Catalog

This recording of tangos began with the idea of writing music that could allow for freedom of improvisation while adhering to the composer's intent. Composer Pablo Ortiz began writing works for cello, multiple cellos and cellos with other string instruments while exploring the concept of original composition versus transcription, or music inspired by other music. His colleague Anssi Karttunen began transcribing music as well, using music of classic tangos, both from Argentina and Finland. Thus the listener will experience original compositions in the tango idiom along with transcriptions and arrangements of classic tangos. It is often hard to tell whether the composer is the interpreter or the interpreter the composer. This is a study in freedom and the shifting line between invention and re-invention. The two different kinds of tangos -- those from Argentina and those from Finland give different shades to the nostalgia and sadness they are both about.

David Ashley White's secular and sacred compositions are widely performed and published and he has received numerous commissions. Recordings of his music appear on the Gothic and Zephyr labels. In addition to the extensive publication of White's choral and instrumental music, his hymns are included in a number of hymnals, including those of the Episcopal, Methodist, and United Church of Christ. A graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, David White serves as director of the University of Houston Moores School of Music. The core of the music on this recording duplicates the repertoire from a concert honoring the composer at the University of Houston and focuses on his secular music, although some of the works employ sacred texts. The music represents a wide range of White's output offering amid the diversity unifying elements of lyricism and expressiveness.

Spectacular sonics are presented on this unique offering of a Blu-Ray surround stereo disc and a regular cd for those people who do not have Blu-Ray players. The Blu-Ray format permits recordings of works in multi-channel at a higher resolution as well as layering of separate mixes so that surround recording and stereo can be presented simultaneously and conveniently as options to listeners. The pieces written to include electronics are all written for eight channels of electronic sound surrounding the audience. The regular compact disc presents content at a lower bit and sampling rate in comparison with the Blu-Ray, making the music available to everyone with a cd player. Composer David Felder has long been recognized as a leader in his generation of American composer. His music is known for its highly energetic profile, its frequent employment of technological extension and elaboration of musical materials and its lyrical qualities. Felder is on the faculty at SUNY-Buffalo and artistic director of the June in Buffalo Festival.

Born in 1934, composer Bernard Hoffer attended the Eastman School of Music. After serving as arranger for the U.S. Army Field Band, he came to New York as a freelance musician/pianist, composer, conductor and arranger. He has written extensively for films, television and commercials for which he has won several Emmy nominations, including the music for the MacNeil-Lehrer News Hour. One of the major works on this recording (MacNeil/Lehrer Variations) is based on the theme he wrote for the News Hour in 1975. The two elegies on the recording are Hoffer's musical reaction to friends and loved ones' deaths. The Symphony was influenced and inspired by an exhibit of the New York abstract expressionist Richard Pousette-Dart's work.

Composer David Patterson is on the faculty at the University of Massachusetts Boston. He was a recipient of a Fulbright Scholars Award and the Chancellor's Distinguished Teaching Award. Patterson received his Ph.D. from Harvard and studied with both Olivier Messiaen and Nadia Boulanger in Paris. His compositions have been described as "a clear and natural blending of many different kinds of music." Of special note on this recording of his chamber music are two works written for James Pellerite, former principal flutist of the Philadelphia Orchestra, and now a virtuoso on the Native American flute. One work is for Native American flute and percussion, while the other is for Native American flute and chamber ensemble.

Born in 1948, composer/pianist Steven R. Gerber studied at Haverford College and Princeton. His music has been performed by orchestras and ensembles across the United States, including the San Francisco Symphony, the National Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Louisville Orchestra. His music is especially popular in Russia and the Ukraine where there have been dozens of performances of his orchestral, solo and chamber works. His music appears on the Chandos, Naxos, Koch and Arabesque labels. This recording includes almost all of his solo piano music performed in reverse chronological order, interspersed with a riveting performance of his Duo for violin and piano by Gregory Fulkerson and Jennifer Rinehart.

The compositions of Amy Williams have been presented at renowned contemporary music venues in the United States, Australia and Europe. Her works have been performed by leading contemporary music soloists and ensembles including the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra, the International Contemporary, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble and the California E.A.R. Unit. Ms. Williams is the recipient of a Howard Foundation Fellowship, a Fromm Music Foundation Commission and a Creative Development Grant from the Heinz and Pittsburgh Foundations. She received her Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo and is on the faculty at the University of Pittsburgh. This recording, the first devoted exclusively to her music, features compositions for piano and strings, all given virtuosic performances by some of the finest performers of contemporary music including the JACK Quartet, Jeffrey Jacobs, Amy Williams and the Bugallo-Williams Piano Duo.

Pianist Findlay Cockrell has had a long and distinguished career in upstate New York as a soloist, chamber musician and concerto soloist. He served on the faculty at the State University of New York at Albany, where he taught piano and classes in music as well as creating a radio course titled Keyboard Masters. A graduate of Juilliard, Mr. Cockrell has performed around the United States and in Russia, where he appeared in recital at the Moscow Conservatory and a guest soloist at Tchaikovsky Hall with the Ossipov Orchestra. This recording includes three American composers whose last names begin with G: Gershwin, Gould and Gottschalk with some seldom recorded arrangements by Earl Wild of Gershwin songs.

This unique recording features Mark Morton performing the double bass and piano parts of popular works by Bottesini and Paganini on the first disc, while the second disc contains all the piano accompaniments performed by Mark Morton and is intended as a play-along disc for bassists. Hailed by critics as "a most artistic representative of the new generation developed in the last half century," Mark Morton is on the faculty at Texas Tech University. He has performed in orchestras (principal bass of the Columbus Symphony Orchestra); been featured in recitals and as a concerto performer and was the first-prize winner of the 1990 International Society of Bassists Solo Competition. He is the author of the popular "Dr. Morton" series of double bass technique books. Morton studied at Juilliard, earning his undergraduate and graduate degrees there. He performs on a double bass made by Gennaro Vinaccio of Naples in the last quarter of the 18th century.

Music by Greek and Greek-American composers is featured on this recording, offering an overview of compositions from several generations. Theodore Antoniou, born 1935 in Greece, maintains affiliations with universities and contemporary music ensembles in the United States and Greece. Nickitas Demos, born in 1962, is the youngest of the composers represented. He studied at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Indiana University and the Cleveland Institute of Music. He is founder and artistic director of the neoPhonia New Music Ensemble at Georgia State University, where he is also a professor of composition. Christos Samaras, born in 1956, studied at the State Conservatory of Thessaloniki, the University of Music and Fine Arts in Vienna and the University of Fine Arts in Berlin. He now teaches composition at Aristotle University in Thessaloniki. George Tsontakis, born in 1951, studied at Juilliard and the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. He has received two Grammy nominations and the University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for his Violin Concerto No. 2. Many of the performers are on the faculty at George State University and conservatories in Thessaloniki and Macedonia.

Pianist Pola Baytelman performs works for piano by American composers Joseph Fennimore, George Crumb and Lowell Liebermann. She is joined by flutist Jan Vinci in Katherine Hoover's Medieval Suite. Born in Chile, Baytelman has studied at the University of Chile's National Conservatory, the New England Conservatory and the University of Texas, Austin. She is an active recitalist who has toured extensively in China, Europe, Hong Kong, South America and across the United States. Her recording on Centaur of Schumann's Humoreske was listed by American Record Guide as one of the top performances of the work. This is her second recording for Albany Records. The first, From Chile to Cuba (TROY1116) received high praise from the press. Jan Vinci, Baytelman's colleague at Skidmore, where both are artists-in-residence, has been hailed as an "exquisite performer" by High Performance Review. She appears on two other recording on Albany Records, including a solo recording titled Global Flutescapes (TROY947).

Born in 1934 in London, American composer Godfrey Winham died at the age of 40. He graduated from the Royal Academy of Music and later attended Princeton where he studied with Roger Sessions. He worked at the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center writing for the RCA Sound Synthesizer, which fostered his interest in this medium. From 1964 until his death in 1975, he was a pioneer and authority in the field of computer music. He also wrote music criticism and contributed to journals like Music Review and Tempo. The bulk of his writings on music, theory, logic and philosophy are at the Firestone Library of Princeton. His short life limited his actual number of music compositions, but the works on this recording are representative of his output. This is the first recording devoted exclusively to his music. Every musical work by Winham was an essay on music, showing by example the content and implications of his complex evolving philosophy of music. The music is performed by some of the best-known exponents of contemporary music, including soprano Tony Arnold and pianist Alan Feinberg.

The second volume of Jean Kopperud's Rated X series features works by five composers for clarinet and percussion, all of them commissioned by Ms. Kopperud for the series, who asked composers to dare to stretch the medium as they considered what to write. Jean Kopperud is well known for her superhuman performance abilities. She has toured the world as a concert soloist and chamber musician and performs with many new music ensembles such as The New York New Music Ensemble. She is also a performer on the cutting edge of the music-theater genre and received national acclaim for her presentations of Karlheinz Stockhausen's Harlekin. She is joined by the percussionist Tom Kolor, who specializes in 20th and 21st century music. He has given dozens of premieres of music by such composers as Milton Babbitt, John Zorn, Tania Leon and Wayne Peterson and has recorded for the Bridge, New World, Naxos and Albany record labels, among many others. Both performers are on the faculty of the University of Buffalo. Extreme Measures I is a 2-CD set (TROY1217/18) that includes commissioned works for clarinet and piano.

Things Fall Apart, a work for voice/narration and small ensemble, is based on the landmark novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe. It tells the story of Okonkwo, a village leader, who through a series of unfortunate events and the coming of Europeans, ultimately takes his own life. Things Fall Apart was written in 2011 and was commissioned by Odekhiren Amaize, who gave the world premiere performance with the musicians on this recording. Composer Roger Vogel has more than 140 compositions to his credit. He is on the faculty at the University of Georgia. He has received awards and prizes from the Roger Wagner Choral Composition Competition and the Delius Composition Competition, among others. Nigerian-American Odekhiren Amaize has studied voice at the University of Texas at Austin, Indiana University and the St. Petersburg State Conservatory. His other professional teaching and research interests include promotion and marketing of the arts, arts management and creative advertising through literature. He is currently on the faculty at the Canadian University in Dubai. His recordings appear on the Musicians Showcase and MSR Classics labels.

Composer David Wolfson enjoys a particularly eclectic and varied compositional career, which has included chamber music, musical theatre and opera. He studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music and Hunter College and his chamber and solo works have been performed through the United States and Europe. His work Story Salad, a series of stage revues for children, toured the U.S. for 13 consecutive years and was seen by more than a million children, teachers and parents. He has received awards and commissions from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet The Composer, the Puffin Foundation and the Manhattan Cultural Arts Fund. This first recording devoted to his music includes a work for solo piano and a cello sonata.

The music of Canadian-American composer Karim Al-Zand (b. 1970) is wide-ranging — from settings of classical Arabic poetry to scores for dance and pieces for young audiences. His works explore connections between music and other arts, and draw inspiration from diverse sources such as 19th century graphic art, fables of the world, folksong and jazz. This second recording on Albany Records devoted to his music amply demonstrates these influences. Two of the works are inspired by literary sources (Imaginary Scenes and Four Fables); while Capriccios takes its inspiration from the Paganini 24 Capriccios and the Variations on a Theme of Bartok draws from Bartok's Concerto for Orchestra. Movements from the Art of Conversation are introduced to the audience through short, spoken dialogues performed by the string quartet, which alternate with the seven movements of the piece.

2013 celebrates the 100th anniversary of the birth of Jerome Moross, an American original. Best known for his outstanding motion picture scores, he considered himself primarily a composer of concert music and this recording, originally released by Koch, demonstrates his considerable contribution to American music. Writing for the theatre remained Moross' first love as a composer. Frankie and Johnny, written in 1938, was one of a number of works he wrote for this medium. The recording spans his compositional output from his earliest work, Biguine, written in 1934, to his last completed work, Concerto for Flute and String Orchestra, written in 1978.

Steven Holochwost (b. 1978) studied at Yale and Rutgers University, where he was under the tutelage of Charles Wuorinen. He has received awards and citations from the National Association of Composers, the Fisher Foundation and ASCAP. His music has been performed throughout the United States and in England, France, Austria and Japan. In addition to his career in music, Holochwost is active at the intersection of developmental psychology and public policy, having earned a doctorate from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. This first recording devoted to his music includes pieces composed between 2002 and 2010. They feature modal sonorities and lyrical melodies on their "sounding surface," which are supported by a structural architecture developed through the application of Charles Wuorinen's "nesting" method of composition — an approach that reflects the self-similar nature of musical sound and references the broader tradition of Western art music.

Jerome Moross (1913-1983) was in the vanguard of composers who realized that there was a music of America, and for America written by Americans. This recording, originally released by Koch, offers three major scores by this major American composer. Moross grew up with and listened to jazz bands, played in theatre pits and found that his own composing style was totally, spontaneously conditioned by it. Having found his métier relatively early in life, he stuck to it through thick and thin to the end. And perhaps because he was so young when he found his voice, his music sounds young--always, early and late. His music is exciting and always sounds fresh, but uniquely his own.

This disc of music for flute and clarinet by Daniel Dorff includes his own compositions as well as his arrangements of Bach inventions for the two instruments. Born in 1956, Daniel Dorff studied at Cornell and the University of Pennsylvania. His music has been performed by the Atlanta Opera, Baltimore Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Aspen Music Festival and the Eastman Wind Ensemble, to name but a few. The Scott/Garrison Duo, featuring clarinetist Shannon Scott and flutist Leonard Garrison, has performed together since 1988 and has been featured at many national conferences of the National Flute Association and the College Music Society. Ms. Scott is on the faculty at Washington State University and Mr. Garrison teaches at the University of Idaho. This is their second recording for Albany Records.

August Nölck was a respected and well-published cello teacher of his day, a director of the Vienna conservatory and a voice from the great German cello tradition of the 19th century. He authored a catalog of cello pieces numbering in the hundreds of opuses, yet no mention of his name appears in contemporary histories of famous cellists. This recording of Nölck's salon music for cello and piano should help bring his music and his accomplishments back to the attention of cellists and audiences. Cellist Beth Vanderborgh enjoys a rich and varied career as both soloist and chamber musician. She is principal cellist of the Greensboro Symphony Orchestra and on the faculty at the University of Wyoming. She is joined by colleague Theresa Bogard.

Three world premiere recordings highlight this disc of chamber music by the distinguished American composer Jennifer Higdon. Ms. Higdon served as Eminent Artist-in-Residence at the University of Wyoming and this composer-supervised recording was the culmination of her activities there. Ms. Higdon comments that when composing "I often picture colors as if I were spreading them on a canvas, except I do so with melodies, harmonies, and through the instruments themselves." All of the performers serve on the music department faculty at the University of Wyoming.

Blossom Time, Sigmund Romberg's delightful 1921 operetta, is based on the music of Franz Schubert and on that composer's touching love life. Blossom Time opened September 29, 1921 at Broadway's Ambassador Theater. The show played for more than 500 performances and became one of the longest-running musicals in Broadway history.

This recording fulfills a long-time dream of Charles Tibbetts to make the music of Alec Wilder for French horn more widely available. Tibbetts first met Alec Wilder and became acquainted with his music through his French horn teacher, the great John Barrows. In fact, some of the works on this recording were written for Barrows and Charles Tibbetts gave the world premiere performance of Suite Nr. 2 while a student of Barrows at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Charles Tibbetts studied with John Barrows until his death in 1974 and then left school to pursue a 46-year career in Europe where he played with the Philharmonia Hungarica, the Badische Staatstheater Nationaltheater Mannheim and the SWR Radio Orchestras. He returned to the U.S. in 2010 and is now active as a chamber musician in the Eau Claire area of Wisconsin.

This recording is a short tour of some of the most important works in the development of the clarinet as a stand-alone instrument along with two new works by composer/clarinetist Sean Osborn that build on the works that came before. Sean Osborn has traveled the world as soloist and chamber musician, and during his 11 years with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. He has also appeared as guest principal clarinet with the New York Philharmonic, Pittsburgh Symphony, Seattle Symphony, and the American Symphony Orchestra. The New York Times dubbed him "...an excellent clarinetist," the Boston Globe called him "...a miracle," and Gramophone "...a master." With more than 40 concertos in his repertoire, Sean has also recorded dozens of CDs for London, Deutsche Grammophon, Sony, CRI, and others, as well as premiering works by John Adams, John Corigliano, Chen Yi, and Phillip Glass to name a few. Sean has performed at many festivals including Marlboro, Seattle Chamber Music, Aspen, Zagreb Bienalle, Pacific Rims, and Colorado. He is also an award-winning composer whose works have been played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and members of the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera, Marlboro Music Festival, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic among others. His other recordings for Albany Records include Cyrille Rose's 32 Etudes; the Mozart Clarinet Quintet and Quartet; and a disc of music by American composers.

Laura Kaminsky is an astute and voracious listener. For decades, the journeys her ears have taken have benefited audiences in her native New York City through all the concert programs she has presented at venues like Town Hall, the 92nd Street Y, Miller Theater, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Roulette, The New School, and Symphony Space, where she currently serves as Artistic Director. But in addition to the staggering amount of music of others she has made available to the public, she has also crafted a formidable oeuvre of original musical compositions that are deeply individual responses to the world around her. Social and political themes have been common in Kaminsky's work, as has an abiding respect for and connection to the natural world. Her music has also been deeply informed by her extensive travels -- from Eastern Europe and West Africa, to throughout the Americas. All seven works featured in this recording -- the first devoted exclusively to her music -- share common elements. Prevalent is the persistent use of irregular rhythms, repeating patterns that shift constantly as well as the narrative aspect of the solo and chamber works.

The Ohio Light Opera performs Emmerich Kálmán's delightful three-act operetta in a new English performance. Written by Kálmán in 1915 and called Miss Susie, producers from Broadway secured the first international rights. In 1916, with English lyrics by novelist P.G. Wodehouse, the show opened at the New Amsterdam Theater as Miss Springtime and ran for 227 performances. Spurred by this success, Kálmán sought a German language libretto to adapt Miss Susie for Vienna, where it opened in 1917 and was called The Carnival Fairy. Subsequently mounted in Berlin with significant rewrites by Kálmán, this version in a new English translation is the one used for the Ohio Light Opera production.

Three works for solo instruments and orchestra by Laura Schwendinger are presented in world premiere recordings. Esprimere for cello and orchestra was written in 2007 for Matt Haimovitz and premiered by him. Curtis Macomber is the soloist for Charoscuro Azzurro for violin and chamber orchestra and Waking Dream, a single movement work for flute and chamber orchestra was written for flutist Christina Jennings, who gave the premiere. The first composer to win the American Academy in Berlin Prize Fellowship, Laura Schwendinger is on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin Madison and directs their contemporary chamber ensemble. The recipient of numerous prizes, awards and commissions, Ms.. Schwendinger's music has been performed by leading ensembles and artists of our time. The three soloists, all virtuosos of international acclaim, give stunning performances of this music of infinite beauty.

Music has been a strong political, unifying force for the Latvian people. It rose slowly, out of folk songs, during the 700 years of oppression by Russian tsars and German overlords. Poetry and song, with their indirect and symbolic undertones, became an inside language — a way of passing on messages, revisiting legendary heroes and building confidence. Latvian composers have fused their folklore with contemporary trends and this recording is an example of this fusion. Cantatas for the Christmas season by three of Latvia's most well-known composers are offered. Sung by the New York Latvian Concert Choir with the Latvian National Opera Chamber Orchestra conducted by Andrejs Jansons, the recording was made in Latvia in February, 2012. The New York Latvian Concert Choir was founded in 1975. Since the break up of the Soviet Union and the re-establishment of Latvia's independence, the choir has regularly collaborated with choirs and soloists in Latvia. Its mission has been to keep alive and promote Latvian music within the Latvian communities of the U.S., Canada, Australia and elsewhere and to introduce these countries to Latvia's ongoing cultural heritage.

Rosa Antonelli evokes the memories of Latin sounds for her second recording on Albany Records. Born in Argentina, Ms. Antonelli enjoys an active and varied performance career. She has been hailed as a leading exponent of Spanish and Latin American music, which she has performed to audiences around the world in extensive tours that have taken her to Europe, Africa, Asia, Latin America and North America. Trained at the National Conservatory in Buenos Aires, she was also a participant in the International University Music Program in Santiago de Compostela where she received the Rosa Sabater Award for her interpretation of Spanish music. Her first recording on Albany Records, Esperanza-Sounds of Hope, received critical praise as did her New York debut at Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall, where Harris Goldsmith wrote that her " inward poetry forced me to rehear, and revalue Piazzolla's Tangos, which she infused with an eloquence and inner communication "

George Whitefield Chadwick was one of the most significant and influential composers in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Although best known for his orchestral compositions, he also wrote more than 100 songs for voice and piano in a wide variety of styles. The songs included in this recording, many recorded for the first time, demonstrate Chadwick's range of styles and subjects. They are creative, playful at times and filled with a distinctive sensitivity and intelligence. Tenor Glenn Siebert has appeared with many of the world's most acclaimed orchestras and has recorded extensively. He is on the faculty of the University of North Caroline School of the Arts. Pianist Peter Kairoff is on the faculty of Wake Forest University. He has performed throughout the U.S., Europe and China and has recorded music by 19th century American composers for Albany Records.

For its first commercial recording, the Almeda Trio takes the traditional classical music ensemble of piano, violin and cello on a journey through various styles of more modern inspiration — from Argentinian tango to American jazz -- and even country fiddling. Stops along the way include two works by American composers Paul Schoenfield and Paul Ferguson and a composition by the 20th-Century beloved Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla. Since its debut in 2008, the Almeda Trio (Robert Cassidy, piano, Cara Tweed, violin, Ida Mercer, cello) has performed to enthusiastic audiences throughout the greater Cleveland area and beyond. They serve as the ensemble-in-residence at The Music Settlement in Cleveland and their mission is three-fold -- performance, education and outreach. The ensemble takes its name from the early 20th-century social activist and founder of The Music Settlement, Almeda Adams.