Steven Stucky (b. 1949) is the very model of the modern academic composer, supported by commissions and subsidies of various kinds, and keeping down a day job at a respected university. He won a Pulitzer Prize for his Second Concerto for Orchestra in 2005, as if that means anything these days. After all, if John Adams could snag one for his unspeakable On the Transmigration of Souls, then anything is possible. The most interesting thing about these pieces is the time and attention Stucky must have lavished on at least the first two in finding interesting titles.
Spirit Voices consists of seven sketches inspired by mystical beings of various cultures. They all sound pretty much the same here, at least harmonically speaking. The work opens with Evelyn Glennie hammering away, and shrieking now and then, a tired device of which it seems only George Crumb holds the secret. Otherwise, the music meanders pretty much aimlessly before waking up for a minute or two in the fifth movement, “Coyote”, before subsiding back into its habitual torpor. It’s a bore, which is saying a lot for music featuring a percussion solo much of the time.
Pinturas de Tamayo ostensibly depicts five paintings by the great Mexican artist, but evidently Stucky wasn’t trying very hard to characterize them in an expressively meaningful (to anyone else) way. Paul Griffiths in his notes praises Stucky for not making a “condescending attempt at a ‘Latino’ atmosphere.” Well, how about a respectful Latino atmosphere, or any atmosphere at all for that matter? Indeed, the more you listen the clearer it becomes that Stucky’s music consists largely of inhibitions: not tonal, but not entirely atonal; not melodic, but not amelodic; not rhythmic, nor arrhythmic. It’s a catalog of negativity.
One thing Stucky can do is score brilliantly for the orchestra, but then this is a given today. His brilliance is entirely generic. The finale of the Concerto for Orchestra (thank God it has no other title) features predictably exciting brass writing, but ultimately comes off as Shakespearian: “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” One presumes these well recorded performances give the composer (who was present) everything that he asks for, and one cares even less. Give the performers kudos, though, for handling a thankless task with unflagging professionalism and courtesy, and give BIS credit for allowing us to hear, in typically fine sound, what we aren’t missing.
