ECCO, Mar 10, 2025

I heard ECCO, the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, at a Music Mondays performance on March 10, 2025. It was a total accident that I even knew about the concert - - I'm a fan of tenor Paul Appleby and looked at his website a couple months ago to see if he was doing anything interesting. I saw he was doing a Music Mondays performance in May so I made a note to keep an eye on when tickets would become available (tickets are free but you have to reserve them ahead of time). I wandered around the Music Mondays site and saw that they were doing the concert I heard last night - - and nearly fell out of my chair.

1. They were doing Benjamin Britten's Les Illuminations, one of my very favorite pieces. I'd only heard it live once before so this was a very big deal.

2. They were also doing John Adams's Shaker Loops, another piece I adore and love hearing live.

3. The tenor soloist for the Britten was Nicholas Phan, a singer I'd heard in two recitals online during lockdown but had never heard in person.

I was all a-twitter for weeks leading up to the concert. It was everything I was hoping for an then some.

ECCO is a self-governing string group. This performance had eight violinists, three violists, three cellists, and one bass player. Everyone but the cellists stands the whole time, which makes for an exciting visual experience. The concertmaster rotates from piece to piece and while that person often leads in the sense that they give downbeats and occasional cues, I got the feeling that the players know each other and the music well enough that they don't need much leadership.

And interesting side note about ECCO's history with Music Mondays: they've performed on the series for 19 consecutive seasons. Pretty impressive, no?

The first piece was Danzas de Panama by William Grant Still. I think I've heard some of Still's music before but am not sure. This piece was what I'd call "classical lite" but it was lovely, well made, and the ensemble played it with integrity.

The Britten was next. The tenor, Nicholas Phan, gave a very informative introduction, telling us the history of the piece. Britten and tenor Peter Pears were living in New York in the late 30s, they were conscientious objectors getting out of the UK. They were gay but not dating and they finally got together when they were on tour somewhere in Canada. Phan said, "It can get very cold in Canada."

The piece bristles with young genius energy: Rimbaud was 19 when he wrote the poems and Britten was 26 when he wrote the settings. Maybe Britten was just writing the best music he could but I felt like he was planting his flag and showing the world what a talent he was. The text setting, the expert vocal writing, and particularly the idiomatic string writing, it's all at the very highest level. And the nine movements of the piece have such sweep and variety, endless harmonic and melodic invention, it's a masterpiece. Phan sang it with a great feeling for the style - - I would love to hear him sing all of the great music that Britten wrote for tenor (and there's a lot of it). Next up, the serenade for tenor, horn, and strings, please! I was impressed with how deftly ECCO managed all of the mercurial changes in tempo and tone in the piece, especially with no conductor.

I first heard this piece in 1998 in Madison, played by Orpheus Chamber Orchestra and sung by the great soprano Benita Valente. I got a little teary when the final movement started last night - - not so much because the music is so beautiful (though it is) but because it saddened me to think I might need to wait 27 years to hear another live performance of this piece. I certainly hope not.

I posted this performance of the piece as a Fabulous Friday feature back in January. It's still just as good.

The second half started with a piece by a composer with whom I was not familiar, Hanna Benn. The ECCO member who introduced the piece described her as a contemporary singer/songwriter which made me think we were going to hear some limp, gauzy Rufus Wainwright-style meanderings but no! The piece was rich and gorgeous, not afraid to be beautiful. The music unfolded in a satisfying and organic way, it was a joy to hear. I felt like the composer was concerned with harmony and texture but not with melody or rhythm. I would love to hear more of her music.

The final piece was Shaker Loops, another piece I love and was thrilled to hear live. This was more young genius, though not quite as young as the others - - Adams was 31. Talk about RHYTHM, this piece is where it's at. The drive is unlike anything I've heard anywhere else. Here's a performance in the original seven-string arrangement (ECCO played an expanded version):

ECCO seemed to emphasize the larger patterns in the piece rather than its relentless physicality. The first time I heard it was in the 90s in Madison, performed by a Milwaukee group called Present Music, and I could swear I saw sweat dripping off the players. The ECCO players were making plenty of effort but it didn't sound or look like it. It was, like the Britten, another stellar performance. I couldn't have asked for a better performance of either piece.