Composers

Choral Music, Classical Music, Commissions, Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, Orchestral

John Adams’ “On the Transmigration of Souls” – A Visceral Experience

  A visceral work headlined the opening program of the NY Philharmonic’s 2026-2027 season at Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center on September 16: John Adams’ On the Transmigration of Souls, a work written in response to the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center. As the 25th anniversary of the tragedy was just a few days prior, my gut was still tender from the echoes of the memories of that day. The work included a recording on which the names of some of the victims were spoken. Even a quarter century later, hearing the names put me right into

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by Gail Wein
Boston, Composers, Concert review, Conductors, Contemporary Classical, Festivals, File Under?

Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music – Nordic Boomers

  Nordic Boomers at Tanglewood Festival of Contemporary Music July 27, 2026 Published in Sequenza 21 By Christian Carey   LENOX – The annual Festival of Contemporary Music concludes with an orchestra concert by the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra. This year, the festival was curated by Esa-Pekka Salonen, and featured themed programs spotlighting emerging composers, Gen X creators, and Monday’s concert, “Nordic Boomers,” dedicated to fifty and sixty-something Scandinavian composers. Most were colleagues of Salonen from his early days as a student composer. These connections were fruitful, but each composer forged their own path, as was evidenced by the FCM

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by Christian Carey
Composers, Contemporary Classical, Minimalism

Simone Dinnerstein/Baroklyn: Hourglass (CD Review)

Although primarily known as a Bach interpreter, pianist Simone Dinnerstein and her string ensemble, Baroklyn, find a natural affinity for the music of Philip Glass, the subject of Hourglass, her first recording for the Naïve label. Yet affinity alone hardly explains the uncanny sense of inevitability that permeates these performances. What emerges instead is a meeting of imaginations preoccupied with the strange elasticity of passing moments and the hidden variations between them. In the album booklet, the ensemble’s leader observes that every repetition in Glass reacts to what preceded it while anticipating what follows. Nothing remains static. “We hear it

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by Tyran Grillo
ACO, Classical Music, Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical, Experimental Music, New York, Orchestral

American Composers Orchestra Performs a New Work Crowd-Sourced by Dreams

On March 11, 2026 at Carnegie Hall, the American Composers Orchestra will perform the world premiere of Cosmologyscape by the composer and violinist Kite. The work was commissioned by the ACO. An essential aspect of the work is crowd-sourced: the audience is invited to submit descriptions of their dreams ahead of time via the Cosmologyscape website. These dreams will be translated by an AI app into a visual language of Lakota symbols, which will be projected on stage at the performance. The composition is a concerto grosso of sorts, as the Cosmology Ensemble (Marilu Donovan, harp; Nava Dunkelman, percussion; JJJJJerome

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by Gail Wein
CD Review, Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, early music, File Under?, New York

Blue Heron Brings Ferrara to New York

Blue Heron in New York In Praise of Laura Peperara – Music for the Concerto delle dame • Ferrara, 1580s St. Ignatius of Antioch Published in Sequenza 21  By Christian Carey February 25, 2026   NEW YORK – Blue Heron always presents thematic programs, and they excel at giving the audience a sense of the time and place in which the music they perform resides. This past week in their program at St. Ignatius of Antioch Church, they featured the music performed in the court of Ferrara in the 1580s, specifically by the Concerto delle dame. These were a trio

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by Christian Carey
Choral Music, Composers, Concert review, Conductors, Contemporary Classical, File Under?, New York, Orchestras

Adés Conducts the New York Philharmonic

Adés Conducts the New York Philharmonic David Geffen Hall January 24, 2026  Published in Sequenza 21 By Christian Carey   NEW YORK – Thomas Adés is best known as a composer, but he is a talented conductor as well. Leading the New York Philharmonic in a program of recent works and a neglected early twentieth century piece, his approach was effusive and commanding, with a versatile and fluid gestural repertoire. The orchestra’s musicians always play at a high standard, but their performance on last Saturday’s concert was superlative, and given the challenges posed by the programmed pieces, all the more

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by Christian Carey
CD Review, Composers, Concerts, Contemporary Classical

Music for Guitars, Bass Clarinets & Contrabasses on Aural Terrains

Music for Guitars, Bass Clarinets & Contrabasses – Various Artists (Aural Terrains) Last month, I was pleased to have my music visit Cafe Oto for the first time, with Feier, a solo piece, performed on a contrabass clarinet. The venue is well known for presentations of experimental music of many kinds. Not all of the shows there are in circulation, but Cafe Oto has some releases for sale on their website. Others have been documented for the label Aural Terrains, including a new recording of a gig from 2023, made by a most heterogeneous grouping of instrumentalists: guitarists, bass clarinetists,

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by Christian Carey
Choral Music, Composers, Concert review, Contemporary Classical, early music, File Under?, Miller Theater, New York

The Tallis Scholars at St. Mary’s (Concert Review)

Mother and Child The Tallis Scholars, directed by Peter Phillips Miller Theater Early Music Series, Church of St. Mary the Virgin December 4, 2025 By Christian Carey   NEW YORK – The choral ensemble The Tallis Scholars, directed by Peter Phillips, are regular visitors to Manhattan, and their December concerts at Church of St. Mary the Virgin have a devoted following (pardon the pun). Often they perform a Marian-themed program appropriate to the space, and  their appearance this past Thursday was no exception. In addition to pieces principally drawn from the English Renaissance, a new Salve Regina setting by the

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by Christian Carey
CD Review, Classical Music, Composers, Twentieth Century Composer

LuLo: The Restless – Rued Langgaard reimagined

Painful footsteps are behind me Here you stand so clear and far Through the willows all I see is a lonely burning star –Thor Lange, “Sun at Rest” Cellist Kirstine Elise Pedersen and bassist Mathæus Bech, a.k.a. LuLo, came together through a shared fascination with the singular, often-misunderstood Danish composer Rued Langgaard (1893–1952). Their approach to his music is both reverent and daring. Rather than treating the scores as sacred artifacts, they dismantled them lovingly, listening closely to recordings, transcribing passages by ear, and distilling sprawling works—from piano pieces to string quartets and symphonies—down to a page or less of

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by Tyran Grillo
Books, Chamber Music, Composers, File Under?, Strings, Twentieth Century Composer

A Book on Elliott Carter’s String Quartet No. 1

Elliott Carter’s String Quartet No. 1, by Laura Emmery, Cambridge Elements, Music Since 1945, Cambridge University Press.    Laura Emmery has done a great deal of analytical research on the music of Elliott Carter, and her book on his string quartets is a valuable resource for anyone interested in learning how he composes. Emmery’s latest publication is part of Cambridge University Press’s Elements series, one of several slender and specific books that each deal with a particular topic. Here, it is Elliott Carter’s String Quartet No. 1, which was composed in 1950-’51 and is widely regarded as a watershed work

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by Christian Carey