Symphonic spontaneity.

• Author: Holston, Mark
• Position: Music Notes

Mexico City Woodwind Quintet Visiones Panamericanas (Urtext JBCC051)

Individually, the members of this chamber group perform with Mexico's best symphonies--the National Symphony Orchestra, the Mexico City Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Mexico State Symphony Orchestra. Collectively, they've become well known since the mid-1990s as one of the leading woodwind quintets in the Americas. Visiones Panamericanas, the group's third release, builds on their desire to perform new works by Mexican composers and expands their repertoire to include styles and composers not of Mexican origin. Cross-cultural connections that link the pieces to Mexico, however, are always present.

One example is Mexican composer Eugenio Toussaint's "Mambo." Inspired by the work of Cuban composer and mambo popularizer Damaso Perez Prado, who lived in Mexico City for the last half of his life, the piece shapes this characteristic Afro-Cuban rhythm through the staccato articulations of the piccolo and French horn, while the bassoon and clarinet carry the theme. At one point, the clarinetist scratches the keys of his instrument to approximate the sound and rhythms of a guiro. On Cuban composer Paquito D'Rivera's "Wapango," subtle references to the Mexican hua-pango style can be detected in the piece he wrote in the mid-1970s for a saxophone quartet. Its dancing, playful quality is well suited to the quintet's instrumentation--flute, oboe, bassoon, horn, and clarinet. On other works, such as Cuban composer Tania Leon's "De Memorias" and Puerto Rican Roberto Sierra's "Essays," the mood is thoroughly contemporary--indeed avant-garde leaning--as dark, often dissonant-sounding chords are over-layed with unconventional time signatures.

Compelling and often provocative, the performances sport a feeling of genuine spontaneity by the five musicians who confirm their credentials as virtuosi at every turn. The CD package is equally impressive, with a detailed booklet translated into four languages and original art.

The Harp Consort Missa Mexicana (HMU 907293)

Spanish composer Juan Gutierrez de Padilla, maestro of the cathedral of Puebla, Mexico, in the mid-seventeenth century, organized and conducted what is believed to have been the finest such ensemble of its day in Spain's territories in the Americas. Modeled along the lines of such church-based groups in the motherland, the composition of the ensemble and its instrumentation and repertoire reflected the baroque-grounded music...