On the album, Schumann’s variations are followed by Michael Finnissy’s “RS Geistervariationen.” Ferruccio Busoni saw any written composition as a means of transcription, and thus was perfectly comfortable composing adaptations of celebrated composers like Bach and Brahms; Finnissy’s works take a similar approach, and — drawing from ideas around filmmaking and photography — he regularly composes through, against, on top of and around existing musical material. Where a project like his “36 Verdi Transcriptions” adds embellishments to more straightforward, less puzzling source material, “RS Geistervariationen” fulfills a different function. It’s a commentary on the Schumann, or even a musical explanation.
Though Finnissy’s piece begins in the same way, a spread chord changes the work’s direction. Later, a similar moment triggers a bluesy harmony, an upward thrust in register and a mysterious new ending. Finnissy separates what follows into variations made from transcriptions of Brahms’s Op. 23 (itself a set of variations on Schumann’s theme) and “tropes,” cloudy divertissements that newly tangle the threads that Brahms had worked loose.
Finnissy finishes with a section titled “Choir of Ghost Voices From Afar.” Schumann was experiencing hallucinations around the time he wrote the “Geistervariationen,” and spoke of hearing an “angel” theme that guided the work. Finnissy’s closing music is unsettling and suspended, like a marionette suddenly paralyzed.
Havlat’s most emotionally insightful playing occurs here. The close, gentle variation marked “Con Tenerezza” (with tenderness) begins like a torch song, travels through rhapsodic yearning, drifts into a disembodied register and arrives at something angrier by “Trope (c),” all in under three minutes. Havlat navigates these swift transitions smoothly, with an acute sense of line. He connects his disparate materials by drawing out all of their moodiest, most subdued hues.
Ideas around variation, whether written or conceptual, tie Havlat’s album together. Finnissy, the great transcriber, finds a kindred spirit in the composer Cassandra Miller, sharing credits on the piece “Sinner, Don’t Let This Harvest Pass.” They both create variations on the title song, as sung by Marian Anderson, and approach the material in contrasting ways. Miller’s opening is simple, modal, moody and rhythmic. Next, Finnissy brings the theme to the foreground, then thoroughly abstracts it. His third section has the suspended distance of “RS Geistervariationen,” and Miller closes with a slow, drawn-out sunset. It’s some of the sweetest music on the album.
