Get to Know Jin-Hwa
Newly released interview of Jin-Hwa Choi discussing her background and latest work.
Click here to read or listen on SoundCloud
DASHING! VOL. 3 FEATURING GAVIN BROWN
Gavin Brown has 5 songs on the new DASHING album from Navona Records. With lyrics written by Miesha Lowery, this compilation CD includes 5 songs that will bring to mind the holiday season. DASHING is a compilation album put out every year by Navona Records featuring new composers. Great gift for friends and family. Performed by Gavin Brown at the piano and Diana Cantrell.
BRASS TACKS FEATURING JANICE MACAULAY
BRASS TACKS from Navona Records offers far more than the fundamental idioms of classical music. While the works featured on this album pay homage to great classical and romantic composers, subtle contemporary flairs shine throughout this collection. Odd meters, blue notes, ferocious brass writing, and imaginative deviations from traditional song structures seamlessly push the envelope for brass repertoire. Delve into the rich sound of brass soloists and ensembles in this compelling multi-composer album.
Order or stream through Navona
MORTON FELDMAN’S PIANO AND STRING QUARTET BY RAY FIELDS
Morton Feldman viewed Piano and String Quartet as his capstone work—the culminating example of the aesthetic that Feldman spent his life seeking. Written in 1985, the year before Feldman’s death, this single movement, roughly eighty- minute composition was heralded by Steve Reich as “the most beautiful work [of Feldman’s] I know.”
Ray Fields presents a detailed analysis of the complete piece and examines the elements that contribute to its formal and expressive design. He discusses the sonic experience of the music itself and provides insights into Feldman’s aesthetic influences. The book also includes basic biographical information about Feldman; descriptions of the music of his early, middle, and late periods; and an overview of analyses of other Feldman works.
In examining this beloved piece, the book addresses the question: what was everything Feldman wanted in his music? Also included are interviews with Kronos Quartet’s David Harrington about the origins of Piano and String Quartet and crucial information from pianist Aki Takahashi about performing the work.
Order on Rowman & Littlefield, Amazon, or Barnes & Noble
STORIES OUT OF CHERRY STEMS BY PETER DAYTON
Composer Peter Dayton and Navona Records present STORIES OUT OF CHERRY STEMS, an album of original vocal chamber music with carefully curated texts spanning multiple centuries. Soprano Katie Procell and numerous selected performers navigate a persistent tension between simplicity and complexity delicately threaded throughout the program, providing a solid stage for the texts of notable poets Pablo Neruda, Oscar Wilde, and more. The strengths of vocal and instrumental chamber music merge into a cohesive powerhouse in this recording, brimming with sung stories that compliment Dayton’s compositional style.
Order on Navona
LILY THE OPERA BY GARTH BAXTER
In the summer of 2022, the opera Lily was filmed in a fully staged production in Westminster, Maryland. Composer Garth Baxter and librettist Lisa Van Auken (pen name Lisa Van Allen) created this opera over 13 years.
Lily is a romantic opera written in the style of Puccini and Verdi. The opera is melodramatic, full of arias, and each scene has motives that carry the action and make the music understandable and enjoyable. Lily is loosely based upon the novel The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton and is set in 1910 New York.
The principal performers are Soprano Katie Procell as Lily, Bart Tenor Han Jeong Wook as Seldon, and Baritone Jeffrey Gates as Gus.
Please visit Lily’s website for full details and photos.
The Baltimore Composers Forum 