The Two Faces of Christopher O’Riley
UPON REFLECTION, I suppose you could say that renowned American pianist Christopher O’Riley has three faces, considering his radio role as host of the popular NPR show, “From the Top”. But allow me to get by here with the two salient aspects of his active performing life, both of which we were richly blessed to experience during his visit to Charleston last week.
I haven’t been to an all-Robert Schumann piano recital since the Schumann series I heard from pianist Joerg Demus as a teenage piano student in Vienna in the early 1960s. So I was delighted when I learned that O’Riley was scheduled to deliver one right here in Charleston at the College of Charleston’s evergreen International Piano Series at the Sottile Theatre.
His ambitious program began with a happy and lyrical rendition of Schumann’s lovely Arabesque, Op. 18: a mostly gentle and flowing number that O’Riley delivered with sweet sentiment, an elegant sense of line, and singing tone. He negotiated the piece’s three contrasting episodes with sensitivity and a natural feel for abrupt transitions.
Robert Schumann
Speaking of abrupt transitions, many more of those came with O’Riley’s account of Kreisleriana, Op. 16: a cycle of eight pieces reflecting a wild and scatterbrained fictitious character of the same name: the literary alter ego of the German romantic writer E.T.A. Hoffman. These pieces further reflect the passion that Schumann felt for Clara Wieck, the brilliant piano virtuoso who was soon to become his wife. In any discussion of Schumann’s music, it’s useful to consider the composer’s own highly bipolar psyche: a mental disorder that eventually deteriorated into the deep schizophrenia that kept him confined to an insane asylum in his final years.
But Schumann’s manic-depressive personality is exactly what makes his music (especially for piano) so fascinating. Kreisleriana—perhaps more than any of his other piano works (except maybe Carnaval)—offers (as I said in my program notes) “a huge, unpredictable tumble of forms, styles, moods, and emotions,” moving from one to the other in dozens of abrupt, even precipitous mood swings. I won’t bore you with all of them here; suffice it to say that O’Riley inhabited Schumann’s soul beautifully in these incredibly varied pieces, keeping his listeners on the edges of their seats wondering what was coming next and when. Even if you know this music well, artists like O’Riley can still make it seem full of surprises. Some of these pieces are fiendishly difficult—but our artist dispatched them with impressive technical skill and confidence.
After intermission came the great (and very difficult) Fantasie, Op. 17: perhaps Schumann’s “most original and cohesive piano work of larger scale and scope” (again, from my notes). Cast in three movements, it tends to strike the listener almost as a classical sonata—though, like most purely romantic works, it generally avoids thematic development in favor of heaping often wildly varied and unrelated themes atop each other with bipolar abandon. Still, part of Schumann’s genius lay in his ability—with some help from his better interpreters—to make such a thematic mishmash hang together. O’Riley plowed through this towering masterpiece with tremendous zest, unbridled passion, deep (but never cloying) sentiment, and technical wizardry. I held my breath as he approached several of the almost superhumanly difficult passages—but he handled them to near perfection (I have yet to hear a note-perfect performance of it in concert).
Speaking with him at the reception afterwards, I theorized that some of the zany antics he pulls on his NPR show (after all, he’s working with kids) reflect something of a mercurial goofy streak that helps him get inside Schumann’s head and heart better. “That’s the Irish in me,” he quipped.
OH, GOODY. Now I get to play the clamoring rock fan instead of the stuffy classical critic. That’s because I felt like a rock fan the following evening when Christopher appeared in “Between the Lines,” an entirely different sort of event, also at the Sottile. I feel entitled to call him by his first name now, as here he was more like one of the boys, wailin’ and jammin’ to the heady and captivating strains of the rock group, Radiohead. Besides, we’re friends on Facebook.
By way of background, Christopher came out some years back with a CD featuring his own vital and virtuosic arrangements of Radiohead’s music. It hit like a bombshell and I sold dozens of them at Millennium Music, my old CD store. Its immense popularity kick-started something of a global movement (of which Christopher remains the unofficial “godfather”) devoted to the interpretation of the best pop music by classically-trained (or jazz) artists. One such group is the Entropy Ensemble, a crack combo of young College of Charleston grads that’s now touring with a dynamite Radiohead show. Their members are pianist and founder Andrew Walker, violinist and co-founder Javier Orman, Ben Wells on stand-up bass, cellist Lonnie Root, and Stuart White on percussion; their artistic adviser is Julia Harlow.
But wait—that’s not all. In addition to The Entropy bunch, cross-disciplinary interest was added by seven accomplished dancers from Charleston’s Annex Dance Company, plus a sonorous ten-voice mixed chorus that (I suspect) comes from the Trippintones, the College’s nifty a cappella group. Add to that Lauren Duffie’s imaginative lighting, a computer-generated light show from the College’s computer science department, and inspired stage direction from Corey Webb (with support from several other departments), and the result was a stupendous show that pleased and stimulated on multiple levels.
Members of Entropy Ensemble
Out of the thirteen sets offered, two were almost purely classical in nature. Leading off was a straightforward, but lovely solo piano rendition—with a single dancer—of Claude Debussy’s Arabesque No. 1. Doing the keyboard honors was Huey Waldron, a multitalented pianist, singer, and composer/arranger. He sang in the chorus, too. About midway through the evening came J.S. Bach’s magnificent (and bloody difficult) Chaconne for solo violin—again interpreted by a solo dancer. There’s a personal (and rather emotional) connection here. The very fancy fiddling was courtesy of Javier Orman, who, along with Huey and many of the Entropy group, often performed in my Sunday afternoon concert series at Millennium Music. What a joy it’s been to watch them develop—as human beings and as artists—from talented kids into finished professionals.
The remaining sets presented mostly Radiohead material in varied arrangements; some with dancers and/or singers, some without. Christopher appeared twice for amazing solo renditions, and jammed happily with the others in several other sets. Along the way, we heard many classic Radiohead pieces: All of them were fabulous, though I particularly enjoyed ‘Subterranean Homesick Alien, ‘Backdrifts,’ ‘All I Need,’ and the concluding ‘Everything in its Right Place.”
How fortuitous and fortunate for us, that right here in Chucktown Christopher found such eager and capable young musicians to work with—many of whom owe him a profound debt of gratitude for his singular influence and inspiration. Together, they showed us some intriguing and entertaining ways to stretch the boundaries of great music as we know it.
So thank you, Christopher, for sharing your multifaceted approach to music with us. We hope you’ll come back sometime and do it again. Only next time, why not bring your From the Top show with you and let Charleston bask in the glow of all three of your remarkable faces.
So glad you wrote about this terrific event. The dancing, the music and the atmosphere was truly refreshing! Collaborations of this kind always make the experience that much more significant. Kudos to all of the artists involved, college students and professionals!