Prisma 2: Contemporary Concertos & Works for Orchestra
Iliana Matos, guitar. Zagreb Festival Orchestra/Miran Vaupotic
Barbara Hill, flute. Petr Nouzovsky, cello.
Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra/Petr Vronsky, Stanislav Vavrinek
Janacek Philharmonic Orchestra/Jiri Petrdlik
Navona Records 6232
Total Time:  52:31
Recording:   ****/****
Performance: ****/****

Prisma 2 brings together five new works for orchestra, three of which also feature soloists, in this new release from Navona.  The recordings were all made in the last year.

The album opens with a concerto for guitar and string by James Lentini.  Written in 1996, the three movement work features a blend of modal and traditional harmony, though often with more open intervals.  The first movement “Andante” has a sunnier quality with motive that helps unify it.  The central adagio takes on a slightly more somber tone with dissonance hovering at the edges and adding an emotional depth.  The final movement brings us back to more technical display with some interplay with the orchestra and an excellent cadenza that adds to the heart-warming quality of Lentini’s style.  Words cannot do justice to Iliana Matos’ interpretation and performance here.  The music’s accessibility makes for an immediately engaging opening to the album with the performances here certainly among the finest in Navona’s catalogue.  The recording is stunning as well with a perfect balance of the soloist.  As the most substantial work on the album, it is certainly well worth the price of admission to what follows.

Two shorter works for soloist and orchestra are interspersed with orchestral pieces.  First is Rain Worthington’s Full Circle.  The piece blends the cello solo with the orchestra in a more meditative work.  The orchestra is like a memory out of which solo ideas come to the forefront only to recede back into the texture.  The musical style is more contemporary than the opening work with fascinating timbral qualities and sounds explored in the fabric of the music while a particular line moves through them.  It makes for a rather intriguing and moody work with the dark colors of the cello heightening the dramatic flow of the music.  The performances here are superb bringing out Worthington’s expressive musical qualities well.  Peter Castine’s Aperture is constructed like a Baroque concerto grosso with a flute solo and string quartet set against the orchestral string ripieno group.  Because of this, the music tends to have a more intimate, and yet denser texture.  The three groups are in far greater opposition as the piece opens as if they are coming from quite separate directions often clashing together with pizzicato sections or sudden harmonic clusters signal a possible new direction.  The music is striking with its unrelentless intensity that also includes spoken text of encouragement and frustration.  All serving as an emotional response to the 9/11 attacks.  This is music at the opposite end of the spectrum from Lentini’s opening work.  Here, all sense of brightness has been removed as dense clusters and dissonance struggles against small cells of music trying to break through, or away.

Camerata Music (1990-orchestral version) by Jan Jarvlepp was premiered by the University of Ottawa Orchestra and subsequently by the Ottawa Symphony.  It takes some of its inspiration from Columbian folk music which infuses the work with a host of percussion and hand clapping, coupled with interesting rhythms.  The music works to provide contrast to what precedes it on the album.  Jarvlepp’s opening lyrical line moves against these rhythms exploring different solo expressions of the primary idea in gradually growing layers while the percussive elements punctuate and add rhythmic interest.  The album closes with Beth Mehocic’s Left of Winter (2014).  This seven-minute work was commissioned to serve as a prelude to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring.  The piece though is also a reflection of young men going off to war as they head to the train station.  As they contemplate their lot, there is a sense of nostalgia for what they left behind, a setting in of the realization that they may not return and a trumpet call to gather them back from their musings before they march off the train.  Mehocic takes inspiration from the rhythmic ideas of Stravinsky (which is obvious from its opening bars and several musical references) and then melds them into her own style and narrative here which makes this like a score for a short film.

Prisma is actually a rather fitting title here for the different works that are included in this compilation of modern music.  Each presents a different aesthetic facet that allows us to reflect on deeper meanings, or simply enjoy the moment.  Each work receives excellent and committed performances and as a result the pieces come alive and encourage the listener to consider each on their own merits.

John Williams at the Movies
Christopher Martin, trumpet.
Dallas Winds/Jerry Junkin
Reference Recordings 1425
Total Time:  75:43
Recording:   ****/****
Performance: ****/****

If you had the opportunity to play in a wind ensemble or concert band, this new Reference release will certainly be worth your time.  The Dallas Winds are the premiere professional wind ensemble in the country.  Under their music director, Jerry Junkin, they perform a variety of concerts exploring the vast symphonic wind band repertoire.  They also do a very popular John Williams program each year.  Transcriptions of Williams’ music for band have begun to improve tremendously over the past decade with “official” suites in Signature Editions from Hal Leonard.  Unlike some of the versions of Williams’ music in band versions, these tend to be far closer to his original orchestral intent.  The ensemble includes your traditional concert band instrumentation complete with string bass and a battery of percussion.  Harp, piano, and organ are added in as needed for color.

After an exciting beginning with the Olympic Fanfare and Theme we move into the excellent overture from The Cowboys.  Hearing the articulation here in the rapid passages, often transferred to the saxophone section, is simply amazing.  Often one forgets that there are no strings present—that is a mark both of the excellent transcriptions and the assured performances.  The same can be said for “Adventures on Earth” from E.T.: The Extraterrestrial  which appears later on the album.  Some pieces like the Superman march, the “Imperial March” from The Empire Strikes Back, the theme from J.F.K., and the march from 1941 are perfectly captured in these performances and are spot on parallels to their orchestral versions.  Most fascinating though is the way the “Excerpts” from Close Encounters is organized.  This is similar to the one Williams programs in concerts, but with the woodwind texture, the fascinating clusters and textures are quite fresh and even more intriguing—especially when the alto saxophone takes on the primary theme (in place of what would be violin).  It makes this a particular highlight for that reason.  The central part of the album does focus on Star Wars music including the original “Main Title” (which is remarkably close to the real thing, with excellent wind writing and playing here) and the aforementioned march.  But. It also includes two selections from The Force Awakens: “Scherzo for X Wings” and “The Jedi Steps and Finale”.  These fresh versions arranged excellently by Paul Lavender are truly “hot off the press” with the first of the selection still not in a “final copy”.  So that makes this release even more compelling.  Special guest trumpeter Christopher Martin, who was featured on the soundtrack to Lincoln, appears here for a selection from that score, “With Malice Toward None” in a beautiful performance.  Also interesting is the little “encore” of The Star-Spangled Banner arrangement Williams did for the 114^th Rose Parade when he was also that year’s Grand Marshall.  It is another of the gems on this very rich album

Reference recordings is at the top of industry standards for stellar sound and imaging of performances and the release here does not disappoint.  Toss it into your multi-channel system and you will feel like you are there in this 5.1 stereo imaging that perfectly captures the Myerson Hall, Dallas.  It is no wonder then that the album was up for a Grammy this year.  The performances are really amazing.  When you realize that wind instruments tend to need to work a bit differently for all those runs that seem so effortless on a string instrument (though they can be just as difficult), it is even more impressive what the members of Dallas Winds are capable of technically.  The brass shine throughout this release and have an excellent full sound that is marked with superb, crisp articulation as well.  If you missed, or overlooked, this release, rest assured it is certainly among the finest collections of Williams’ music.