On first hearing this disc I was reminded of similar experiences with certain “modern music” LPs in the 1960s, on labels such as CRI or Louisville or even among Mercury’s Eastman recordings. Once in a while you’d know from the first measures that the music, no matter how well crafted the tunes and counterpoint, was just going to be totally forgettable. And that’s pretty much how this collection struck me. Chinese-born composer Bright Sheng can write music of immediately evident value–H’un (Lacerations), Seven Tunes Heard in China, and the clarinet concertino, for instance. However, in this disc’s two larger works, he’s not as adept or compelling. Sure, the music is well crafted, and it exudes a certain exoticism, but it’s a kind of commonplace exoticism, the predictable pentatonic scales and heterophonic textures otherwise presenting little of distinction.
The four-movement China Dreams is the more engaging work of the two, a pleasant half-hour that just as quickly fades from memory. Nanking! Nanking! falls flattest. Here, Sheng uses an inherently quiet instrument, a Chinese version of the lute, in a 26-minute concerto meant to bear witness to the 1937 Japanese rape-massacres in China’s then-capital, which claimed more than 300,000 lives. Quiet stretches that feature the solo instrument–ably played by Zhang Qiang–are heard in alternation with brass-laden chords that sound like they belong in a James Bond film score by John Barry.
But wait. In between those two 25-minute pieces is Two Poems from the Sung Dynasty, at once memorable and expressive. The first of the two poems, dealing with regret, is short enough (three minutes) that it is virtually a prelude to the 10-minute, fiercely grief-laden main event, a setting of the poem “Sheng sheng man” by Li Qing Zhao. This is deeply emotional music, portraying a painful degree of personal heartbreak while also lamenting the fall of a dynasty to foreign invaders. I can’t vouch for soprano Juliana Gondek’s Chinese pronunciation, but she strongly conveys knife-edged anguish.
Alas, there is another parallel here with the “new music” recordings from the ’60s: As was often the case with those, on this Naxos disc the performances are thin and colorless, while the sound is only serviceable. If you’re interested, China Dreams is available on a better-sounding BIS recording with the Singapore Symphony Orchestra.
