Avi Avital ART OF THE MANDOLIN

 

ART OF THE MANDOLIN

 

Avi Avital J.S. BACH

Avi Avital is one of the world's leading classical mandolinists, gracing concert halls from Tel Aviv to Munich to New York. But the young Israeli says he discovered the mandolin only by coincidence.

"When I was a kid, I had a neighbor who played the mandolin — the neighbor from upstairs," Avital tells NPR's Guy Raz. "It was one of those buildings where all the doors are open and all the neighbors are friends and more close than relatives. It was like one big family.

"I arrived to the age where I wanted to do something after school, and I liked music very much, so when my mother asked me, 'What would you like to play?' I said, 'Mandolin, like my neighbor.'"

Avital says it was also a coincidence that he was able to learn to play classical mandolin in his hometown of Beersheba, a small city in the desert of southern Israel.

It is a seductive sound and his playing is dazzling. Avital has transcribed for the mandolin, music originally written for three other instruments. The texture is different without being distorted. He achieves a bright and brilliant articulation in the works for harpsichord, a more lyrical virtuosity in the violin concerto and a mesmerising woody legato in the flute sonata, demonstrating not just the adaptability of the instrument but the versatility of his playing as well. His "tempi" are brisk and energised without being rushed and the slow movements are taken with becalming sensitivity . . . [the musicians are] doing more than ample justice to the sounds of the baroque. (Shamistha de Soysa)

Avi Avital / Omer Avital AVITAL MEETS AVITAL

Two superb musicians of international stature – classically trained mandolin player Avi Avital and jazz bassist Omer Avital – have combined their creative energy and set out in search of their cultural roots. Classical music meets jazz, tradition meets modernism, East meets West. Now Avital Meets Avital presents the fascinating results of what is surely one of the most unusual gatherings in classical music.

Early in their careers Avi Avital and Omer Avital already took their musical bearings on the North African traditions of their families and absorbed influences from the multi-cultural melting pot of Israeli society, indulging their fondness for western music. Today the Israeli mandolin player Avi Avital is one of the most accomplished and best-known masters of his instrument. At his concerts with leading orchestras and musicians he is celebrated by fans and media all over the world for his thrilling renditions of klezmer tunes, baroque compositions and his great love, contemporary art music. In 2010 he became the world’s first mandolinist ever to be nominated for the coveted Grammy^® Award. His namesake and decades-long friend, the New York-based composer and bass player Omer Avital, stands in high repute as one of the most adventurous and visionary minds in contemporary jazz. Put them together, and two completely antithetical worlds of music overlap.

“The basic idea behind this album was the collaboration of two artists, one who focuses mainly on classical music while the other is primarily at home in jazz.” Thus Avi Avital describes Avital Meets Avital, a work full of exciting opposites and contradictions that Avi and Omer blend into a spellbinding unity. Avital Meets Avital is pure unadulterated exoticism: oriental melodies clash with North African rhythms, swinging jazz improvisations with classical mandolin playing. It’s a musical journey reaching far back to their roots, preserving the legacy of their shared culture while giving it a wholly new and modern guise.

As a result, Avital Meets Avital covers a musical spectrum as varied and exciting as the culture of Israeli itself. Lively dance-floor tunes bursting with joie de vivre alternate with slow, melancholy ballads; classically sculpted motifs merge with free improvisation, western jazz harmony, standard compositional technique, Moroccan beats, cantabile melodies and lilting rhythms. (Deutsche Grammophon)

Avi Avital VIVALDI

If Avi Avital’s intention is to do for the mandolin what Andrés Segovia did for the classical guitar, he’s already well on the way. Appropriate then that this, his third and possibly best release to date, should feature three Vivaldi concertos popular with guitarists. This homage to Venice’s favourite musical son in many ways picks up where Avital’s terrific debut recording of JS Bach concertos left off. This time, the mandolin’s on home turf, not only returning to its Italian roots but in one case rejoicing in a concerto actually written for it.

Avital and the superb Venice Baroque Orchestra make the C major Mandolin Concerto, RV425, their own, the pizzicato strings and organ continuo the rich clay into which Avital carves his crisp, fluid lines. But even better is the utterly thrilling account of ‘Summer’ from The Four Seasons. Here, as throughout, Avital’s astonishingly smooth legato playing is broken up by rapid détaché passages and propulsive strums that sweep through the music like electrical storms, perfectly complementing the orchestra’s crisp, light string-playing and spooky sul ponticello effects in the slow movement.

As a respite from the concertos’ high drama, there’s an exquisite account of the C major Trio Sonata, originally for violin and lute with continuo. Avital again takes the violin’s part, while harpsichord duties fall to the brilliant Mahan Esfahani, recently signed to DG. The gentle final track, where Avital and friends accompany tenor Juan Diego Flórez in the charming gondolier’s song ‘La biondina in gondoleta’, feels just right. (Gramophone)