The Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, Tokyo, was founded in 1962 by Japan's three leading media companies--The Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper company, Nippon Television Network Corporation (NTV) and Yomiuri Telecasting Corporation (YTV). The orchestra performs around 100 concerts each year true to its founding mission of dedicating to promoting the universe of classical music in Japan. On this release, the ensemble pairs Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring and Bartok’s The Miraculous Mandarin Suite. French-born conductor Sylvain Cambreling is a musician with big ideas. A thought-provoking, colourful and dramatic artist, and persuasive champion of contemporary music, he has a flair for grabbing the attention of audiences, yet his originality is rooted in thorough knowledge of musicology.
Jazz and classical music had certainly mingled before, perhaps most notably in the work of the Modern Jazz Quartet, but seldom with as much sense of purpose as on this 1971 Hubert Laws outing. While the flautist had previously shown himself to be of an eclectic bent, working in pop and R&B as well as jazz, an album like RITE OF SPRING was an unprecedented move for him. In tackling the works of Faure, Stravinksy, Debussy, and Bach, he secured the distinctive arrangement chops of Don Sebesky, who in turn harnessed a number of fine players. Together they worked out third-stream arrangements (at a time when that was still a new idea) of the title piece, "Pavane," and others with an ear towards a new paradigm. This isn't some cheesy swing-meets-strings deal, it's an earnest (and successful) effort to break new ground. You still might have to pinch yourself when you realize you're hearing Bob James playing Bach harpsichord.
Solstice Ritual, Homage to Varesse and Ravel for fourteen vi
Nimbus
Book
$129.99Mar 20, 2026
Over the past forty-five years, I have composed many works whose titles point to natural and celestial radiances: galaxy, star, sun, earth, moon, sky, light, dawn, illumination, equinox, summer, etc. One central metaphor of my life's creative work is that of light refracting. Of interest to me, for my work, is to build, sculpt, and compose clean, clear, transparent, translucent, luminous, radiant, shining, resounding, and resonant musical materials. Solstice Ritual for 14 virtuosi shares many of these preoccupations. Solstice Ritual also pays homage to the composers Edgard Varèse and Maurice Ravel, and it celebrates their imagination, joy, love, vitality, soul, energy, great chords and rich chord progressions, resonant orchestrations, tight big-band-like splash-chords, and the sheer beating-heart inner life of their music. I love all of their compositions, and to give just two examples among many, Varèse's percussion writing and Ravel's gorgeous orchestrations have been longstanding sources of inspiration. - Augusta Read Thomas
