Review of Piano Concerto #2 (Fanfare, May/June 2002)
Lees's concerto displays [a] meticulous craftsmanship-unwavering focus, clarity of texture, and streamlined sense of purpose... Though the work inhabits the same driving, aggressive post-Bartokian /post Prokofievian stylistic realm as most of Lees's music from the 1960s, it is powerful and convincing in its own right, despite a certain narrowness of expressive range. Those who enjoy Lees's fourth piano sonata will not be disappointed with this concerto. Ian Hobson, whose brilliant pianism and remarkable affinity for Lees's music can be heard on a CD (Albany TROY 227; see Fanfare 21-3) devoted to his solo works, here offers a stupendous performance of the Concerto No.2 (Albany TROY 441).
Walter Simmons
Review of Piano Concerto #2 (Classical CD Review, May 2002)
* Bishop: Crooning
* Shawn: Piano Concerto*
*Creston: Dance Overture
* Lees: Piano Concerto No. 2**
Ursula Oppens (piano)*, Ian Hobson (piano)**, Albany Symphony
Orchestra/David Alan Miller
Albany TROY441 Total time: 73.55
Summary for the Busy Executive: Two piano concerti, no errors, one hit.
...The weaknesses of Shawn's concerto come into immediate focus when you hear the Lees second. It's Mark Twain's distinction between the right word and the almost-right word - between lightning and the lightning-bug. Lees' concerto premiered in 1968 with, I think, Graffman as soloist and Leinsdorf conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Thirty-three years later, this may be its first commercial recording.
Lees has always been a musical dramatist, even in abstract works. The concerto form suits him, and he's written several, including concertos for each of the principal sections of the orchestra - string quartet, brass choir, wind quintet, and percussion. Here, he opposes sharply-contrasting ideas, each distinctive in itself. The first movement, a lickety-split toccata, exploits what Lees calls a "trill" idea and what I think of as more of a skip. The skip gets extended into rat-a-tat runs, which Lees contrasts with slower, punchier versions of themselves and the initial skip. The skip is never absent for long, even in a lyrical theme, where it becomes a kind of grace note. As the work continues, one becomes more and more aware of links among what one originally thought of as separate ideas. Eventually, they become different aspects of the same idea. The movement runs to probably some version of sonata form, but the listener is more aware of an idée fixe in constant transformation and running into itself. Even more important, Lees shows his mastery of symphonic rhetoric. He seems to create a movement of constant excitement because he knows just when to hold back and when to apply the gas again. It will leave you breathless.
The second movement opens with a real trill idea and elaborates it yet another way. Lees tells an emotional "story" of a struggle against stasis.So many of the themes emphasize one note and snap out of it only at the impulse of a trill. Even the timpani seems to trill. Like much of Lees's music, there's not a hummable tune, but the composer presents his ideas so clearly and so powerfully, that you don't miss the opportunity to whistle along. Lees interrupts his slow movement with yet another quick toccata passage of trills, which leads to a remarkable section where the trill slows down to its motific atoms: the rising and falling half-step. Lees tells us about that for a bit and then ends the movement with a dialogue between the piano and timpani recapitulating material from the movement's opening.
The rondo finale, a sort of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, comes up with a theme filled with half-steps, which, as we have heard, the composer has connected to the skip idea. Most of the episodes (excepting a very Stravinskian idea of a rising minor third) seem related to the main theme. Like all of Lees' music the concerto is architecturally tight, even rigorous, but this all serves the emotional drama. Most listeners would, I believe, hardly notice, but I think most would thrill to its power. Lees music, above all, connects, not only to itself but directly to the listener. This is music for the body, as well as the brain. If you can keep still, you're probably dead.
Ian Hobson does a marvelous job. He takes on the role of concerto-hero heroically. He is in your face. His fingers not only find the right notes, they rage and brood with them. Hobson has also made a terrific recording of some of Lees' solo piano music, including the fourth sonata (AlbanyTROY227).
Steve Schwartz