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This disc collects the public performances from Silk Road Chicago, the yearlong initiative of the CSO and the Art Institute that strove to show just how much people absorbed from each other along the Silk Road when they weren’t busy waging war. The passionate playing of Yo-Yo Ma and his Silk Road friends brought sounds to Orchestra Hall that aren’t usually heard there.
The CSO plays on two tracks, the Song of Eight Unruly Tipsy Poets by Zhou Long and Ambush from Ten Sides, a traditional Chinese piece. Without knowing the title, a listener would marvel at the sounds of a string quartet (of Silk Road players plus Ma) sliding around discordantly in Unruly Tipsy Poets; as it is, they illustrate the poets’ inebriation. The CSO apparently is the loud, drunken poet, given the monolithic mass of the music it was asked to shoulder.
When it reaches its battle scene, Ambush from Ten Sides is one of the disc’s high points. Arranged by Li Cang Sang and China Magpie (honest), whom Kurosawa would’ve given five cameramen for, the work lets the orchestra wail, and with pipa player Wu Man, sheng player Wu Tong and Ma available for the closing hymn, it really is a unique fusion.
Among the Silk Road Ensemble’s tracks, Osvaldo Golijov’s Night of the Flying Horses stands out for its flexibility. Golijov, the CSO’s composer-in-residence, originally composed it for orchestra and soprano, then arranged it for a group of Eastern and Western instruments. It still sounds right at home.
Unfortunately, there’s much more music here that doesn’t rise to this level. The high points are pretty high, however, showing how lofty the project’s goals were.—Marc Geelhoed
