September 10, 2022 • 8:18 am Comments Off on Album Review: Sarah Plum’s Personal Noise
My latest review for Gramophone is of violinist/violist Sarah Plum‘s new release, Personal Noise:
A slim discography barely hints at violinist Sarah Plum’s prolific career as a ‘new music specialist’ but confirms her engagingly adventurous sensibility….
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone, violinists
February 16, 2022 • 10:33 am Comments Off on Lowell Liebermann’s Frankenstein
My latest CD review for Gramophone is of the recording by the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra of Lowell Liebermann’s lengthy ballet score Frankenstein:
Within just five years of its publication in 1818, Mary Shelley’s classic horror novel inspired a stage play that became a hit – the first of a seemingly endless stream of adaptations for other media that has flowed ever since. While the most popular of these are associated with the screen (going back to a 1910 short silent film from Edison Studios), Frankenstein has additionally spawned operas, musicals and this full-length ballet, premiered by the Royal Ballet in 2016….
Filed under: ballet, CD review, Gramophone
October 28, 2021 • 11:54 am Comments Off on Christian Baldini’s New CD
The talented young conductor Christian Baldini conducts the UC Davis Symphony Orchestra on this newly released album — a challenging and fascinating collection of music by Lutosławski, Ligeti, Varèse, and Baldini himself. I was delighted to review it for the November issue of Gramophone:
Having proved himself an engaging Mozartian with his previous release (a collection of arias and overtures with Elizabeth Watts and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra – Linn, 7/15), Christian Baldini here displays his expertise in modernist and contemporary fare…
Filed under: CD review, conductors, Gramophone
October 5, 2021 • 8:08 pm Comments Off on James Ehnes Named Gramophone’s Artist of the Year
Heartiest congratulations to an artist I have admired for many years. James Ehnes was named Artist of the Year at Gramophone’s recent annual awards ceremony. Charlotte Gardner writes eloquently of the violinist’s extraordinary recent accomplishments in a complete Beethoven sonata set as well as his pandemic project recording the Bach and Ysaÿe solo violin works: “Ehnes’s warm, golden sound is as much a constantly changing story of articulation and timbre as ever, but sounding even more emotionally up close and personal than ever before…”
It’s deeply gratifying to see such a deserving artist receive this distinction. Here’s the playlist Gramophone has put together in conjunction with this award:
Filed under: Gramophone, James Ehnes
August 4, 2021 • 12:37 pm Comments Off on Paul Lansky’s Angles
I review Paul Lansky’s latest release in the August issue of Gramophone:
After more than three decades as a computer music pioneer, Paul Lansky made a dramatic change of tack and began composing exclusively for acoustic instruments. This release is Vol 17 in the extensive series from the Bridge label …
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone
July 15, 2021 • 12:27 pm Comments Off on Lavena: in your hands
My review of the cellist Lavena is in the July issue of Gramophone:
An enigmatic soundscape shivers into being in Gemma Peacocke’s Amygdala for solo cello and fixed electronics. The cellist wends her way, tentatively, towards acoustic clarity, playing richly expressive double-stops as if coming up for air….
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone
May 17, 2021 • 9:02 am Comments Off on Yuri McCoy, Symphonic Roar
My latest review for Gramophone, in the May issue, is of organist Yuri McCoy’s debut album, Symphonic Roar:
The impetus for this debut album by Yuri McCoy was to celebrate the French Romantic organ and the gloriously rich, ‘symphonic’ sonority associated with it. But the American organist has set about doing so with a bracingly original programme of pieces…
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone, organ
April 8, 2021 • 10:44 am Comments Off on Robert Carl: White Heron
My review of this marvelous BMOP anthology of Robert Carl’s music for Gramophone has now been posted here.
Aficionados of contemporary music will already be familiar with the name Robert Carl as a writer. He has authored extensive reviews for Fanfare and a recent, thought-provoking collection of essays on the challenges faced by 21st-century composers…
Filed under: American music, CD review, Gramophone
March 30, 2021 • 1:41 am Comments Off on Bruits from Imani Winds
I reviewed the latest release from Imani Winds for Gramophone:
Musicians have felt an increasing urgency over the past year to become engaged with issues of social justice. Imani Winds were already there well before most, having devoted themselves to giving a platform to marginalised voices since they started out in 1997. So the moral focus of their new album, which addresses the effects of systemic racism, reflects much more than a current trend.
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone
December 7, 2020 • 12:50 pm Comments Off on Golijov’s Falling Out of Time
Here’s my review for Gramophone of Osvaldo Golijov’s remarkable new collaboration with Silkroad Ensemble, Falling Out of Time.
Though conceived and created well before the pandemic, Osvaldo Golijov’s latest collaboration with Silkroad Ensemble seems uncannily well suited to the era of corona.
Filed under: CD review, Gramophone, Osvaldo Golijov, Silk Road Project
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MEMETERIA by Thomas May 