Gran Fanfare (review)

For more than thirty years, Venezuela has promoted classical music among its children and young adults like no other country in the world. The National System of Venezuelan Youth and Children's Orchestras (known as el sistema) is perhaps best known throughout the world for the Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra (SBYO), whose video performance of Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story dances under Gustavo Dudamel created such a stir.

The exuberance and total musical commitment exhibited by the Simon Bolivar Orchestra is also displayed by the Venezue lan Brass Ensemble (VBE). Founded in 2003 by its director, trumpeter Thomas Clamor, Gran Fanfare is their first DVD; the group also has a CD (We Got Rhythm! on EMI) with some of the same repertoire. However, to hear them play captures only part of their magic. The visual aspects, especially in some of the later works, incorporate everything from spinning instruments to trumpets being played into the bells of tubas and horns, a technique I have never before seen.

One of the works that is on both discs is the DVD's title work, by the young Ven ezue lan composer Giancarlo Castro (former principal trumpet of the SBYO). An exciting and virtuosic showpiece, its nearly nine minutes belies the fanfare of its title. The VBE plays Gran Fanfare with verve, and with a lightness that allows them to fly through the work's fast outer sections. There are times, however, when things are too exuberant. Clamor takes some tempos a bit quicker than perhaps they warrant, as in, for example, the famous piccolo trumpet part in the "Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle" section of Pictures at an Exhibition. The members of the VBE have no difficulty playing at any tempo or in any range, however, leaving no wanting on the part of the listener for woodwinds or strings.

If the first half of the concert is about big pieces and ideas, the second half is about youthful enjoyment of music making. Several smaller works of South American origin are intermixed with Bernstein (dances from West Side Story) and George Gershwin's "I Got Rhythm" (of which the VBE has an abundance). Zequinha Abreau's well-known "Tico Tico" provides an excellent vehicle for concertmaster Tomas Medina to display his virtuosity. Guerrra de Secciones, written by former VBE member Félix Mendoza, allows the entire ensemble to revel in the rhythms and sounds of South America, including an extended section of percussion and call-and-response vocalizing. This might have been an exciting end of the concert, but the VBE were called back for three encores. The arrangement of "I Got Rhythm" includes extensive choreography that harkens more to Earth, Wind & Fire than to the Berlin Philharmonic. The finale, a reprise of "Mambo" from West Side Story is taken at a tempo that almost defies belief, leaving the audience breathless. The VBE is truly an astonishing group of young musicians.