ReviewGuitarist Bowman contributes versatility,
talent at BAMA event Few cities can boast new music forums as active as the Birmingham Art Music Alliance. Most of the works this tenacious organization presents will never achieve masterpiece status, and its concerts won't set any attendance records. Yet they consistently turn up gems. Saturday's BAMA event at Hill Recital Hall featured guitarist Paul Bowman, whose passion for the moderns has landed him solo engagements at places like Carnegie Recital Hall and Alice Tully Hall. The concert had Bowman busy on all six works, four of them premieres. An exceptionally versatile musician, he negotiated a pastiche of styles with ease. Equally devoted to the cause, violinist Karen Bentley Pollick performed with enthusiasm and expertise in four of the pieces. For his "Ten Strings," a duo for guitar and violin, Monroe Golden made an about face from his unique brand of microtonal minimalism. The open strings of the violin and guitar were his palette, violin slides and glissandos his brush strokes. Suggestions of country fiddling and swing added to the color. Dorothy Hindman reprised her "Needlepoint," a poignant evocation for solo guitar that was inspired by her mother's battle with cancer. Repetitive, relaxing arpeggios create the backdrop for dissonant outpourings that seemed to reflect pain and anger. Joseph Landers' gentle "Eclogue" used an alto recorder and cello, played by Lori Ardovino and Craig Hultgren, to create an effective pastorale. Matthew Scott Phillips' "An Approach to Destiny" and Mary Elizabeth Neal's "Duo for Violin and Guitar" were less engaging works that drew more on early 20th century styles. Like much of Charles Norman Mason's music, "Scrapings," for violin and guitar, is a smile inducer. Blips of synthesized and pre-recorded sounds combined with jazzy violin riffs and steady guitar rhythms. Recorded voices, reciting poetry by Patrick Barron, seeped into the complex, but transparent fabric. Michael Huebner |