Glennie's nothing short of amazing

Thanks to the Seattle Symphony Orchestra, the Scottish virtuoso has appeared almost every other season in Seattle for the past five years, never failing to ignite audiences who are witness to this musical phenomenon.

Her press materials do not mention that she began to lose her hearing at age 12 in her native Aberdeen, just as she took up percussion studies. She obviously wants to be taken as a musician who is remarkable for her gifts, not as a musician who is remarkable because she is deaf. But, how can one not stand in amazement at her talent, which has developed into something so extraordinary despite her handicap? We stand in awe of Beethoven who continued to write great music although deaf 200 years ago, so why not Glennie?

She understands the fascination people have with this seeming oxymoron -- someone deaf who is such a supremely gifted musician -- adding she hears differently: through her feet (she wears no shoes on stage), and nearly every other part of her body, including her neck and face. Her hearing, writes her husband, Greg Malcangi, "is basically a specialized form of touch," in which hearing a sound and sensing a vibration equal each other.

However she "hears," she is an immensely talented musician who has carved out a solo career as a percussionist on a scale previously unknown.

In some ways her biggest challenge is to find music suitable to her talent and ambition. So she is always commissioning new work, such as Margaret Brouwer's "Aurolecent Circles, which premiered Thursday night.

The American composer, who was in the house to receive the rapturous applause along with Glennie, has written a marvelous display piece that takes into account the astonishing virtuosity of Glennie and the need to be careful not to overwhelm her with the collective sound of nearly 100 musicians.

Now in her late 30s, Glennie travels with a huge array of percussion instruments, but this time she may have outdone herself to meet Brouwer's demands. There were four groupings of instruments: three downstage, flanking the podium, and another upstage in the center. Two were primarily composed of drums of different sizes and timbres and the others of mallet instruments, such as a marimba, as well as gongs, chimes, bells, and so forth. Maybe three dozen all together. I lost track.

Brouwer's music is effective and solid, often rather atmospheric, and gives the percussion soloist many opportunities. The vigorous phrases of strong fortes and excited passages are deftly joined with their opposite numbers. There is much to keep one interested, especially with Glennie as the chief proponent. The duets between soloist and other orchestral instruments -- flutes, trombone, clarinet -- were cleverly conceived and integrated into the whole.

SSO music director Gerard Schwarz was a sympathetic and attentive partner.

Everything else on the program seemed like a prelude to Glennie. Dvorak's "Carnival" Overture was given a lively reading, and Josef Bohuslav Foerster's "Cyrano de Bergerac" a handsome introduction to Seattle nearly 100 years after its premiere in Prague. Raymond Davis, longtime principal cellist, was at his best in his solo role.

P-I music critic R.M. Campbell can be reached at 206-448-8396 or rmcampbell@seattlepi.com.

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