Americascapes

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All four American composers on this new album by the Basque National Orchestra and conductor Robert Trevino wrote music that was known, played and esteemed during their lifetimes, but none of them ever had a huge “hit” and so the pieces here are likely familiar only to musical scholars. Yet while it is uncommon enough to find Charles Martin Loeffler, Henry Cowell, Carl Ruggles and Howard Hanson sharing the same album, the conductor Robert Trevino has taken his exploration still further, into the recesses of their repertory – complete with a Hanson piece, Before the Dawn, that has had to wait a century for this, its premiere recording.

Charles Martin Loeffler’s (1861-1935) La Mort de Tintagiles from 1897 is based on a play by Maeterlinck. This impressive 25-minute orchestral work features a solo part for viola d’amore akin to the role of the violin in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Sheherazade. Carl Ruggles (1876-1971) remains among the very greatest of American composers, despite having finished only a little more than an hour’s worth of music over the course of his 95 years. His Evocations exists both as versions for solo piano and orchestra. The orchestral version showcases in an excellent way Ruggles’ skill as an orchestral composer.

Howard Hanson (1896-1981) was one of major figures in American 20th century music. Hanson was a conservative Romantic and sometimes likened to an "American Sibelius". Prior to winning the "Prix de Rome" in 1921 Hanson had already written 20 opuses, including an orchestral work, Before the Dawn, Op. 17. It remains a mystery why Hanson hid this orchestral work in his archives. Hanson may have considered it juvenilia. Yet it is engaging from the start, filled with rich melodies, and sumptuously orchestrated. The album ends with Henry Cowell’s (1897-1965) Variations for Orchestra, written in Shah’s Iran, by the great American experimentalists who had a profound influence on the early music of John Cage and Lou Harrison. © Ondine