Wiancko is a gifted young violin virtuoso, composer, and arranger, whose talent and imagination have catapulted her into the upper echelon of the country’s musical scene. In her triple threat career she simultaneously has been a lauded violin soloist with some of our top symphony orchestras, an important member of the highly praised East Coast Chamber Orchestra (and leading arranger of some of its repertoire), and a successful composer of music for an astonishing variety of genres and media. Variously, she has collaborated with such luminaries as Yo-Yo Ma, Emanuel Ax, and Steve Reich; soloed with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic; written an opera premièred at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; and helped create music for important films and commercials. Not to mention extensive engagement in the distinctive field of indie rock bands and electro-acoustic music. That’s impressive and there’s much more.
Wiancko has provided several compositions for the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, many of which fall into a rather hybrid genre that she calls her “re-imagining” works. These are compositions—or rather, “re-compositions” shall we say–of works from the past, often the eighteenth century, wherein she works them over completely, tapping them for the raw materials for essentially new compositions, but preserving the basic identity of the source. This approach to musical creativity is not new of course, but it is rather popular these days with many of the young composers. All of the arts since the beginning of time have drawn upon the works of previous artists for inspiration, reinterpretation, and as an inspirational repository of materials for new visions. The various approaches to this in music are myriad. A simple melody, chord progressions, a bass line, or even the whole weft of a complete composition can be the basis for new works. This is true from the first polyphonic compositions of the Notre Dame School of the Middle Ages, masses of the Renaissance—all periods right up to jazz artists playing variations over, say, Gershwin’s “I Got Rhythm” or the blues format.
Composers of the Baroque period in music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were particularly fond of variations composed to familiar tunes or bass lines. “La Follia”—perhaps the most renowned of them–is a simple chord progression and melody used by over a hundred and fifty composers over the centuries as the basis for variations. The names are all familiar: Corelli, Handel, Bach, and later, Rachmaninoff. Even in the second movement of Beethoven’s fifth symphony, you can hear his brief, clear take on it. One of the most popular of all these many uses of it was “La Follia” Variations by the Italian violin virtuoso and composer, Francesco Geminiani. Student of Scarlatti and Corelli, he is known for his concerto grossos and works for solo violin, as well as his treatise on violin playing. He spent most of his adult life in the British Isles. As a student of Arcangelo Corelli, he redid some of his teacher’s violin sonatas into concerto grossos, one of which, Concerto Grosso No. 12, “La Follia,” is the basis for Wiancko’s “re-imagining.”
Wiancko’s take on Geminiani’s work is subtle, largely preserving much of the familiar bass line, harmonies, and melody in almost two dozen iterations of the short, original iconic structure. Like everyone before her who essayed variations on the original, she dazzles us with an apparently infinite number of musical ideas. Tempos vary, an array of Baroque dance rhythms parade, innumerable melodies and counter-melodies beguile, and the bass line constantly changes guises. Textures never remain the same. While at first, her arrangement seems to just echo the eighteenth-century Geminiani, gradually we hear her moving into new sonic territory from later centuries. As we approach the last variants, she slyly integrates modern, lush harmonies, and even a Latin flavored dance, replete with claves! Finally, near the end there’s an enigmatic forte “thump” from out of the blue, and the claves rejoin us. And perhaps most tantalizing of all is a little glissando at the end that sounds for all the world like a human, high soprano sigh. It’s all a refreshing and interesting re-examination of an old musical friend. New wine in old bottles, so to speak.
–Wm. E. Runyan
©2021 William E. Runyan