Concert held to help preserve Indonesia's forests

By Gus Kairupan

JAKARTA (JP): Alexander Baillie strode onto the stage, acknowledged the applause, sat down, touched bow to strings, and from that moment on everyone in the audience knew they were in the presence of a true maestro of the cello.

Baillie entered the stage without any hesitation, entirely confident, his bearing and manner uttering the unspoken words "let's get on with it." And getting on with it he did, the result being the most exquisite sample of cello music ever heard in Jakarta.

The recital, a fund-raising event for the Barito Ulu Project forest preservation and regeneration project in Kalimantan, was held Tuesday evening at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, one of the many businesses that sponsored the performance.

The forest project was established in 1986 and depends entirely on contributions to maintain its operations.

One interesting aspect is that practically all its support has come from large industrial enterprises that more often than not are accused of destroying the environment. Among the prominent corporate contributors to the project are Enterprise Oil, St. Michael, Wickes Plc, PT Trakindo Utama, and Glaxo. Others are Cathay Pacific, PT Chubb Lips Indonesia, PT Multi Bintang and Allied Pickfords, while PT Pacific Removindo sponsored the concert.

Equally important were the hands-on efforts of Rupert Ridgeway, Barito Ulu's project controller, and his wife Diana, who organized the concert.

Individual supporters included Anna Peters, Harry Darsono, Lela Pello and Margaret Ilyine.

Flawless

Baillie opened the program with Bach's Third Suite in C for Solo Cello. It belongs to a number of works for unaccompanied violin and cello, all of which require (from the listener) something of an acquired taste.

They're not the sort of music even classical music fans take to straight away. On the other hand, they're equally demanding for the musician, who must make every one of the many lines that typify the music of Bach's era stand out.

Baillie succeeded in this -- with crystal clarity, giving each of the voices a different tonal quality. Baillie's was a splendid example of the cello as a total instrument.

For the rest of the official program Baillie was joined by pianist Iswargia Sudarno, who recently graduated from New York's Manhattan School of Music with a master's degree.

For him, as for many young and talented Indonesian classical musicians (including Adelaide Simbolon some time ago), playing with such international luminaries as Baillie provides the opportunities they sorely need to achieve maturity.

Baillie and Iswargia performed Schubert's "Arpeggio" Sonata in A Minor for Cello and Piano, Schumann's Five Pieces in Folk Style, and Variations on a Slovak Theme by 20th century Slovak composer Bohuslav Martinu.

In all these works, Iswargia proved himself to be a very able pianist and accompanist, singing along with Baillie in Schubert's sonata, which throughout all movements is virtually a lied on a gigantic scale.

Rapport between the two, who had never met before, was well- nigh flawless; but then, Alexander Baillie is a person who communicates with ease on as well as off stage.

That the recital was a success need not be doubted. The audience of a hundred or so invited guests accorded the duo a deserved standing ovation which, in turn, was rewarded by no less than four encores that included two more than well-known pieces whose hackneyed versions are often heard in the elevator -- Edward Elgar's Salut d'Amour and The Swan, the most popular excerpt from Camille Saint-Saens' Carnival of the Animals.

Alexander Baillie's visit here offered more than the recital. Masterclasses for Indonesian cellists were held at Erasmus Huis (sponsored by BP Indonesia), which was also the venue of a special concert for children sponsored by the Lentera International School.