The music of Scottish composer James MacMillan (b. 1959) is very much of the hit-or-miss variety. When his ideas work, they work spectacularly. (See for example his Symphony No. 2 on BIS.) When they miss, they’re quite wide of the mark, as on this Black Box release of works centering on the cello. The broader array of orchestral forces clearly allows MacMillan to flesh out his ideas and give them considerable intellectual depth. But in a simple sonata setting, his ideas merely appear vapid. The good news, however, is that this disc brings cellist Raphael Wallfisch back into the public eye (or ear, as the case may be). Wallfisch has a huge discography of performance work on the Chandos label and has yet to turn in an uninspired performance.
His work on this release is no exception. Fourteen Little Pictures takes the cello–accompanied by the piano–through several primly characterized variations, and these variations only hold together because of Wallfisch’s sympathetic readings. His inclinations are to highlight the natural warmth of the cello while the pianist, James York, merely bangs away at his instrument. (None of this is York’s fault, either. It’s the writing.) York, however, does manage to exonerate himself in a piece titled Angel, a four-minute affair of single notes interspersed by long stretches of silence, à la Morton Feldman, but without Feldman’s broken rhythms or fractured tonalities.
The major work here is the Cello Sonata No. 1 and it has more to redeem it than any other work on this release–once again owing primarily to Wallfisch’s supreme musicianship and interpretive instincts. The bracketing movements of this work are filled with gorgeous cello passages that alone almost make this disc a worthwhile addition to anyone’s collection of contemporary classical music. As it is, composer MacMillan needs a clearer sense of direction, a greater vision to give his music meaning. These works come across as mere graduate student noodlings, despite the best efforts of two fine performers.
