Tokyo Metropolitan SO, Hiroshi Wakasugi - Toru Takemitsu, Orchestral Works II: Gemeaux; Dream/Window; Spirit Garden (1995)

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Tokyo Metropolitan SO, Hiroshi Wakasugi - Toru Takemitsu, Orchestral Works II: Gemeaux; Dream/Window; Spirit Garden (1995)

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"Gemeaux" (1971-1986) is one of Takemitsu's grandest works in terms of musical arc, scoring and length of gestation. It is written for two orchestras with two conductors, and with solo trombone at one orchestra and solo oboe at the other. As half of it was written during Takemitsu's "modernist apogee" of the turn of the '70s, we find a host of extended techniques, and at one point the soloists even speak through the mouthpieces of their instruments. As the other half of the work belongs to Takemitsu's late period, we find a successful of elegant self-contained gestures, his musical "gardens". The synthesis of two creative periods, however, makes for a piece singular in its impact in Takemitsu's oeuvre. I've heard "Gemeaux" called a love song, but whatever it is, the dialogue between the soloists and their orchestras is mesmerising, and the huge crescendo at the end (unique in Takemitsu's output) is possibly the greatest close of an orchestral work I've ever heard.

The other two pieces on the disc are from Takemitsu's late period, You might read that they both happen to show some interest in twelve-tone serialism, but don't let that scare you away. Though Takemitsu had a great interest in numerology and pitch class wizardry, the result is writing much in keeping with his interest in a serene and ordered soundscape. "Dream/Window" (1985) and "Spirit Garden" (1994) are among the most varied of Takemitsu's late works, and the former is my favourite of this era. The performances here work much better than Knussen's reading of "Dream/Window" on a Deutsche Grammophon disc or Alsop's reading of "Spirit Garden" on Naxos.

Review by Christopher Culver, Amazon.com

COMPOSER'S NOTES:

GÉMEAUX for oboe, trombone, two orchestras and two conductors

Commenced in 1971, Gémeaux was conceived as a work for two orchestras located spatially apart from one another, with Heinz Holliger and Vinko Globokar as the respective oboe and trombone soloists. The work consists of the following four sections:

1 Strophe
2 Genesis
3 Traces
4 Antistrophe.

As suggested by the title, the notion of the number 'two' pervades the work. There is also considerable in­fluence from an excerpt from a poem by Shuzo Takigu­chi entitled Handmade Proverbs:

Your eyes, your hands, your breasts…
You are twins in yourself.

The music is more a large‑scale collection of chamber works than an orchestral work and requires of each performer an extremely high level of virtuosity. It is a love story set to music depicting the plight of two beings who sometimes come into conflict with one another but who, through love, become one.

DREAM/WINDOW for orchestra

The title Dreaml/Window is taken from the Buddhist name of a Zen priest of the Muromachi Period, Muso (mu=dream, so=window) Soseki (1275‑1351). Among the many famous gardens designed by Muso Soseki is that of the Saihoji Temple (popularly known as the 'Moss Temple') in Kyoto. My music has been profoundly influenced by Japanese historic gardens. For example, Arc for piano and orchestra (1963‑66/76) and In an Autumn Garden in the complete version for gagaku orchestra (1979) were based on relatively concrete images of gardens.

How was I to describe Kyoto through this music? To transform Muso Soseki's moss‑covered temple gardens into music is to grasp but an extremely small part of this complex urban space. In Kyoto a progressive tendency coexists with an entrenched conservatism, concealing a dynamism different from that of Tokyo or Osaka. Beneath the hushed serenity of Kyoto, the gears of change grind on and on without cease. At the core of my image of Kyoto is this struggle of such opposing tendencies. The name 'Muso' (i.e. Dream Window) seemed the perfect symbol for this struggle.

I use 'dream' and 'window' as metaphors for the two contradictory dynamisms of facing inwards and outwards. To make the inner and the outer resound simultaneously is the prime object of the music. Accordingly, it was necessary to alter the arrangement of the orchestra from the standard. A small ensemble (flute, clarinet and string quartet) is placed between the right and left string sections at the centre front. Yet this piece is not a concerto. This small ensemble is not only one part of the entire orchestra but also a microcosm symbolising an orchestra in and of itself. One might even call it an inner self. At the centre of the orchestra, four instruments (two harps, celesta and guitar) create a passageway of clear timbre as an intermediary between the outer and the inner. The brass, woodwind and percussion sections are positioned at the centre rear. The form of this music resembles that of a dream. While the details are clearly defined, their arrangement is left up to the fortuities of the self‑propelling narrative. While repeating itself and revealing itself in a seemingly incoherent manner like the fragments of a dream, the musical sequence gradually forms itself into a tonal image with D as the primary note.

SPIRIT GARDEN for orchestra

Spirit Garden was commissioned by the Hida Furukawa International Music Festival and so named as a metaphor for the sacred ground, endowed with an inviolable dignity, of the festival's home, Furukawacho, in Gifu Prefecture. At the same time, the title is intimately connected to the structure of the work.

The work is based on a twelve‑note row from which three chords each of four notes are generated. These chords, accompanied by changes in tone colour (sometimes expanded, sometimes contracted), are an ever‑present undercurrent, vibrating at the fundamental, from which a musical garden is composed.

The 'objects' of sound placed about the garden ‑ in some cases the 'object' is the melody, in other cases it is fragments serving as the tone colour structure ‑ are all derived from the basic raw material of the twelve‑note row, and aim through use of that material at achieving a cosmological (musical) unity. The 'objects' of sound placed about the garden change their forms through the changes in the angle of viewing which result from moving around the garden. Spirit Garden is not intended to be programme music. It is my experiment with and ongoing inquiry into orchestral colour and melody.

Toru Takemitsu

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Tokyo Metropolitan SO, Hiroshi Wakasugi - Toru Takemitsu, Orchestral Works II: Gemeaux; Dream/Window; Spirit Garden (1995)

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Tokyo Metropolitan SO, Hiroshi Wakasugi - Toru Takemitsu, Orchestral Works II: Gemeaux; Dream/Window; Spirit Garden (1995)

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Tokyo Metropolitan SO, Hiroshi Wakasugi - Toru Takemitsu, Orchestral Works II: Gemeaux; Dream/Window; Spirit Garden (1995)

Close