Complete Crumb Edition, Volume Nine

Ancient Voices of Children; Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik; Madrigals
Bridge (9170)

Walter Zimmermann: The Echoing Green
HCD Ensemble and guests
Mode (mode 150)

Xenakis: Music for strings
Ensemble Resonanz, Johannes Kalitzke
Mode records (mode 152)

Bartok: Piano Concertos
Pierre Boulez, conductor, Krystian Zimerman (1st), Leif Ove Andsnes (2nd), H�l�ne Grimaud (3rd)
Deutsche Grammophon (000388502)

Knots
Music by Fraser Trainer, his group Between the Notes, and an arrangement of Love Action
Black Box (BBM1095)

Kyle Gann: Long Night
Sarah Cahill, pianos
Cold Blue Music

Kyle Gann: Nude Rolling down an Escalator
New World Records (80633-2)

CDS WORTH PARTIALLY HEARING

Golijov/Ayre ; Berio/Folk Songs
Dawn Upshaw, soprano
Deutsche Grammophon (B0004782-0)

Ayre is an okay piece, but I�m not convinced of its appeal on repeated listenings. I think a lot of critics were distracted by the sociopolitical message and over-reacted to the musical merits of the piece, which to my ears sounded like your average Tzadik Radical Jewish Culture release. Folk Songs is terrific, a much more interesting blend of folk and modern music practices, I think. Maybe it comes down to that I don�t hear Golijov in Ayre, but I do hear Berio in Folk Songs. Regardless of the merits of Ayre, Dawn Upshaw is amazing, and the disc is worth owning just to hear her performance.

The Music of Mario Davidovsky: Volume 3
Bridge (9171)

I can do without the Duo Capriccioso and the Quartetto, but the Synchronisms no. 5, 6, and 9 (performed by the Manhattan School of Music Percussion Ensemble, Aleck Karis, and Curtis Macomber, respectively) are all great pieces and performances. I also enjoyed the electronic-musicky Chacona, performed by members of Speculum Musicae: Curtis Macomber, violin; Eric Bartlett, violoncello; Aleck Karis, piano. One of the quintessential Uptown composers. The usual excellent Bridge engineering.


Lewis Spratlan: When Crows Gather and Other Works
Albany Records (TROY725)

When Lewis Spratlan won the Pulitzer in 2000, most of us who live south and/or east of New York City scratched our heads and said �Who?� Finally, 5 years later, a CD of Spratlan�s music over the last 20 years gives us some idea of what he sounds like. The lengthy vocal cycle Of Time and the Seasons is competent academic atonalism, but nothing special. However, the other three works [When Crows Gather (1986), Concertino (1995), Zoom (2003)] display a wide-ranging eclecticism, with Ligeti-like passages, Ivesian overlapping of ragtime with a chorale, a blatantly tonal waltz with dissonant business on top of it, and a rock-inspired romp in the last movement of Zoom (2003) worthy of a composer twenty years his junior. Nice performances by Sequitur, with Mark Kaplan as the violin soloist in the Concertino.

Copland/Sessions/Perle/Rands
American Symphony Orchestra, Leon Botstein
New World Records (80631-2)

I don�t care much for Copland�s Inscape (Aaron trying too hard to write that twelve-tone music like all the hip young composers did in the �60�s) or Perle�s Transcendental Modulations (sounds like warmed-over second-rate Berg), but worth a listen for Roger Sessions� gritty Symphony no. 8 and Bernard Rands� beautiful and elegant �where the murmurs die�


Naked City: The complete studio recordings
Tzadik (7344-5)

All the releases by John Zorn�s most controversial project, wonderfully remastered. Lots to admire here (Spillane and Torture Garden both kick serious ass two decades later), but lots of self-indulgence too. Is Zorn a sadist? A misogynist? A racist? Or an inspired postmodern genius? Give this a listen and make the call. The inside art is not for the squeamish (don�t let the kiddies see it), and neither is this music.


Matthew Welch: Dream Tigers
Tzadik (TZ8015)

The inner piece, Enantiomorphs (2000), is an undistinguished Scelsi-like piece for multiple clarinets. But the outer works, both from 2004 (perhaps a new turn for the composer?) display a lively, solid hybridization of Eastern music, Celtic bagpipes, and classical music. Siubhal Turnlar is a string quartet with Balinese-like melodies. The Self and The Other is for bagpipes (played by Welch), piano, and percussion ensemble, again with a gamelan-like sound. Very attractive works.