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...program alternated between works by Japanese and American composers, more than half of which, including the piece by Kissel herself, were written by women. Such new music for a relatively new instrument creates an interesting circumstance for most audiences: expectation defined by the instrument itself, rather than a repertoire of standard works or recordings of well known performers. In many ways, the marimba is a very limited instrument. The wood bars that generate the sound make subtle fluctuations of pitch (vibrato) impossible. The metal tubes under each bar--the resonators--provide only a few seconds worth of audible sustain...
...brief, meditative piece dominated by a single, poignant melody. Predominantly homophonic, registral spacing and changes in tempo demarcated the basic two-part form. Though perhaps a bit too short and lacking development, the B-1work succeeded in conveying a strong sentiment, proving again the expressive capacity of the instrument...
...lyricism is a challenge, rhythm is entirely idiomatic to this instrument. The program was dominated by groove; that is, in almost every piece the music was underpinned by rhythmic regularity, be it the ocean-like undulations of the opening chords of Keiko Abe's Memories of the Seashore, the fantastic polyrhythms of Rhythm Song by paul Zadbeck or the intricate arpeggios, executed at amazing speeds, of Keiko Abe's Michi...
Michi, introduced by Kissel as one of the most powerful pieces written for marimba, easily lived up to its preface, exploiting the entire dynamic and registral capacity of the instrument. Beginning with complex arpeggios, the piece unfolds into a mass of sound of almost orchestral density. The abrupt pause that followed filled the room with a tremendous resonance. Kissel succeeded in making not only the instrument but the entire room sing with a resonance of unprecedented duration. After a contrasting section in the upper register, compositionally disappointing in Abe's almost banal use of functional harmony, the return...
...works, made the program a bit too homogenous. The one admittedly "atonal" work, Two Movements for Marimba by Toshimitsu Tanaka, provided a welcome contrast to the harmonic vocabulary of the other works. With a change of mallets, Kissel brought out the greatest diversity of color and texture from the instrument. Perhaps one of the most dramatic works on the program, the piece's opening gestural fragments are later contrasted with homophonic and polyphonic textures. Arriving at a moving climax, Kissel superimposed complex passage work over a furiously pounded drone in the bass...