Czech Enchantress Takes Audience Down The Rabbit Hole

The Age

Tuesday May 27, 2008

Jessica Nicholas, Reviewer

IVA BITTOVA and LISA MOORE

Bennetts Lane Jazz Lab, May 23 bennettslane.com

CZECH singer/violinist Iva Bittova turns 50 this year, but on stage at Bennetts Lane last Friday she looked like a young girl from a European fairytale.

Wearing a black dress with a bow at the waist, her face framed with dark ringlets, she closed her eyes and began to sing.

Bittova, though, stretches the definition of singing to its very limits. She opened the concert with a series of partly improvised Slavic folk songs, her voice darting up into high-pitched flutters or sliding into a guttural growl. Arms outstretched, she turned slowly in a circle, seemingly lost in another world. Then her eyes opened wide and she smiled mischievously, inviting us to come with her.

By the time she picked up her violin, we were utterly entranced. Bittova rubbed the violin's bow percussively across the strings, her voice emitting a series of trembling cries, clicks and resonant hums, before she flicked the bow to send a spray of resin into the air.

New York-based Australian pianist Lisa Moore has only recently begun performing with Bittova, but complemented the singer perfectly. In some ways she played the "straight" partner to Bittova, creating intuitively minimal instrumental foils for the Czech artist's surreal vocal excursions. But she could also sweep across the keyboard in rhapsodic glissandi to mirror Bittova in full flight, or coax the audience into becoming "grunters" or "clappers" on an idiosyncratic piano etude.

The evening's repertoire ranged from East European classical and folk pieces to songs by Randy Newman and John Lennon. There were also several lullabies, where Bittova's shrill bird calls, finger snaps and foot stamps dissolved into graceful lyrics (in Czech, English or Russian) and luminous piano accompaniment from Moore.

For the audience it was like spending a few hours down the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, with Bittova's Alice guiding us through a strange but enchanting domain. Superb.

© 2008 The Age

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