sadly defunct Fremantle International Jazz Festival. A performance of the first movement of the C.Y. O’Connor Suite will precede the premier of Two Quartets.
The concert is to be performed on the Verandah of Perth’s Concert Hall overlooking the Swan River. So not only will the audience enjoy an innovative mix of jazz and Mozart, including the world premier of Two Quartets, they will also be in a box seat for Perth’s Australia Day celebrations. There will be a sausage sizzle and Australia Day lamingtons, a full bar service and the renowned fireworks overhead, followed by the concert. It will be a night to remember.
Peter Kenyon
Chair, JAZZWA
Photograph: Emma Van Dortrecht, f22 Photography
