REVIEW: SummerFest’s ‘Eastern Visions’ — Rare Musical Offerings with Exotic Influences

August 8, 2026

Friday’s SummerFest program Eastern Visions focused on western music influenced by Asian musical traditions. The starting point for these discussions or programming always begins with Claude Debussy, the Impressionist composer whose experience of Javanese gamelan music at the age of 27 at an international exhibition in Paris changed his notions of harmony and musical texture.

At Friday’s 6:00 p.m. Musical Prelude, the Prometheus Quartet played two movements from Debussy’s String Quartet in G Minor—“Andantino” and “Scherzo”—and in the 7:00 p .m. concert we heard Debussy’s Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp.

The young members of the Prometheus Quartet gave a commanding account of Debussy’s fleet, animated motifs in his String Quartet’s “Scherzo” and indulged in luxurious melodic forays in the delicate “Andantino,” especially violist Brian Jennings’ gorgeous, aptly wistful solos. Heavenly duets between violinists Roger Shao and Anthony Chan also added to the allure of this movement. Because the ensemble’s regular cellist Wilson Vanderslice was indisposed, cellist Eliana Razzino Yang of the Kairos Quartet—the other string quartet in residence at this year’s SummerFest—graciously filled in for him in the Debussy movements, as well as in Prometheus’ scintillating account of Miklós Rózsa’s “Scherzo” from his String Quartet No. 1. That Yang merged seamlessly into the Prometheus Quartet on short notice is a tribute to the stellar musicianship of each of these young musicians.

Principal Harpist of the San Diego Symphony and frequent SummerFest participant Julie Smith Phillips was joined by her colleague Rose Lombardo, Principal Flute of the San Diego Symphony, and violist Matthew Lipman in an exquisite account of Debussy’s late Sonata for Flute, Viola, and Harp that opened the 7:00 p.m. concert. The pellucid textures of Debussy’s Sonata proved an excellent prelude to Lou Harrison’s Varied Trio, a ceaselessly inventive sonic exploration for piano, violin, and a splendid array of percussion applications from vibraphone to drums to tambourines to rice bowls tuned with water and played by chopsticks!

SummerFest wisely brought in percussion virtuoso Steven Schick to hover over the percussion batterie and work his magic, adding the composer’s amazing collection of exotic but lustrous sonic effects to each movement.

Equally important in the Harrison equation were pianist Pedja Mužijević and violinist Blake Pouliot. Mužijević not only played Harrison’s piano score at the keyboard, but also plucked strings within the piano and tapped the instrument’s metal frame with a mallet. Pouliot created ethereal themes in his instrument’s highest register as well as drawing deep growls from its lowest range. The fourth movement dispensed with percussion acrobatics and presented an earnest, almost Brahmsian duet for violin and piano, followed by a racing, ecstatic finale fueled by bright violin pizzicatos and intricate drumming. Harrison was one of the last century’s most innovative composers, and experiencing his Varied Trio only underscored the sadness of his relative neglect, especially in the state in which he practiced his splendid art.

It was appropriate, however, to experience on this program featuring music by Lou Harrison half a dozen of John Cage’s Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano. Another brilliant California eccentric from Harrison’s generation, Cage envisioned a rebirth of the concert grand by placing foreign objects–screws, bolts, nuts, erasers, and pieces of plastic–on the strings of the piano, creating a variety of muting effects. Cage’s prepared piano is a more variously percussive instrument, at the same time less resonant, and Mužijević crafted these clever bagatelles with consummate finesse.

Maurice Ravel’s Tzigane was inspired by the violin music of the Romani that he heard played by Jelly d’Arányi, a Romani violinist who had performed Ravel’s own Sonata for Violin and Cello in 1922. Although the Romani folk settled in Hungary, they migrated from central Asia, bringing their exotic culture with them. Ravel’s bravura violin solo captures the flair and defiance of this non-western culture, and violinist Tessa Lark mesmerized The Conrad audience with her brilliant account of Tzigane. The work includes modest participation of the piano towards the end of the work, which Inon Barnatan gracefully supplied. But the violin tells the whole story.

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade is one of the most beloved late Romantic orchestral tone poems, and contemporary English composer Iain Farrington reworked this four-movement orchestra piece into Fantasy on Scheherazade, a single movement for nonet consisting of string quintet, three winds, and harp. In his program notes, the composer states his goal as “a reworking of the material, using new harmonies, adding countermelodies, and condensing the structure into a single movement.” To that end, I would say he succeeded. Did he create, however, a compelling musical work to add to the chamber music repertory? Not in my estimation. We heard many of the Russian composer’s memorable themes stuffed into a grinding etude that managed to remove all of the wonder and adventure of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade. The program states that this work was commissioned by the La Jolla Music Society for SummerFest. I suggest they ask for their money back.

This program was presented by the La Jolla Music Society on August 7, 2026, at La Jolla’s Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center.