Contemporary music more or less comes under the same heading, and the CD Wild Grass from the Beijing New Music Ensemble (北京新樂團) doesn’t contain any great surprises. It features pieces, most of them for a small group of instruments, by two composers, Zhou Long (周龍) and Chen Yi (陳怡). Both are in their mid-50s and teaching in the US.
This ensemble should be given its due, however. It’s apparently the only independent group dedicated to performing this sort of music anywhere in China, and this is its first CD. Even so, though most of the items on it might go well with film of strange deep-sea life-forms emerging from the oceanic gloom, it’s hard to imagine any widespread enthusiasm for this abstruse style in its own right. The most energetic item, I found, was the last of Zhou’s Taigu Rhyme set.
Finally, DGM has issued a CD of various items by John Tavener, either written or adapted for violin. The soloist is the young Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti. Many of Tavener’s pieces offered here owe their inspiration to Indian ragas, but on the whole I prefer their Indian originals. The publishers clearly anticipate a less-than-gigantic following for this music, so placed first on the CD is Vaughan Williams’ well-worn piece for violin and orchestra, The Lark Ascending.
It should be noted that both these CDs seek to meld Eastern traditions with Western ones. In neither case is the result overwhelmingly convincing, leaving you with the conclusion that musical traditions have their own characteristic strengths, but don’t necessarily travel all that well.
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