Dana Booher
For anyone attending saxophonist Dana Booher’s recital at Sunset Center last night, two things were immediately apparent: Mr. Booher is a virtuoso of the highest order, and he is a master at putting together a whale of a program.
When it was announced at last year’s Carmel Music Society instrumental Competition, that the grand prize winner was a saxophonist, there were probably many people who wondered, “Are we going to enjoy hearing a concert program next year solely devoted to saxophone music?”
Well, last night we had our answer. When young Dana Booher traipsed out on stage – he looks young enough to be a high school basketball player – he seemed bright-eyed and bushy tailed and ready to tackle anything. His youthful exuberance spilled over to his playing and won us over with his total command of the instrument and his high level of musicianship that made everything he played sound easy and natural.
The opening work of the evening was Darius Milhaud’s two-piano suite Scaramouche, arranged by the composer for piano and alto sax. Assisting Booher was the excellent pianist, David Hughes, who performed most of the works on the first half of the program. Scaramouche not only worked surprisingly well for piano and sax, but produced one unexpected dividend. In the second movement, Modéré, the long melodic lines played on soprano sax were much more effective than in the two-piano version – unfortunately long notes on the piano immediately begin to decay, whereas on the saxophone they can be prolonged and shaped with an infinite variety of dynamic shadings, which is precisely what Booher did in an artistic and satisfying manner. This was the most expressive sax playing I have ever heard.
The Aria (1936) by Eugene Bozza was a gorgeous piece that was heavily ornamented and embellished in the Baroque manner and gave Booher ample opportunity to demonstrate his many levels of sensitivity. Saxophonist Matt Evans, a member of the Panoptic Quartet, joined Booher on stage for the next work, “Concert Piece for Two Alto Saxophones (1933)” by Paul Hindemith. This turned out to be a charming piece with amusing imitative repartee between the two instruments.
After the Hindemith work, Booher returned to stage to announce that he was making a substitution, and instead of the piece by Desenclos, he was going to play the Prelude from Bach’s Suite No. 1 for unaccompanied Cello, a work that he fell in love with through a performance by Yo Yo Ma. His playing in this Prelude showed amazing agility, subtle phrasing and a beautiful long closing cadence, where I found myself holding my breath.
The first half of the concert wound up with the “Carmen Fantasy” – themes from Bizet’s opera arranged originally for flute by François Borne, but heard here in an adaptation for sax and piano by Fourmeau. Although nothing remotely approaches Vladimir Horowitz’s transcendental piano version of the “Carmen Fantasy,” this piano & sax arrangement certainly had its moments, and the thrilling conclusion was worth the wait through the less interesting parts.
José Zayas-Caban, Kristen McKeon, Matt Evans and Dana Booher
After intermission, we were introduced to the Panoptic Quartet, consisting, in addition to Dana Booher on soprano sax, Kristen McKeon on alto, Matt Evans on tenor and José Zayas-Caban on baritone. After a charming performance of the “Arrival of the Queen of Sheba” by Handel, came the meatiest selection of the evening, Premier Quatuor, Op. 53, by Jean-Baptiste Singlée. Booher announced from the stage that the composer was a friend of the inventor of the saxophone, Adolphe Sax, and this work from 1857 has the distinction of being the first concerted quartet written for members of the saxophone family. This turned out to be a charming and well written piece that delighted us from beginning to end.
The concert wound down with a group of three tangos by Astor Piazzolla. Jazzy and slyly humorous, they were a hoot! The group gave us one encore, a bluesy arrangement of “Don’t get around much anymore.” Although what I really wanted to hear was “Harlem Nocturne,” what we did hear was pretty OK!
End
