KVT – A Night Of Piazzolla at Hanoi Opera House

The Moon and Piazolla

Saturday night gave us a Super Moon, that night once every 18 years or so when it is closest to the earth, 14% larger and 30% brighter. When I rode across Long Bien Bridge in the early evening the sky was clear and a full moon sailed silver, low in the sky over Gia Lam, and rippled its echo in the Song Hong. It was as if you could reach up and almost shake hands with naughty thang Cuoi, sitting up there under a banyan tree.

The moon spread its spell into the Opera House and the night’s music under the painted dome was definitely Super. Astor Piazolla’s ‘Four Seasons of Buenos Aires’ were wonderfully manipulated by a super dooper combination of classical piano trio and a jazz quintet and it all resulted in one of the best live music gigs I’ve heard this year. I first came across Argentinian Piazolla’s (1921 – 92) tangoesque music a couple of years ago and assumed it slotted into the classical genre on the full orchestral concert platform (which it does perfectly) but apparently for a lot of his composing career, Piazzolla’s preferred group was a quintet playing bandoneon, violin, piano, electric guitar and double bass. Piazolla played the bandoneon (a member of the concertina family) and this clip shows him with one of his most popular works.

This bit that I’ve plagiarized from Wikepedia explains much better than I could possibly do about why Saturday’s music was such a success (mind you its success relied on the considerable talents of the individual musicians:

‘The use of the passacaglia technique of a circulating bass line and harmonic sequence, invented and much used in 17th and 18th century baroque music but also central to the idea of jazz “changes”, predominates in most of Piazzolla’s mature compositions. Another clear reference to the baroque is the often complex and virtuosic counterpoint that sometimes follows strict fugal behavior but more often simply allows each performer in the group to assert his voice. A further technique that emphasizes this sense of democracy and freedom among the musicians is improvisation that is borrowed from jazz in concept, but in practice involves a different vocabulary of scales and rhythms that stay within the parameters of the established tango sound-world……’

On Saturday the improvisation spread to the instruments used. The classical trio of violin, cello and piano played Piazzolla’ seasons as gorgeously as a lot you’d come across in a concert hall ( I would have been happy enough to have had only them on the program) but it was the improvisational stuff by the jazz combo of saxophone, drums, double bass and piano that electrified the air.

When they segued with the violin and cello singing Piazolla’s plaintive or joyful tango tunes up and over the drums and double bass, or when the sax led the groups into a fusion, it was as magical as that moon riding clear in its cloud free sky.

Funny, but I found it hard to decide whether I wanted to behave as though I was at a classical concert and applaud only at the end of a movement, or as though I was at a jazz concert and applaud whenever an individual musician did a great bit. For my overall enjoyment I adopted the classical mode but then when the jazz guys were at their best I forgot and was at one with all of the dyed in the wool jazz aficionados around me and clapped wildly. Piazzolla probably would have enjoyed the dichotomy as his work reflects some of the best aspects of both classical and jazz musical practices

What a super effort it was to co-ordinate two grand pianos, three strings, percussion and sax into a cohesive whole. At the beginning I had misgivings but when they all launched into the Seasons, the sun, the moon, the wind and the rain melded with the joy and sadness of a latin city’s passionate existence.

The two females, cellist Nguyen Hong Anh and violinist Nguyen My Huong were never put in the shade by the extrovert males…Nguyen Bao Long on the saxophone, drummer Le Viet Hung, double bassist Dao Minh Pha or the nimble fingered pianists, Tran Thai Linh and Nguyen Tien Manh …What I’d like to know is the date of their next collaboration

The night started as nicely as a full moon slowly rising up over the horizon as the performers casually came on stage, one by one, and combined in Piazolla’s famous ‘Libertango’. The example set by the French has still to make its way across to a few embassies who still see the need for long speeches of introduction. It would have been perfect if the Libertango had progressed seamlessly into the Seasons without the wordiness between (us bods who paid up to 700 000 VND a seat could have dispensed with the niceties…..though if it was a freebie night we’d naturally grin and bear it)

Apologies to the readers who don’t like my supposed impartiality to be tainted with effusiveness… but when writing about such a night as this, I couldn’t help myself ….must be something to do with the effects of the moon on a Piazzolla lover.