Includes work(s) by John Philip Sousa. Ensemble: Razumovsky Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Keith Brion.

Just for fun, try playing this CD as a quiz for a musically knowledgeable friend. You can give one hint: the composer is well known. As the suite from the operetta The Bride Elect proceeds, you'll probably get guesses like Johann Strauss (during the opening waltz), Offenbach, or Victor Herbert. But when the concluding number, a march, arrives, the composer will be obvious. Sousa's operettas, if one judges from these orchestral selections, aren't highly original or even outstandingly tuneful. But they are good light entertainment, especially as played by this crack group of Slovak players under the direction of Sousa expert Keith Brion. Naxos's recording is as crisp and clear as the orchestral playing.

Sousa, J.P.: Music for Wind Band, Vol. 3

Includes work(s) by John Philip Sousa. Ensemble: Royal Artillery Band. Conductor: Keith Brion.

Includes work(s) by John Philip Sousa. Ensemble: Royal Artillery Band. Conductor: Keith Brion.

SOUSA Music for Wind Band, Vol. 7 • Keith Brion, cond; Martin Hinton (cnt); 1 Royal Artillery Band • NAXOS 8.559247 (57: 26)


America First. The Presidential Polonaise. The Rifle Regiment. Congress Hall. El capitan. Intaglio Waltzes. Golden Jubilee. The Bride Elect. Sounds from the Revivals. 1 The Charlatan. Sheridan’s Ride. The Black Horse Troop. The Naval Reserve


Keith Brion, one of the foremost authorities on the music of Sousa, has been building an extensive library of Sousa’s music for Naxos since 1998, beginning with the first release (“On Stage,” Fanfare 22:1), which first appeared on marco polo in 1997. This is planned to be the most comprehensive collection of Sousa assembled, currently consisting of these seven volumes of wind band music, in addition to an earlier three volumes of Sousa for orchestra. In terms of wind music alone, Brion has so far released 86 works: marches, suites, waltzes, and novelty numbers. The current largest collection is by the Detroit Concert Band, which recorded all 116 published marches on five CDs (Walking Frog 300). The U.S. Marine Band’s set of four CDs, available as “A Box of Sousa” on Altissimo 5571, has 56 works. In terms of performances, the Marine Band is probably my favorite, with the Naxos set a very close second. Both compare favorably with the best single-disc releases, including Junkin with the Dallas Wind Symphony (Reference Recordings 94), Fennell with the Eastman Wind Ensemble (Mercury 434300), Foley with the American Main Street Band (EMI 54130), and Keith Brion with his own New Sousa Band (Delos 102 or Walking Frog 217), which includes seven restorations of recordings conducted by Sousa himself. The relative completeness of the Detroit release recommends it, but the performances often lapse into the routine. Besides, the Naxos set will eventually include 20 additional marches and dozens of concert works.


This seventh volume is as good a place to start as any, as it continues the series pattern of presenting a satisfying mix of the familiar ( El capitan and The Black Horse Troop ) and the unfamiliar ( Congress Hall and The Naval Reserve ), of marches derived from Sousa’s stage works ( El capitan , again, The Bride Elect and The Charlatan ), of Strauss-inspired waltzes ( Intaglio Waltzes ), of historical scenarios à la Wellington’s Victory , complete with battle sounds, racing horse hooves, and cheering ( Sheridan’s Ride ), and novelty numbers like Sounds from the Revivals , an arrangement of late-19th-century hymns which may have been written for Offenbach’s orchestra when they appeared at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition.


James Camner has reviewed three of the earlier releases in the series for Fanfare : Vol. 2, 25:5, Vol. 3, 27:3, and Vol. 4, 28:1. In each he has pointed out the essential rightness of Brion’s performances. I concur. They are not so fast as to make them overbearing or cheaply exciting, but rather taken at a comfortable march tempo that allows the music to unfold naturally. The Royal Artillery Band, formed before the American colonies declared independence, plays with style and verve. Those who have learned their Sousa with (or in) larger concert bands may initially be surprised by the somewhat smaller sound of this ensemble, but in fact, this is the instrumentation that Sousa used in his own touring band. Sousa-lovers will want the whole series. The uncertain risk little, at Naxos’s bargain prices, by diving in here.


FANFARE: Ronald E. Grames

One of the first truly American-born and -bred composers, Leo Sowerby wrote organ music that came straight from the heartland. From his early studies in Grand Rapids, Michigan to his successful career in Chicago, Sowerby revitalized organ music with a body of work rivaling Bach in terms of both quantity and quality.
Sowerby was fascinated by traditional forms, and his 'Classic Concerto' explores many of these structures. Within its three brief movements, it gives an excellent introduction to Sowerby's playful sense of harmony. 'Medieval Poem' and 'Pageant,' both written earlier, also delve into traditional themes.
'Festival Musick' is an audience favorite, bright and playful. Its sense of humor is evident to occasional listeners as well as those more intimately versed in organ music. Composed during a single week in summer, it is one of Sowerby's last compositions.
Both organists involved with this album have the remarkable technical skill and performing panache to bring Sowerby to life. The rich sound of the organ at St. Bartholomew's Church in New York City and accompaniment of the Fairfield Orchestra have been captured masterfully. WORKS FOR ORGAN AND ORCHESTRA is a well-performed and expertly engineered recording.

The two works on this disc date from the early to mid 1920s and very much belong to the "new objectivity" of composers such as Weill and early Hindemith. Indeed, when listening to the Cello Concerto, the latter's Kammermusik series comes readily to mind. The Dance Suite, inventively scored for flute, clarinet, violins, viola, double bass, and percussion, is quite a substantial piece as well, lasting nearly half an hour and featuring a typically manic, highly stylized take on theoretically popular music. Both works are extremely acerbic harmonically, often verging on atonality, but at the same time quite recognizably melodic and often shot through with a curiously haunting, bittersweet lyricism.


In short, these works are very much redolent of their time and place, and if the period or the idiom interests you, then so will these very polished and well recorded performances. There's really nothing more that needs to be said: the players are uniformly fine, with cellist Christian Poltéra making the concerto sound as close to effortless as it probably ever can. The music may be gnarly, but it's also highly virtuosic and often fun (particularly in the Dance Suite), and this latter quality comes through quite effectively. In sum, this is a fine disc, but one for specialized tastes.
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Joan Tower's chamber music has much the same emotional intensity and gestural ferocity as her orchestral works. Her primarily angular harmonic language, with its predominantly dissonant cast, evokes a sense of agitation bordering on rage--something most apparent in Wild Purple for solo viola (played with conviction and arresting virtuosity by Paul Neubauer). Like many Tower works, In Memory (in a stunning rendition by the Tokyo String Quartet) begins quietly--the violin's first notes are almost imperceptible--then builds to a gripping climax. The music's emotions are particularly raw and acute, as the composer was inspired by the death of a close friend, and then the 9/11 attacks that occurred shortly after.


Big Sky for piano trio (persuasively performed by Tower, along with Chee-Yun and Andre Emelianoff) has somewhat softer contours. It begins and ends in a subdued, melancholy atmosphere, while the climactic central section jars with its abrupt syncopations fleshed out in robust, quasi-romantic piano writing.


Island Prelude is the most surprising piece in this collection, as it features passages of genuine consonance and even lyricism, as well as some characterful writing for solo oboe (featuring the expert Richard Woodhams with the Tokyo String Quartet). Of course, all of this is woven into Tower's free-flowing, volatile musical style, which quite often catches you off-guard--the very thing that makes her music compelling.


No Longer Very Clear is a set of four piano pieces, the titles of which are lines taken from the John Ashbery poem of the same name. This very intimate encounter with Tower's art reveals a composer of imagination and ingenuity, and one who possesses a profound emotional sensitivity. The piano writing is brilliant and ranges from Scriabinesque passion to the mystery and exotic beauty found in Messiaen. Ursula Oppens (in the first two pieces) and Melvin Chen (in the remainder) both offer powerfully evocative performances. The recordings are uniformly excellent in both the chamber and solo settings. This release marks an important document of the composer, and a fine addition to Naxos' American Classics series. [9/16/2005]
--Victor Carr Jr, ClassicsToday.com

Includes work(s) by Naoko Akutagawa. Ensemble: Group for Contemporary Music. Conductor: Harvey Sollberger.

AMERICAN CLASSICS FOR VETERANS DAY

Taking a phone call, Miklós Rózsa could scarcely believe that the legendary violin virtuoso Jascha Heifetz really was seriously interested in his Violin Concerto and ready to give the work its premiere – but so he did in 1956, and the first recording of the work, with its extreme technical challenges, was also made by Heifetz. And it had been just the same with the Violin Concerto by Korngold: the 1947 premiere and the brilliant first recording of this 20th-century classic again showcased Heifetz as soloist.

In the new generation of genuinely American musicians, one outstanding figure was Leonard Bernstein, an all-rounder whose early success led on to even greater heights. Bernstein rated his Violin Concerto of 1954, “Serenade,” inspired by Plato’s Symposium, as his best work ever, and this work too in its imaginatively slimmed-down scoring is now acknowledged to be an important 20th-century concerto for violin.

As an “encore,” this compilation includes the masterly Symphonic Dances from the immortal “West Side Story.”

REVIEWS:

This set of American concertos sees her widen her recorded repertoire still further and her performances of all three are highly successful. She’s very well supported by the young Finnish conductor, Santtu-Matias Rouvali who here appears with the two orchestras of which he’s currently Music Director. The Gothenburg Symphony does the honors on the first disc while disc two features the Tampere Philharmonic. Both orchestras make first rate contributions.

— MusicWeb International

AMERICAN COUNTERPOINTS

The Lansdowne Symphony Orchestra and conductor Reuben Blundell release "American Discoveries", a continuation of their series of promoting previously unrecorded orchestral repertoire unearthed at the Fleischer Collection in Philadelphia. This collection features music by three composers whose work deserves to be more widely known: Priscilla Alden Beach, Linda Robbins Coleman, and Alexandra Pierce. The Lansdowne Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1946 to provide music for the First Presbyterian Church of Lansdowne. Belgian-born conductor and publisher Henri Elkan led the orchestra from 1955 until his passing in 1980. One of the most distinguished community orchestras in the world, the LSO performs a regular season of five concerts at the Upper Darby Performing Arts Center, and other various projects. Led by its sixth Music Director, Reuben Blundell, the orchestra continues its traditions of musical excellence, service to the community, and promotion of area talent.

The 'American dream' is the thread that connects these three works. Amy Beach was born in New Hampshire in 1867 and composed more than three hundred works, including a monumental suite for two pianos inspired by the Romantic tradition and based on ancient Irish melodies. Nadine Dana Suesse nicknamed the "Gershwin Girl" was born in Kansas City in 1909. She played her own compositions on the radio from the age of thirteen and composed hit songs, notably for Bing Crosby. She refused the attractions of Hollywood and studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. Her works disappeared from the repertory after her death, although the Berlinskaya Ancelle duo are keen to revive her music with this 1943 concerto, described as "romantic, but mixed with modern harmonies and chords straight from jazz". Victor Babin was born in Moscow in 1908 and emigrated to the United States with his wife Viktoria Vronskaya in 1937. Their piano duo was very successful there: they gave the first performance of Babin's virtuosic Second Concerto under the direction of George SzelI in Cleveland in 1957.

Winner of the First Prize at the Maria Canals Piano Competition in Barcelona, Viv McLean has performed in all the major venues in the UK as well as throughout Europe, Japan, Australia and the USA. Viv's concerto work includes appearances with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Halle Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, BBC Concert Orchestra, Sinfonia Viva, Orchestra of the Swan, Orchestra of St John's, Northern Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Concert Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra under the baton of such conductors as Daniel Harding, Wayne Marshall, John Lubbock, Christopher Warren-Green, Owain Arwell Hughes, Philip Hesketh, David Charles Abell, Stephen Bell, Carl Davis, Christopher George and Marvin Hamlisch. Recent concerto highlights include Mozart K467 with the ECO at the Royal Festival Hall, Grieg with the LPO at the Barbican, Rachmaninov's 3rd Concerto with the RPO in Cambridge, Gershwin, Bernstein, de Falla and Ravel with the Hall� at the Bridgewater Hall, The Sage Gateshead and other venues in the North of England, and Beethoven's 5th Concerto with the Philharmonia at the Royal Festival Hall. Viv has recently been on tour with the London Concert Orchestra where he played Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue in venues including the Royal Festival Hall, Symphony Hall, Bridgewater Hall, St David's Hall Cardiff, Philharmonic Hall Liverpool and Leicester's de Montfort Hall. On this new release, he presents a programme of well-known George Gershwin compositions and transcriptions.

In May 2026, Metier Records proudly presents American Ethos from acclaimed pianist Carolyn Enger, a stunning collection of works from a range of American composers, including Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, John Corigliano, Ned Rorem, William Grant Still, Florence Price, and many others. Released in time for the celebration of the 250th anniversary of America's Declaration of Independence, Carolyn Enger poses the question of how to characterise American composition over so many years and throughout times of such sharp division. How can a musical 'Ethos' be encompassed in all it's various styles, sentiments, and beliefs? "I wanted to have a broad feeling of Americana," Enger explains. "Voices that have been overlooked over the years then come to light because they influenced voices that we're very familiar with." Enger has long been a champion of the piano music of Ned Rorem, and American Ethos centers his work, The Wind Remains, alongside three selections from Soundpoints, each a brief moment of distilled emotion. Rorem then stands as a starting point for connecting Enger's vision of American composition threads. Contemporary composer Daron Hagen was Rorem's first student, and we hear his Five Nocturnes, telling of a family setting down for the night. Rorem's roots in American music go deep as well, having studied with composer Margaret Bonds, who was herself a student and friend of composer Florence Price. Enger presents the African-American sacred music traditions behind Florence Price's Adoration. Price influenced many American composers beyond Bonds and Rorem, including William Grant Still. Price's influence on Grant Still is easily heard in his evocation of the divine in Seven Traceries: A Suite for Solo Piano, of which Enger plays four. Perhaps one of the most famous of American voices is Leonard Bernstein, who spoke about the healing power of music as a response to violence, and several works in this collection connect to him. His Thirteen Anniversaries, by turn tender and whimsical, celebrates 13 family members, friends, and colleagues. One of these is composer Craig Urquhart, a former assistant, represented here by The Awakening, Urquhart's birthday offering to Bernstein, and Adieu, which followed the global pandemic and 2020 political upheavals. John Corigliano's An Anniversary for Lenny is an affectionate remembrance for a 2016 Bernstein centennial celebration, and Aaron Copland's 'Our Town' Three Piano Excerpts is similarly dedicated to Bernstein. Completing Enger's vision of a comprehensive, inclusive American ethos is 'The Vastland' from Under the Blue Dome by San Francisco-based composer of Native American descent JJ Hollingsworth, conjuring the Colorado plains, and Margaret Ruthven Lang's Twilight, the first woman to have a work performed by a major American orchestra. New York City-based writer and editor Steve Smith says in his excellent booklet notes: "What emerges in this collection of disparate yet interconnected lives and works is a patchwork quilt of individual voices, perspectives, and aspirations, woven together to form a more perfect union stronger than it's parts. The music they made, informed by shared stories and songs, brings to life the sky, stone, sinew, steel, and sentiment that make up this nation - an American ethos, expressed in sound". Internationally celebrated American pianist Carolyn Enger has gained critical acclaim for her exquisite lyrical playing and her deeply felt interpretations, with many performances across the United States and Europe. Her 2013 recording of Ned Rorem: Piano Album I was on The New York Times Best of Classical list that year, and her recent Metier recording Resonating Earth, an artistic response to the contemporary climate crisis, received glowing praise: "a thoughtful programme. Enthralling" (Nigel Simeone, International Piano). Ms Enger studied at the Manhattan School of Music and is a Steinway Performing and Recording Artist.

This repertoire spans almost eighty years of classical composers' excursions into blues, folk, hip-hop, jazz, musical theater, samba, tango, techno and other genres. Each piece goes beyond mere stylistic imitation, cultivating an authentic expressivity within a transcribed musical language rooted in the Americas. ___Alexander Crosett

Classical Music

The iconic Walt Disney Concert Hall organ's rich textures, dramatic tempi, and colorful registrations are fully engaged by organist Daryl Robinson performing new music by George Baker, David Briggs, Aaron David Miller and Jason Roberts plus composers of historic stature including Dupré, Sowerby, and Demiessieux. Daryl Robinson has earned critical acclaim as a solo and collaborative artist, described by London-based Choir and Organ Magazine as a performer with “…a driving muscular poetry underpinned by nimble technique and nuanced sense of style…” Winner of both First Prize and Audience Prize in the 2012 American Guild of Organists National Competition in Organ Performance, Mr. Robinson maintains an active career as a teacher, collaborative artist, church musician, and recitalist under the auspices of Karen McFarlane Artists, Inc.

Classical Music

Classical Music

The Yale Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1965 by a group of students who saw the growing potential for a large orchestral ensemble to thrive on campus. With a spirit for promoting new music and performing underrepresented composers alongside works of the standard Western canon, the orchestra has become a destination for students who wish to perform orchestral music at the conservatory level while taking advantage of all that Yale - a liberal-arts institution - has to offer. In it's more than fifty years, the orchestra has performed in some of the most hallowed music halls in the United States from Carnegie Hall in New York to Benaroya Hall in Seattle, toured twelve countries including Turkey, Russia, Brazil and Mexico, and premiered over fifty works of new music by composers including Leonard Bernstein, Benjamin Britten, and Caroline Shaw. YSO alumni have music careers in major orchestras around the world, including the New York Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, and the Berlin Philharmonic. The YSO is led by William Boughton, who is in his seventh and final year conducting the orchestra.

The "[Everything Jazz - Vol.5 ECM Edition]" collection stands as an essential, high-fidelity offering for any serious jazz enthusiast, compiling fifty carefully curated, generation-spanning masterpieces from the renowned ECM label that have earned acclaim both internationally and in Japan. What truly elevates this set is the commitment to superb technical brilliance; presented on the Ultimate High Quality CD (UHQCD) format-often for the first time-and enhanced with the Green Color Label Coat specification, these reissues promise pristine audio fidelity, faithfully reproducing the original master recordings with astonishing clarity. Beyond the cutting-edge sound, the collection adds substantial value with detailed booklets featuring brand-new liner notes and artist comments for each work, making this an indispensable, comprehensive package that blends timeless classics with definitive sound quality, ready for you to discover your next destined masterpiece.

A disc devoted to two very different, much-honored American composers Pianist Orli Shaham has an established and impressive international reputation and is admired for her interpretations of both standard and modern repertoire. Internationally renowned conductor David Robertson and 1984 Gold Medalist, Leeds Piano Competition, Jon Kimura Parker join Ms. Shaham for this recording. Includes two world premiere recordings!

Hailed as "an extraordinary virtuosa" and "sheer luminescence at the harp," Kondonassis has performed around the globe as a concerto soloist and in recital, bringing her unique brand of musicianship and warm artistry to an ever-increasing audience. Her second release for Azica Records features three world premiere recordings of works by Liebermann, Lash and Paulus. "Miraculous is Kondonassis' playing. " ClassicsToday.com "Harp playing doesn't get much better than this. " Fanfare Track Listing: The Lanes of Limerick (1999) by John Williams � Bagatelles (1969) by Norman Dello Joio � in a Landscape (1948) by John Cage � Bariolage (1992) by Elliot Carter � World Premiere Recordings: Stalk (2008) by Hannah Lash � Music for Harp, Op. 116 (2001) by Lowell Liebermann � Berceuse (1983) by Stephen Paulus �.

Gershwin began work on An American in Paris in the spring of 1928 and it's premi�re by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under Walter Damrosch took place later that year on 13 th December in Carnegie Hall (three years earlier in the same venue Damrosch had conducted the first performance of Gershwin's Piano Concerto in F). In this hugely popular one-movement symphonic poem, whose colorful orchestration includes four saxophones and several taxi horns, the composer intended 'to portray the impressions of an American visitor in Paris as he strolls about the city, listens to the various street noises and absorbs the French atmosphere'. The melancholic blues theme announced by the solo trumpet, suggesting a sudden bout of homesickness on the part of the protagonist, is one of the finest Gershwin wrote. Following the premi�re in Boston's Symphony Hall of his Second Rhapsody, conducted by Serge Koussevitsky on 29 th January 1932, Gershwin and several friends took a two-week holiday in Havana. The composer, fascinated by the small Cuban dance orchestras with their novel rhythms and unusual percussion instruments such as guiros, maracas, claves and bongos, was inspired to write the Cuban Overture. He orchestrated the work between 1 st and 9 th August 1932, completing it just a week before the first All-Gershwin Concert at the Lewisohn Stadium in New York, an open-air concert attended by some 18,000 people which was, according to the composer, 'the most exciting night I have ever had'. Cast in Gershwin's characteristic fast-slow-fast form, he wrote that he had 'endeavored to combine the Cuban rhythms with my original thematic material. The result is a symphonic overture which embodies the essence of Cuban dance'. Gershwin's magnum opus, the three-act opera Porgy and Bess, was written to a libretto by DuBose Heyward and Ira Gershwin. Based on Heyward's novel Porgy about life among the black inhabitants of Catfish Row in Charleston, South Carolina, the opera was started in late February 1934 and the seven hundred page full score was completed in September 1935. Heyward memorably described the idiosyncratic working methods of the Gershwin brothers, who 'would get at the piano, pound, wrangle, swear, burst into weird snatches of song, and eventually emerge with a polished lyric'. It numbers amongst it's classic songs 'Summertime', 'I Loves You, Porgy' and 'It Ain't Necessarily So'. The orchestral suite heard on this recording, the Symphonic Picture from Porgy and Bess arranged by Robert Russell Bennett, has become the standard version since it's premi�re in 1943, this despite the fact that Gershwin made his own arrangement in 1936. Evidently long forgotten about by the time Bennett made his arrangement, Gershwin's suite was retitled Catfish Row by Ira when it was rediscovered in 1958. The opera, a commercial and critical failure at the time, is now recognized as one of the greatest achievements of twentieth-century American music.

Williams: An American Journey

Recorded in 2006 and 2008 in Leamy Hall Auditorium and the U.S Coast Guard Academy, the Coast Guard Band under conductor Cap. Kenneth Megan presents American Journeys. The CD features compositions from American composers Williams, Gould, Daugherty, King, Grantham, Buckley and Cheetham.

This is an album of first-rate contemporary works for clarinet and piano.