Hearing musicians and arts presenters apologize to audiences for staging challenging or unconventional music always makes me furious. The excellent Kansas City bassist Krista Kopper came uncomfortably close to begging forgiveness for the cutting-edge repertoire performed at InterUrban ArtHouse in Overland Park, Kansas, on Wednesday, January 18.
The program exhibited by her No Treble trio included premieres of experimental pieces by three Kansas City area composers. Even though the audience of about 40 was presumably receptive to new music, Kopper offered defensive explanations of the adventurous sounds. The strength of Viktor Suslin’s woozy “Grenzubertritt” and “Evening Redness in the West,” Seth Andrew Davis’ twist on Spaghetti Western scores, spoke for themselves.
Nothing on Saint Boy, the wondrous new album of chamber music by the British violinist Daniel Pioro, is as jarring as the gnarliest moments of the concert in Kansas. Even so, the album’s blend of old (Johann Sebastian Bach and Hildegard von Bingen) and new (Laurence Crane’s “2020 Music” and Pioro’s Glass-like title track) is unconventional in the hidebound realm of classical music. In this ahistorical moment, apologies aren’t necessary.