The music of Alan Hovhaness, one of America's most prolific composers, enchants with his signature synthesis of East and West. Influenced by his Armenian heritage and a fascination with nature and spirituality Hovhaness sought to create music "for all people, music which is beautiful and healing." This collection of works featuring the violin includes several premiere recordings. Concerto No. 2, one of a series of ten concertos for various instruments, requires the soloist and ensemble to play using distinctive effects including tone clusters, melisma, and playing without strict measure. Evocations of Armenian liturgy contrasted with dizzying Scottish jigs can be heard in the Violin Sonata.

Although Alan Hovhaness (1911-2000) was born in Massachusetts and ended his days in Seattle, his music was profoundly coloured by his Armenian heritage, in particular through his fondness for the modal melos of the ancient Armenian church. His combination of modality and melisma, of hymn and dance, can often make him sound like an eastern cousin of Vaughan Williams. The organ is an ideal medium for his musical language, allowing it to range from timeless, questing prayer to gloriously full-bodied statements that stir the soul.

Classical Music

Hovhaness, A.: Choral Music

Includes work(s) by Alan Hovhaness. Soloist: Robin Dauer.

HOVHANESS Cantata Domino. Immortality. Unto Thee, O God. Triptych: Ave Maria. Simple Mass. From the End of the Earth. 3 Motets. Psalm 143 . I Will Rejoice in the Lord. Why Hast Thou Cast Us Off? The God of Glory Thundereth. O Lord God of Hosts • Elizabeth C. Patterson, dir; Gloriæ Dei Cantores; David Chalmers, James E. Jordan, Jr. (org); Kathy Schuman (sop); Phoenix Marcela Catlin (alt); Richard Cragg (ten); G. Luke Norman (bs); Lydia Ingwersen, Stephen Velie (ob); Marianne Wierzbinski, Daniel Pfeiffer (hn) • GLORIÆ DEI CANTORES 52 (75:33 Text and Translation)


This CD of religious music by Alan Hovhaness is of such a high quality in performance that it virtually transcends the form of his pieces. In other words, the performers are all so completely wrapped up in this music, and it is sufficiently interesting to maintain one’s attention even if one is not inclined toward religiosity in music, that it commands and holds your attention from first note to last.


A great deal of the credit for this high quality goes to Elizabeth Patterson and her choir, Gloriæ Dei Cantores, the resident choir of the Church of the Transfiguration in Cape Cod. Their blend is clear and well tuned but not creamy-smooth and perfect, and for that I am highly grateful. I’ve had my fill of choirs that sound like their tone was produced on an organ pipe. I like to hear humanity in my choruses, and Gloriæ Dei Cantores fulfills that expectation. (I should also point out that clarity of lines in the chorus also translates, especially here, to clarity of diction, which I also appreciate.) Neither of the two organists on this recording is identified with any specific piece of music, so I cannot tell you who is playing what (there also appear to be unidentified brass players on O Lord God of Hosts ), but the organ-playing as a whole is on a very high level.


Hovhaness’s music employs a number of dissonances and chromatics, yet is never purposely abrasive in a way that shuns the understanding of an average listener. Of course, what audiences of the 1940s wanted and expected to hear and what Hovhaness gave them was not always the same thing, and as the liner notes point out, he faced harsh public judgment of some of his most cherished pieces. Happily, as time went on even the most astringent passages in a Hovhaness piece came to sound almost romantic by comparison. Perhaps one reason for the disparity in acceptance between the 1940–50s and today is at least partially explained by the changes that took place in jazz during the late 1950s and early ’60s. Jazz at that time moved away from strictly tonal chord patterns (and, sometimes, chord patterns in general) and toward modes, stacked chords, and atonality in a highly diverse and sometimes “unpopular” style. Public acceptance and acclaim for such highly developed musicians as John Coltrane, Dave Brubeck, Miles Davis, Ornette Coleman, and Bill Evans helped to make listening to Hovhaness an enjoyable and accessible public experience.


Certainly, most of the Simple Mass is very tonal and highly expressive and the Three Motets, sung by a cappella choir, even more so. Here, the music almost floats above the ground, an effect Hovhaness creates through his use of higher chord positions that almost never include the root tonic or heavy low notes for the basses (these chord positions also allow him to move either chromatically or modally within chords). Sister Phoenix Marcela Catlin’s alto solo in the second motet is beautifully phrased. I should also give special recognition to the excellent soprano of Kathy Schuman in Immortality and the Simple Mass. Another unaccompanied chorus, I Will Rejoice in the Lord, contains modes and harmonies that sound almost Hebraic.


These appear to be the only available recordings of these works. Whether or not they are first recordings, I cannot say. But if you are inclined toward religious music in general, and/or Hovhaness in particular, you cannot fail to be moved by this disc. It is, quite simply, terrific.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

Classical Music

American-Armenian composer Alan Hovhaness was a significant representative of 20th-century music – a composer who sought a path independent to the fashions and trends of his time. He avoided the European avant-garde, instead embracing Armenian and oriental traditions as well as Medieval and Renaissance music. This second volume includes the sonic atmospheres of Hermes Stella, dedicated to the poet-philosopher-mystic Francis Bacon, and the complex and fascinating Piano Sonata ‘Journey to Arcturus’ which takes us to one of the most visible stars from Earth. MusicWeb International considered Alessandra Pompili “a splendid young exponent of Hovhaness's music” in Volume 1 of this edition.

REVIEW:

Komanchi, Op. 249 was inspired by the legendary Japanese poetess of the same name, and by nature. This seven-movement piece has a simple delicacy. The texture is very thin – often just a single-line melody. Hovhaness manages to capture the essence of Asian music while still writing in his own voice.

Greek Rhapsody No. 1, Op. 63 is an early work. Hovhaness completed it in 1944 when he completely reinvented his style. The melody sounds Grecian and is given a mostly monophonic treatment. This free-flowing rhapsody entices with its improvisatory beauty.

Hovhaness’ 1981 Piano Sonata, Op. 354 is a major work and is over twenty minutes in length. But don’t expect a traditional sonata-allegro four-movement structure. The subtitle “Journey to Arcturus” provides the context. This is about moving from one destination to another. As the work does over the course of its six movements.

Hovhaness was a pianist, but one with a unique idea of what piano music should be. Alesandra Pompili gives us Hovhaness’ vision in her performances. Her playing is expressive and fluid. An excellent recording. Highly recommended for anyone wanting a fuller understanding of Alan Hovhaness’ music.

-- WTJU-FM, 91.1 (Univ. of VA)

Hovhaness has found a strong advocate in Gerard Schwarz, and about time too. This prolific and at times prolix composer's music, with its expressively limited mixture of bell sounds, modal and Eastern harmonies, and simple counterpoint, can sound naïve and even irritating in large doses. What is so often missing from many performances is committed playing, giving the music the strength, beauty, and confidence that so often makes all the difference between "getting through the notes" and the quality of response that these pieces need and deserve. This disc, all premiere recordings, does the latter, and even if you dislike Hovhaness you might well be impressed by the results.

Khrimian Hairig is a short, pretty work for solo trumpet and strings much like the composer's Prayer of St. Gregory. It makes a very nice program opener even though it tells us nothing especially new. That certainly isn't true of the larger works. The Guitar Concerto must be numbered among the more successful works in its genre. It has all of the composer's hallmark fingerprints, but it also reveals an astutely judged understanding of how to pit such a weak-toned instrument against a large orchestra. In terms of color, texture, and contrast, the music is wholly beguiling and never overstays its welcome.

The same holds true for Symphony No. 60. At a bit more than half an hour, this is a long work for Hovhaness, but the inclusion of some American folk music makes an interesting contrast with his usual Eastern modes, while the four movements once again offer an unusually broad range of contrast and sonority. Best of all, the entire program is extremely well played, from guitarist David Leisner on up. This isn't difficult music technically, but it must never sound tired or lazy, and here it doesn't. The disc offers what in effect is an entire mini-concert--overture, concerto, and symphony--and you can listen to the whole thing straight through without fear of monotony. Sensitive and coherent notes by the late composer's wife add to the overall appeal, as does the excellent sound, particularly in the difficult-to-balance Guitar Concerto.

– David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

A wonderful introduction to this amazing composer’s music.

With over 500 works to his name Alan Hovhaness may well be the most prolific American composer as well as one of the most fascinating. His music cannot be pigeonholed since he drew influences from so many varied sources. That said, above all, he insisted on melody, having roundly rejected the path of ‘modernism’ that many others followed in the 20 ^th century. Among those influences was his Armenian heritage inherited through his father. These are very much to the fore in his First Symphony subtitled Exile which references the plight of Armenians who were forced to flee in their millions in the face of an onslaught by Ottoman Turks during the First World War. Lovers of big tunes will revel in the lush sonorities on display. They’re in evidence right from the first notes. These are given to the clarinet which introduces a plaintive tune taken up by other woodwind with the orchestra continuing the Middle Eastern-sounding scales and the music becoming disturbed and agitated. The second, short movement marked Grazioso is further demonstration of the melodies for which Hovhaness is rightly renowned. Woodwind sings out against a background of pizzicato from strings and harp. This allows for an interlude of calm before the third and final movement brings us back to agitation. Driving strings and winds recall the opening theme in chorale form which then becomes the main focus of the orchestra. The powerfully expressed message is that a whole people cannot be suppressed. Its spirit will reassert itself and prevail against all the odds.
 
One of the other influences Hovhaness exploits is his love and reverence of the music of the Far East, particularly Japan and Korea, having studied both. The second work, Fantasy on Japanese Woodprints, has a title that allows him to explore his own impressions of the music from this part of the world. It involves extremely creative ways of approximating the sounds of Japan through clever and inventive use of the instruments of a Western orchestra. The marimba is the instrument of choice to carry the main theme against a background of orchestral experimentation creating a convincing and effective ‘Japanese’ sound for Western ears.
 
Yet another influence which has shown itself in many of Hovhaness’s compositions are mountains. He once wrote “Mountains are symbols, like pyramids, of man’s attempt to know God. Mountains are symbolic meeting places between the mundane and spiritual worlds”. It was a natural thing therefore to have been moved to write a symphony that expresses those ideas following the huge explosion of Mount Saint Helens in Washington State in 1980. The first movement sets the scene and pays reverence to the majesty and mystery of the mountain through use of gorgeous harmonically and melodically rich tunes. These emphasise the mountain’s imperious eminence over its surroundings and its naturally serene nature prior to its being geographically changed by the explosion. The second movement is also calm since it describes the fabulous Spirit Lake in whose waters the mountain was often magically mirrored. Once again Hovhaness uses Japanese-sounding melodies to create the air of mystery and natural beauty of a place which was obliterated by the explosion. The finale opens with an almost hymn-like theme from the strings with tubular bells in the background. A sole flute precedes a representation of the cataclysmic events that rent the mountain asunder, and which continues for much of the movement’s 14 minutes. This musical depiction of the destructive power of nature is extremely potent with plenty of work for bass drums and gong as wave after wave of explosions tear the very fabric of the ground on which the mountain stood. Finally the opening hymn returns to re-establish a measure of calm. Hovhaness doesn’t end the symphony there. Instead he creates a coda to signify the “youthful power and grandeur of the Cascades Mountains” that, as he said, renews the vitality of “our peaceful planet, the living earth, the life-giving force building the majestic Cascades Mountains (,) rising, piercing the clouds of heaven”. This symphony represents an extremely satisfying journey that shows the composer’s unique view of how to use music to describe nature in all its creative as well as destructive power. The disc as a whole is a wonderful introduction to this amazing composer’s music that I for one am only beginning to discover. More of Hovhaness’s works are being recorded all the time. With 67 symphonies alone there’s plenty left to record and to discover and that’s an exciting prospect. Gerard Schwarz is a great advocate of American music and he and his orchestra help do the kind of justice Hovhaness deserves. Ron Johnson does a sterling job on the marimba in the disc’s second work. These recordings were originally made by Delos and they offer an extremely rewarding experience for a whole new audience to discover and revel in.
 
-- Steve Arloff , MusicWeb International

Alan Hovhaness’ Symphony No. 48 is subtitled “Vision of Andromeda”, and anyone who has seen the Hubble photos of our neighboring galaxy knows just how gorgeous that must be. For years I used one of those magnificent vistas as my computer’s screen saver. This four-movement symphony, lasting just under half an hour, is typical Hovhaness. There are lovely, modal fugues in the second movement and finale; evocative, vaguely oriental melodies all over the place; luscious string chorales, and interludes for bells and tam-tam. Check out the opening of the finale. Fabulous, isn’t it? Does it do justice to Hovhaness’ “vision”? It’s plausible.

The truth is, Hovhaness always has had his detractors. Bernstein rather maliciously called his First Symphony “ghetto music” (which would be a compliment today), and his 67 symphonies and other works can sound rather the same–but then, so does a lot of Bach. For me anyway, there’s something disarming about his childlike joy in consonant harmony, in the fluidity of his fugal writing, and his utter unconsciousness of the fact that his melodies often tread dangerously close to kitsch. Say what you will, his music is unfailingly honest. It is what it is.

There are also moments where it achieves an astonishing, passionate intensity. The Prelude and Quadruple Fugue is, in its way, a masterpiece in considering the means by which it accumulates energy as each distinctively-wrought fugue subject enters and gets combined with its predecessors. It’s so clear, so easy to follow, and so much fun that you entirely forget the sophisticated contrapuntal mind at work behind the scenes. And that is as it should be.

The Concerto for Soprano Saxophone and Strings also sounds vividly tuneful and unfailingly attractive. When Hovhaness calls the finale, perhaps naively, Let The Living and The Celestial Sing, it’s easy to scoff, but the music is just so bloody pretty. Greg Banaszak plays the solo part with the suave timbre that the work requires, especially in the Adagio espressivo at the start of the second movement, while Hovhaness specialist Gerard Schwarz does his usual fine job with all three works, galvanizing the players of the Eastern Music Festival Orchestra to a welcome degree of corporate integrity. It helps, of course, that Hovhaness’ music is as straightforward to play as it is to hear. Beautiful.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Admirers of the composer need not hesitate.

An hour’s worth of Hovhaness in ‘wind band plus percussion symphonic garb’ is the raison d’être of this Naxos release. It bears all his most obvious hallmarks, sometimes starkly: vistas, intense tattoos, hieratic brass, convulsive dialogues, chimes, noble perorations, edifices of almost Mayan splendour.

The Seventh Symphony dates from 1959. The purity of its rhythmic percussion tattoos and the hieratic nature of its brass calls give one an idea of the processional intensity of its dramaturgy. The loquacity of his wind writing implies a raft of interior monologues. The writing becomes more concentrated in the central movement where Hovhaness ensures themes are less fragmentary and by the finale things have turned positively Olympian. The percussion is now subservient to the to the brass calls, themselves more legato and ushering in a sunset glow, and a cooling, reflective consonance.

The following year he wrote Ararat, Symphony No.14. It makes much of ‘dragon fly’ sonorities, bright trumpets and glittering percussion once again but adds a further percussive layer via bell chimes and a buzzy series of terraced sonorities – dramatic, florid, and ground shaking in the central movement. The percussion starts up immediately in the finale but is gradually worn down by the sheer pugilistic insistence of the conquering brass.

The final symphony of the three is written on a much broader canvas than these two quarter of an hour works. But it too is a powerful construction, its chattering winds and terse declamation capturing the ear with great trenchancy. Drunken lowering lower brass add a leering patina as well, as do the aero engine and gamelan evocations. The finale is a wonderful example of nobility and processional tread with repeated figures passed from brass to wind adding a layer of sonic depth. We feel as if some vast castle is being evoked, as the brass calls resound from battlement to crenellation; Gormenghast in music.

Keith Brion has a long track-record with Hovhaness and he directs his forces with great vitality and precision. This splendid disc has been excellently engineered and admirers of the composer need not hesitate.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

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These three symphonies for wind orchestra treat some recurring themes in Alan Hovhaness' work: mountains (Symphonies Nos. 7 and 14) and his Armenian heritage (Symphony No. 23, evocative of the medieval city of Ani, "The City of A Thousand and One Cathedrals"). The later work is by far the most substantial, but all of them constitute worthy additions to the repertoire for winds and percussion. They are very well played here by the Trinity College ensemble under Keith Brion, who has lived with this music for many decades. Perhaps the English horn soloist in "Sunset", the last movement of Symphony No. 7, is a touch "quacky", but this and any other criticisms would be mere quibbles. The brass play with confidence and the sort of imposing serenity that Hovhaness so often requires, while the drums, bells, and tam-tam punctuate the texture atmospherically. Sonics are very fine, and the entire production is dedicated touchingly to the memory of Lady Evelyn Barbirolli (d. 2008), who some readers may recall was a noted oboist in her day. Recommended to fans of the composer, and of good music for concert band.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

'With their reflections of Nature, the spiritual, and the oriental, the symphonies of Alan Hovhaness are rapidly acquiring cult status.' - CD Review (UK) The recording premiere of Hovhaness' Mount St. Helens Symphony, released in 1993, amazed us all by becoming Delos' most widely celebrated (and bestselling) release since Howard Hanson's Romantic and Nordic Symphonies in 1989. Requests poured in for a sequel offering Hovhaness' greatest hits - and here it is. Mysterious Mountain is probably Hovhaness' most famous symphonic work; And God Created Great Whales features some of the most majestic soloists ever recorded: humpbacked whales. It is clear that Hovhaness' music is finally finding a wider audience. This American mystic has long been a part of the international fabric, but has been waiting many decades for the extended recognition which is now coming to him. Certainly the symphonic sound stage that recording engineer John Eargle has established allows Hovhaness' music to be heard in a dimension never before available. For this album, everything was recorded 20-bit, and transferred in CD mastering via a 20-to-16-bit noise-shaping process. Mr. Hovhaness was present for the recording sessions, as he was for the Mount St. Helens recording. His emotion at hearing his music realized by Schwarz, Seattle, and the Delos team was evident to all in the sessions for both discs. Gramophone: 'If Gorecki, why not Hovhaness, one begins to ask, and there is something of the same flavour in this obviously dedicated music... The obvious dedication behind the performance, a quality which marks the playing of the Seattle symphony under Gerard Schwarz in all the works here. The recording too is full and atmospheric. Who knows, lightning might strike again, just as it did with Gorecki's Third Symphony.'

This program brings together a wide variety of Alan Hovhaness’ works including numerous world premiere recordings. These range from the earliest of his band compositions, the processional ‘Tapor No. 1,’ to more recent chamber pieces such as the gentle barcarole of ‘Vision on a Starry Night.’ ‘The Ruins of Ani’ returns us to the tragic location also explored in Hovhaness’ ‘Symphony No. 23 Ani’, while the ‘Three Improvisations on Folk Tunes’ evoke dances from the Indian subcontinent. Newly discovered works with percussion include the Japanese-influenced overture to Hovhaness’ opera ‘The Burning House’ alongside ‘October Mountain,’ now a classic in its genre.

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REVIEW:

The value of the Naxos label’s ongoing American Classics series has never been so aptly demonstrated as with the success of this release from the able but hardly well-known Central Washington University Wind Ensemble. A few pieces here have gained exposure: October Mountain is a fixture of percussion ensemble concerts in the U.S., at least, but several are world premieres. This is all to the good, and there’s not a dull moment to be had here. This is both a wide sampling of Hovhaness’ music and a valuable close focus on his music for winds.

– All Music Guide (James Manheim)

Heralded by a New York Times article honoring the centenary year of Hovhaness’ birth, Delos celebrates this wonderfully eclectic “American Mystic’s” glowing niche in the pantheon of American musical history from a new angle: Hovhaness as a composer of what we now call “World Music” though on a more exalted plane than most of that genre’s content.

We call Hovhaness a “mystic” largely due to his insatiable curiosity about pan-global musical traditions: primarily exotic sounding middle- and far-Eastern modes, scales and rhythms that, owing to their alien impact upon Western ears, tend to convey mystically spiritual impressions. On top of his own Armenian musical roots, he compulsively explored the music of other Arabic regions as well as the traditions of India, Japan, Korea and Indonesia, absorbing them all into his overall musical consciousness, to be tapped at need to suit his unique creative designs. Accordingly, Delos has combed through its many distinguished previous recordings of Hovhaness’ music to find the individual works that best support such a World Music classification. And everything fits: Like that of many current world music artists, the music of Hovhaness blends disparate musical influences and impulses in musical fusions that are framed by Western contexts of sound, form and instrumentation. - Delos

R E V I E W S:

"This year [2011] is the centennial of Hovhaness’s birth, and for the occasion Delos Records just released a commemorative CD of some of his most important orchestral and chamber works, called “American Mystic: Music of Alan Hovhaness...from childhood Hovhaness had been immersed in the work of Komitas Vartabed, an Armenian priest and musicologist of the late 19th century who specialized in the medieval liturgical and folk music of his homeland in the Caucasus. In the world of mainstream American classical music, however, Hovhaness, who died in 2000, was —and remains an outlier. At a time when dissonance, serialism and other styles were in vogue and many of his colleagues were writing works meant to be both modern and specifically American, Hovhaness embraced tonality and also showed a fondness for archaic elements like the polyphony of Renaissance music and the counterpoint of Baroque fugues...his music could also be deeply spiritual, a quality on display in well-known works like his Symphony No. 2, called “Mysterious Mountain,” and his “Prayer of St. Gregory,” both of which feature soaring trumpet and meditative string parts."

- Larry Rohter, New York Times