[...]
The premiere performance of the Morawetz Harp Concerto was electrifying.
Here we have another example of the great contribution the Guelph festival is
making to the development of contemporary Canadian music. By commissioning
compositions such as this and by ensuring their performances by first-rate
Canadian artists such as Mr. Brott and harpist Erica Goodman, the Edward Johnson
Foundation is doing a great service.
The concerto is colourful, expressive music in a conservative contemporary
idiom, a work of fine craftsmanship which uses the harp in fresh and dramatic
ways.
Erica Goodman came on stage holding her tuning fork with particular purpose, for
it had a special task to perform. As well as helping to tune strings between
movements, this fork actually got to strike the strings during the second
movement. But this and other percussive effects were never gimmicky, and an
impressive dramatic power and mysteriousness pervades the piece. The concerto
evokes something of that sense of space, sometimes brooding and ominous, which
characterizes much Canadian artistic experience.
[...]
