Ryker's eloquent baton/MSO's next: Opera Carmen/Artists T. Unna, V. Zubiri

Last week, at the Philamlife Auditorium, Robert Ryker, music director of the Tokyo Sinfonia, guest-conducted the Manila Symphony Orchestra II. This consists of young, highly talented instrumentalists whose forbears were members of the first Manila Symphony Orchestra founded in 1926 by Alexander Lippay and sponsored by the Manila Symphony Society headed by Mrs. Trinidad F. Legarda for 25 years.

MSO II members are now being trained by Conductor Arturo Molina under the auspices of PREDIS (Philippine Research for Developing Soloists) established by the late violinist Basilio Manalo (who earlier mentored the youngsters) and Sr. Mary Placid Abejo, dean of the SSC music department.

By American standards, Ryker is a small man; by the same standards, he is a man of prankish humor, judging by the remarks he made before conducting each selection. With amusing asides, he informed his listeners that he would be taking them around or half-way around the globe: to France via Debussy’s Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun, to Russia via Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, to Germany via Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks and finally, to Spain via Camino Real (The Royal Road), this composed by the American Alfred Reed and arranged for the orchestra by another American, Ryker himself.

In Debussy’s music, the solo flute announced the entrance of the faun (half man, half goat); the soft, languid, lambent tones of the strings and woodwinds followed, delineating the slow, gentle movements of the faun. The extended pianissimos had occasional intense passages for contrast, but the piece in its entirety delicately evoked Debussy’s hazy, vague — impressionistic — image of a faun slithering across a meadow on a quiet afternoon.

In stark, dramatic contrast, the orchestra was consistently loud and blaring in Stravinsky’s Petrouchka, its vibrant, abruptly changing rhythms, its thunderous percussive effects, its brassy interludes telling the story of a charlatan and his three puppets: Petrouchka, a ballerina and a Moor. There were scenes of the Russian ballerina dancing, of a noisy, bustling carnival, of a frenzied battle during which the Moor slew Petrouchka — all these portrayed through the harshest, brassiest tonal effects.

Differing from the composition of Debussy in one extreme and from that of Stravinsky in the opposite extreme, was Strauss’ Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks. His music has been described as “classical in structure, Romantic in feeling, warm with pleasing melodies and gracious with conventional harmonies.”

To this listener, the score did not quite match this description. It sounded unmelodious, discordant for the most part and percussive. The orchestration, relatively modern in its contrapuntal devices, expressed power, passion as well as rapturous joy in the tuttis as Till Eulenspiegel went about playing tricks on innocent victims.

The trip to Spain via the Camino Real was most welcome to an audience familiar with Spanish music which it has long admired and loved. To my mind, only Russian dances match the spirit and sparkle of Spanish dances. Ryker’s energy and vitality reflected the latter’s robust abandon in the most fiery fashion.

Ryker’s over-all performance, intensely focused, produced an eloquent depiction of each composer’s style and proclivities, while drawing the fullest concentration from the audience. The MSO asserted its position securely as one of our leading orchestras.

Approbation for both the conductor and the MSO was hearty and clangorous.

MSO’s Next: Bizet’s Carmen

Bizet’s four-act opera “Carmen” will be presented on Oct. 27, 8 p.m. at SSC’s St. Cecilia’s Hall, by the Lyric Opera of the Philippines. The MSO will provide the orchestral accompaniment for its “soaring melodies, lively rhythms” in “an entertaining story of intrigue, seduction, love and heroism.”

Unna, Zubiri art exhibit

Presumably to the immense surprise of the diplomatic peers of Mexican Ambassador Tomas Javier Clavillo Unna, as well as of his friends in government and social circles, he will reveal himself as poet and painter on Oct. 2 at the Yuchengco Museum where an exhibition of his poems and paintings — Traces of Sadness”/“Sentimientos Filipinos” — will open at 6:30 p.m. and close on Oct. 31.

On Oct. 16 in the Manila Pen at 6:30 p.m. Vicky F. Zubiri will open her “Point of Perspective Exhibit, Inspired Moments in Chinese and Western Watercolor.” It will be for the benefit of Rayomar Outreach Foundation.

Once again, Vicky amazes with her multi-faceted talent, hectic as her schedule already is as chairman of Filfest which presents cultural events (predominantly musical) at the Insular Life Auditorium in Alabang.