The pair of monumental song cycles for tenor and chamber ensemble that comprise the new CD Open House in many ways represent a culmination of 20th century American art song. Written for lyrical tenor and longtime champion of new work Paul Sperry, the songs by William Bolcom and Robert Beaser combine poetry and music to create a heady mixture that brims with refinement and craft. Sperry is at home in a repertoire that extends from Monteverdi opera and Bach Passions to Britten's "Nocturne" and hundreds of songs in more than a dozen languages, but it is to American music that he has brought a conviction and enthusiasm that has breathed life into it for countless listeners. "Paul Sperry has surpluses of songfulness, curiosity, and intelligence." The New Yorker.

Classical Music

David Kechley’s music is not only known as innovative and provocative, but also extremely technically demanding. Kechley writes for guitar and saxophone. His first piece of this genre won the 1995 Lee Ettelson Award. David Kechley lives in Williamstown, Massachusetts and is emeritus professor at Williams College.

In Secret Pulse composer Zack Browning presents a dramatic music of rhythmically-charged pop-inspired riffs battling transcendental melodies. Each composition can be compared to a spider’s web; musically spinning out events whose design is based on a secret pulse derived from the birth dates of the performers using the Lo Shu Square and feng shui. Browning’s composition awards have included two Illinois Arts Council Composer Fellowships, a Chamber Music America Commission, two Arnold O. Beckman Awards and two FAA Fellowships from the University of Illinois. “propulsive, giddy, rocking…, a rush of cyclic riffs and fractured meters” - The New York Times

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Places & Times is a collection of sonorous landmarks and magical moments; percussion ensemble works that are as compelling as they are mysterious. It is also a record of some of the ways in which life and art might share a journey. Composer and percussionist Baljinder Sekhon, with a doctorate from Eastman and currently teaching at the University of South Florida, has brought toether three fine percussion ensembles to present his exhilarating vision: Los Angeles Percussion Quartet, McCormick Percussion Group, and Line Upon Line Percussion. Three of the works on the album features olo instruments with ensemble: steel pan, guitar, and piano. The combinations afford a wide range of possibilities, from the aggressive noise of a cymbal on piano strings, and peaceful meditations created by finger cymbals gently buzzing on a vibraphone, to the curious thump of a person falling onto a bass drum. Sekhon writes: "I have been heavily influenced by the teachings of Don Juan, specifically those found in the book Journey to Ixtlan. 'Death is an Adviser' is a chapter from the book that deals with the awareness of death and how such awareness advises our decision-making in life. The movement titles each have double meanings, which reflect both the philosophy that inspired the piece and the compositional process. I am interested in finding ways for my creative work as a composer and other life activities to intersect and become the same. For this piece, in an effort to work and spend time with my family at once, my daughters and wife drew numbers from a hat to determine pitch orderings, durations, and contour. After selecting numbers for pitch and duration and combining them, we'd run to the piano and play it and hear how it turned out- we made a game of it."

Contemporary art song is alive and well in the hands of soprano Polly Butler Cornelius and the team she has gathered for Wild Songs, a song recital as suitable for an environmental conscious-�ness-raising event as for the salon. Drawing on impassioned pleas and the enigmatic nature-centered poetry of Emily Dickinson these powerful, lyrical songs charm and chasten.

One of the most prominent American composers today, best known for his orchestral works (including "Aftertones of Infinity," - 1979 Pulitzer Prize), Joseph Schwantner has long shown a special affinity for the flute. On Looking Back, flutist Jennie Oh Brown embraces Schwantner's progressive, colorful musical language while directly quoting and acknowledging music of his past. The four pieces on this album were written over a span of three decades. Jennie Oh Brown is Artistic Director and Flutist with Picosa, a chamber ensemble for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano, and resident composer.

In this era of having to stretch resources and do more with less, one pair of musicians has succeeded in increasing productivity by exactly 50%. They have pushed their duo into trio territory and musical boundaries similarly fall by the wayside. While the violist, Molly Gebrian, remains devoted to her one instrument, the bump in yield is thanks to the super powers of Danny Holt who is equally adept at both piano and percussion, and with the normal number of limbs, deftly employs them and mental acrobatics to wild musical results. Holt’s integration of piano and percussion must be seen to be believed- ranging from incredibly subtle to absurdly virtuosic, pushing the performer to extremes. According to Holt, the idea “stems form my passion for innovation and what might be described as a sense of playful creative restlessness- a somewhat obsessive need to push myself beyond what I already know I am capable of.” Since there was previously no music for the unusual instrumentation of viola and solo piano/percussion, Gebrian and Holt have taken it upon themselves to build an entirely new repertoire. The half dozen works heard here on Trios for Two are among their commissions. The whole project is at once an innovative experiment, a beautiful and sometimes ridiculous spectacle, and alos the result of a twenty-year friendship.

Few groups live up to their name as well as Bohemian Trio, whose debut album Okonkolo speaks to the true voice of America: a cacophony of cultures that together forge a new identity that transcends Old World boundaries. Their original blend of classical lyricism, jazz harmony, Latin dance and Afro-Cuban beats reflects their diverse cultural and musical backgrounds. Saxophonist/composer Yosvany Terry and pianist Orlando Alonso were born and trained musically in Cuba, while French-American cellist Yves Dharamraj is also part Trinidadian. Sax, piano and cello? This unique configuration was a conscious choice by the group to eschew traditional instrumentation for an improvising group, and it pays dividends in the sound of Okonkolo, at once refined and edgy. The album’s title track is named for the “baby” or smallest member of the Bata drums used in Yoruba religious ceremonies. The okonkolo traditionally serves as timekeeper while the “father” itotele and “mother” iya drums converse, improvise and entertain. In Terry’s “Okonkolo,” this drumming tradition is both a metaphor for the interaction between saxophone, cello and piano, and a reflection of the cultural diffusion that embodies the Bohemian Trio and its music. Also on the album are works by Pedro Giraudo and Manuel Valera, some of which use Latin and jazz idioms while dovetailing classical sounds and techniques.

Nils Bultmann's 'Ten Viola Duets' is built up from solo improvisations and sketches into complete works. Bultmann explores the timbral relationship between the viola and the didjeridu in 'From the Depths'. 'Lucid' blends improvised material into a more structured piece. The 'Suite for Solo Cello,' is based on Bach's 'Cello Suite #1,' a work Bultmann calls a 'foundational pillar of [his] musical life.' Peripatetic yet focused, the music on Troubadour Blue is open, warm-hearted and generous.

Border Towns is an encyclopedic mash-up of Americana, a collision of recordings from the geographical and psychological edges. As the New York Times observed, “[Brooke] intricately mashes up a dense collection of familiar and obscure musical quotations along with commonplace noises to make a fascinating score.”

Caught in Time captures moments in clarinetist/composer David Keberle's work from 1997 to 2007 upon his return from seventeen years in Rome. These six eloquent and colorful chamber works were all premiered in either Pittsburgh or New York City and feature well known artists and ensembles of the day including Helen Tara O' Connor (flute), the Pittsburgh Flute Club Flute Choir, Trio Johannes, Daniel Meyer (conductor), Robert Frankenberry (tenor), Eric Moe (piano), and Keberle himself.