08/11/2007
Italian quartet appeals with romantic lull
The Jakarta Post
Features - June 21, 2007
Camelia Pasandaran, Contributor, Jakarta
As part of this year's Jakarta anniversary celebrations, the Gedung Kesenian Jakarta presented on June 13 Colonne Sonore in Concerto, featuring Italy 's Sax Appeal Quartet, with the support of the Italian Cultural Institute.
The concert was a unique one that carried a beautiful tune produced from an unusual blend of instruments: violin, flute, harp and saxophone.
One might have wondered at how a saxophone could blend in harmony with the three classical instruments, but all questions and doubts were answered upon hearing the performance of Deborah Vico (saxophone), Margherita Scafidi (harp), Gloria Frontini (flute) and Giannina Guazzaroni (violin).
In scarlet outfits that contrasted with the backdrop, they brightened up the concert hall with a repertoire of themes from movie soundtracks and theater: "We love cinema and we love music. We are musicians who love cinema," said Vico.
Opening the romantic night, Sax Appeal played V. Youman's Tea for Two from the musical No, No, Nanette. The mood started to build with their second piece, M. Hamlisch's The Way We Were.
As the main melody switched from saxophone to violin, the music created completely different moods, the strong yet sweet sound of the saxophone followed by the sharp and broad sound of strings. The flute and rhythmic accompaniment from the harp produced a timbre that is hardly ever heard.
Sax Appeal thus easily reminded concertgoers of the bittersweet romance starring Robert Redford and Barbra Streisand.
Then came the best songs in the concert, Nino Rota's Romeo E Giulietta, more familiarly A Time for Us, from Franco Zeffirelli's acclaimed film. Vico's saxophone was exquisite as primo and Guazzaroni as secondo in a lower key on the violin. Here, the harp was more dynamic and the flute helped to bring forth the melancholic ambience.
The song appeared to be their favorite, as they played it with heart and soul, involving their deepest emotions in their playing. But the most impressive was the saxophone melody that expressively brought to mind the eternal, tragic love story of Romeo and Juliet.
In the second part of the concert, the quartet performed more upbeat, popular tunes.
One piece of particular note was Libertango, originally composed by Argentinean A.P. Piazzolla. In this lively score, the saxophone was excluded as the violin played a virtuoso solo with the flute as a counter-melody, and in time they exchanged places.
The song was played flawlessly with a wonderful descending introduction and closed with a strong accent.
The concert closed on L. Bernstein's Tonight from West Side Story.
In a show of appreciation for the very enthusiastic audience, Sax Appeal presented Sinatra's famous song, My Way, as an encore. To this rousing finale, the audience gave the Italian quartet a standing ovation.
Sax Appeal was originally founded as the Nina Rota Ensemble, a group specially established by Vico in 1995 with a repertoire of movie soundtracks in classical arrangement. Vico played the piano with the ensemble, and when she began learning the saxophone, she came up with the idea to include the brass instrument in the group.
Thus a new group was born, featuring the saxophone as its main instrument, and the three other instruments -- violin, flute and harp -- were chosen as its accompaniment.
"The result of the combination is dolce -- sweet," said Vico. She added that a friend gave the new group the name Sax Appeal, because the saxophone was principal instrument and all its members were "appealing girls".
The new group carried on the movie theme repertoire, but Vico recalled: "People didn't believe that in this small group we can play a soundtrack that was composed for a big orchestra, and we think this idea is wrong."
Their choice of instruments presents a particular difficulty when performing outside of Europe or in smaller countries where the harp is not a common instrument. At a recent performance in Nigeria , the quartet had to replace the harp with the piano.
While the concert may not have been as grand as an orchestra performance, overall the Sax Appeal concert was simply sweet and romantic -- hearing their music, listeners will want to be in an idyllic place with someone they love.
The instrumental experiment in the Sax Appeal Quartet might be unfamiliar to some concertgoers, having done it "their way", they produced breathtaking music -- and lived up to its name.
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