Paul Lansky is one of the most prominent and accessible modern American composers. He writes primarily for the medium of computer-generated sound, and has made advances in many technical areas, especially those of Linear Prediction Coding, which he developed for his own first computer-generated pieces. He has written that his “[his] goals are not mainly to achieve relative mastery of one form or another… as they are to experiment.” Because of this, his compositions are quite varied in style and form. This recording presents three premiere recordings of Paul Lansky's recent chamber music. "The Long and Short of It" for Woodwind Quintet was inspired by the third movement adagio of Mozart’s Serenade for Winds K. 361. The album also includes his guitar duet “Talking Guitars,” and “Pieces of Advice” for horn and piano.

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REVIEWS:

The Long and Short of It (2016) is for wind quartet. Lansky produces his take on Mozart’s Serenade, K 361, by investing minuets and slow movements with tonal or neo-tonal harmony. Opening with clusters for humor, shortlong rhythms produce the title, literally, in one of the slow movements. This is filled with cleverness and enthusiasm for the classical style, and listening to this piece back to back with the Mozart is enjoyable.

– American Record Guide

It seems whatever the genre, Lansky’s music continues to attract and satisfy.

– The Whole Note (CA)

Garlands for Steven Stucky is a tribute to the late-American composer, Steven Stucky. The project was spearheaded by Grammy-winning pianist Gloria Cheng, who has recorded the 32 new pieces that make up this star-studded “garland”. In addition, Ms. Cheng is joined by soprano Peabody Southwell and oboist Carolyn Hove in a recording of Mr. Stucky’s Two Holy Sonnets of Donne (1982). Musician royalties for the sale of this recording go to the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s “Steven Stucky Composer Fellowship Fund.” Widely recognized as one of America’s leading composers, Steven Stucky was awarded the 2005 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Second Concerto for Orchestra. He wrote commissioned works for many of America’s major orchestras and ensembles. For over 21 years he was resident composer of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He taught at Cornell University, where he founded Ensemble X, until 2014, when he joined the faculty of The Juilliard School. He died of cancer in 2016.

Harold Meltzer's new recording presents recent vocal and chamber works, and features Metropolitan Opera tenor, Paul Appleby, who is also the recording's annotator. Appleby writes: "(Meltzer's) literary imagination and text-setting skills are sophisticated and technically accomplished. More than illuminating discrete words or phrases within a text, Meltzer possesses the Schubertian quality of casting his distinct reading of a whole text in concise, colorful and precisely articulated harmony." Harold Meltzer is inspired by a wide variety of stimuli, from architectural spaces to postmodern fairy tales and messages inscribed in fortune cookies. In Fanfare Magazine, Robert Carl commented that he “seems to write pieces of scrupulous craft and exceptional freshness, which makes each seem like an important contribution.” The first recording devoted to his music, released in 2010 by Naxos on its American Classics label, was named one of the Albums of the year in The New York Times. In December 2017 Open G Records released a second recording of Harold’s music, eliciting similar praise: an “enchanting and unpredictable release” (San Francisco Chronicle); “thrives on ample invention and an astute sense of color (The Wall Street Journal); “summoning up sounds from his ensemble that seem nearly impossible” (American Record Guide); “a composer fully in charge of his powers, and in his prime” (Fanfare Magazine).

This collection of songs was first made popular during the early 20th century, through iconic renditions by great American baritones of the past. Nelson Eddy, John Charles Thomas, Lawrence Tibbett, and Leonard Warren performed these songs on film and television, and they were often heard over the radio. Somewhere over the years, many of these songs became considered “old fashioned,” but the virtues of these classic tunes still endure today, and it’s time they were shared with new audiences. American baritone Brian Mulligan and pianist Craig Rutenberg have curated this program to represent a breadth of composers and musical styles, honoring an incredible period of music in America.

"One hundred fifty years ago, the great mezzo-soprano, composer, and pedagogue Pauline García Viardot created the salon opera Le dernier sorcier ('The Last Sorcerer') in collaboration with the acclaimed Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev. The piece centered on themes of power and progress, gender and equality, and the restoration of natural order in an ever-changing world. A chamber opera in two acts, Le dernier sorcier revolves around Krakamiche, a once-powerful sorcerer whose presence in the great woods has upset the fairies, the forest’s rightful inhabitants, and disturbed the harmony of the land. Through the combined efforts of the fairy folk and their queen, the sorcerer's daughter and her prince, and a hapless valet, Krakamiche ultimately learns key truths about humility, love, and living in harmony with the natural world. Viardot's original manuscript, scored for solo voices, treble chorus, and piano, was held in a private collection for over a century, and as such, the work essentially vanished. Recently, the original piano-vocal score was acquired by Harvard University’s Houghton Library, which has granted permission to produce this world premiere recording."

REVIEWS:

Le dernier sorcier is a lovely discovery. It is not a lost masterpiece, but it is a work that brought me real pleasure. I will return to it in the future, especially in this high-spirited performance. The recorded sound is a bit cavernous and unfocused for my taste; I would have appreciated a greater presence for the voices. Bridge provides extensive and informative notes and a complete French-English libretto.

– Fanfare

If you ever thought that opera is sometimes an overblown genre and could profit from a bit of modesty, here’s a wonderful example of that. The Last Sorcerer could be performed in a small hall or even somebody’s living room and lasts a mere hour, yet it addresses deep human issues and a wide range of feelings. Bridge came out last year with a superb first complete recording of The Cradle Will Rock by Blitzstein with the original orchestrations. Here they take a chance on an even more obscure but also delightful and sometimes touching work.

– American Record Guide

Stefan Wolpe’s escape from Nazi Germany was fraught with uncertainty and danger. During the months following Hitler’s rise to power Wolpe went into hiding, while completing one of his most compelling works- the March and Variations (1932-33), a work of Beethovenian power, scored for two pianos. The piece was largely been forgotten until Quattro Mani’s revival of it, and their sensational premiere recording on Bridge's Music of Stefan Wolpe, Vol. 8. Wolpe’s ballet score, The Man from Midian (1942) a work based on the Old Testament, is centered around the story of Moses, and is the other major work on this release. The virtuoso piano duo team, Quattro Mani (Susan Grace & Steven Beck), has worked with many of today’s leading composers, and is devoted to the expansion of the repertoire for duo piano. QM’s new Wolpe release is the duo’s 14th album for Bridge Records.

Virtuoso pianist Marc Ponthus's new recording for Bridge Records consists of three of Robert Schumann's key masterpieces: Kinderszenen, op. 15, Kreisleriana, op. 16, and Fantasie in C, op. 17. Ponthus's last recording for Bridge was the “Complete Music for Piano” of the late Pierre Boulez. Ponthus's Boulez recording received glowing reviews, and was Gramophone magazine's “Editor's Choice”. Pianist Marc Ponthus, also a conductor and composer, is noted for landmark performances of the complete piano works of Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Boulez and radical performances of celebrated works such as Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” and Beethoven’s “Hammerklavier Sonata”. He has performed extensively throughout North America and Europe and created the “Lower Eastside Ensemble” dedicated to performing contemporary music. His belief that art can define humanity and that music transcends political boundaries brought him to perform in war-torn Sarajevo. He wrote about those experiences for the London newspaper, “The Independent,” and continues to work with intellectuals and philosophers in France and the United States on behalf of the people of Bosnia, Chechnya, and South Sudan.

The Thirteenth Child is an opera in two acts, with music by Poul Ruders to a libretto by Becky & David Starobin. Commissioned by The Santa Fe Opera and the Odense Symfoniorkester, the libretto is an adaptation of the Brothers Grimm story, "The Twelve Brothers." The recording, made in Denmark and the USA, brings Ruders's gripping 80-minute score vividly to life.

The Thirteenth Child is Poul Ruders's fifth opera. The Danish composer is well known for his gripping dystopian opera, The Handmaid's Tale. The Thirteenth Child shares some of the dark world of The Handmaid's Tale, but also gives the listener a fairy tale, full of romance, magic, and transformation.

REVIEWS:

There is plenty of space for lyrical solo numbers in Ruders’ score, which veers between mid-Atlantic neoromanticism and something edgier and more expressionist in the orchestral interludes...it’s particularly Sarah Shafer in the role of Lyra who makes the most of his smoothly contoured vocal writing.

– Guardian (UK)

Fairy tales advance by surprising, generally magical events, and Ruders has invented captivating music for each. Ruders and his librettists have created an enchanting work in the genre of the fairy-tale opera, replete with spells, magic gardens, a quest to find 12 long-lost brothers, and a princess (the 13th child of the title) fated to undergo ill and happy adventures before she rescues her brothers and weds her prince.

There are two outstanding singers here in mezzo Tamara Mumford, as Gertrude, and lyric soprano Sarah Shafer as Lyra. Ruders furnishes the mother-daughter relationship with his most beautiful music, and the two singers are luminous in tone and moving emotionally. I must single out bass Matt Bochler as Hjarne, who encompasses an extraordinary vocal range extending from Fafner-like low notes to an eerie high falsetto. As the love interest, Prince Frederic, lyric tenor Alasdair Kent has a gleaming romantic tone perfectly suited to some of Ruders’s most romantic melodies."

– Fanfare Magazine - June, 2019

American guitarist David Starobin's newest recording includes five works dedicated to the Grammy-nominated virtuoso. Included on the recording are two song cycles with Starobin's duo partner, baritone Patrick Mason, a sonata for guitar and piano, and a new work for violin and guitar. The recording also includes a never before released solo recording that Starobin made in 1975. The New Music with Guitar series was begun in 1981 with Bridge Records releasing three LPs that combined solo and chamber works for guitar. The award-winning series has centered around new compositions dedicated to Starobin by composers including Elliott Carter, Gunther Schuller, Stephen Sondheim, George Crumb, and Poul Ruders.

American pianist Victor Rosenbaum returns for his third album for Bridge Records, a deeply felt and beautifully rendered all-Beethoven recital recorded in Boston's Jordan Hall. The works span a major portion of Beethoven’s output, from the Rondo in C (1797) to one of his last works for piano, the Six Bagatelles, Opus 126 (1825). American pianist Victor Rosenbaum has concertized widely as soloist and chamber music performer in the United States, Europe, Asia, Israel, and Russia in such prestigious halls as Tully Hall in New York and the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, Russia. He has appeared at festivals all over the world. In addition to his absorption in the music of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Rosenbaum has performed and given premieres of works by many contemporary composers.

Andrew Waggoner studied at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, the Eastman School of Music and Cornell University. Called “the gifted practitioner of a complex but dramatic and vividly colored style” by The New Yorker, his music has been commissioned and performed by the Academy of St. Martin’s-in-the-Fields; the Los Angeles Philharmonic; the Saint Louis, Denver, Syracuse, and Winnipeg Symphonies. The three concertos recorded on this program were composed between 2010 and 2013. “…his music has everything we have come to expect from the greatest of contemporary composers—confidence, originality, expressivity, and, above all, palpable meaning. …highly original and compelling.” (Fanfare Magazine)

The Lark Quartet brings its stellar 30 year career to a close with this celebratory album. On it, Lark Quartet performs premieres by John Harbison, Kenji Bunch, Anna Weesner and Andrew Wagoner, all composed for the occasion. Assisting Lark Quartet are Yousif Sheronick, percussion (Bunch), Romie de Guise-Langlois, clarinet (Weesner) and the Lark's four founding members (Waggoner). The Lark Quartet continues to delight audiences with its energy, passionate commitment and artistry since its inception in 1985. The Lark has performed in many of the world’s great cultural centers including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, The Library of Congress, London’s Wigmore Hall, L’Opéra de la Bastille in Paris, and appeared at international festivals including Lockenhaus, the Schleswig-Holstein Festival, Mostly Mozart, Istanbul Festival, Wolftrap and the Beethoven Festival in Moscow. Promising to deliver “a performance of grace, proportion and burnished brilliance” (The Washington Post), The Lark Quartet offers audiences new insights into the art of chamber music through programs that begin with the ensemble virtuosity of the western tradition and continue into recent music from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, all while regularly sharing the stage with dynamic collaborators.

Seasonal Music is the first album of compositions by the remarkable thirty-nine year old American composer, Christopher Stark. Annotator Sean Shepherd writes of the "tremendous spaciousness, and a melancholy resonating throughout" the three recent works that make up this program. Speaking of the largest of these pieces, the virtuosic string quartet "Seasonal Music", Shepherd calls it "at times pictorial and descriptive-- alternatively a vast exploration in sound and the possibilities of the quartet for its own sake. "Stark is served brilliantly on this recording by three leading ensembles-the Momenta Quartet, the Los Angeles Piano Quartet and the Calyx Piano Trio with Scott Andrews, clarinet.

This recording presents two of Claude Debussy's enduring masterpieces- the Children's Corner suite (1908), and his brilliant- Études (Books 1 & 2) (1915), played by the American pianist, Aleck Karis. Aleck Karis has performed recitals, chamber music, and concertos across the Americas, Europe and in China. As the pianist of the new music ensemble Speculum Musicae he has participated in over a hundred premieres and performed at major American and European festivals. His appearances with orchestra have ranged from concertos by Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin to those of Stravinsky, Messiaen and Carter. His five solo discs on Bridge Records include Aleck Karis performs Schumann, Carter, Chopin; Aleck Karis: Mozart Recital; Stravinsky: Music for Piano 1911-1942; John Cage: Sonatas and Interludes; and Karis Plays Webern, Wolpe & Feldman. His two albums on Romeo Records are Piano Music of Philip Glass and Late Piano Music of Frederic Chopin. He is a Distinguished Professor of Music at the University of California, San Diego, and Associate Dean of the Division of Arts and Humanities.

This recording chronicles the growth and development of a deep friendship between pianist David Holzman and composer John McDonald. Over the course of two decades, the two have developed a deep understanding and appreciation of each other personally and professionally. Writing about the relationship, David Holzman says: “I have known John McDonald for almost two decades. At first, he was a generous colleague, joining with Joel Gordon to help bring many of my cd’s into existence—providing the space to record at Tufts University, editing, and a stayover at his house for these multi-day events. By the second such event, he was already becoming a friend and soon a close and trusted friend. I began to know him as a composer about a decade ago, when I began to ask for, and receive, unbidden, compositions—all colorful characterstucke clearly written by one pianist for another. It was only two years ago, when I started to work on this album, that I began to fully grasp the variety and complexity of his works. And only after the two-year journey of learning, performing and recording was complete did I have the pleasure of seeing John’s personality reflected in his music.” The earlier works in this recording capture Holzman's physical approach to the piano, with intense involvement of arm and shoulder. The more recent works were written as Holzman was struggling to perform while using hearing devices.