Barnson / Yale Orchestra / Bortolameolli - Vanitas [CD]

Matthew Barnson's music does more than scrape the surface; it digs deep to reveal the skull beneath the skin. His new innova album brings together a range of his signature works that somehow manage to shimmer with harmony and Concord even in their noisiest moments. The impetus for The Rule and Exercises of Holy Dying (Memento Mori after Gerhard Richter) arose after he was asked to compose a work to accompany Richard Strauss' Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings shortly after his grandfather's passing. It is marked by a gradual introduction of different techniques, often resolving to an uneasy calm. Pulsing rhythms push this high drama work toward extremes of fragility and brutality. By contrast, in Vanitas (Dance Forms), Barnson made his own rules for a new suite of dances inspired by the opulence, elegance, and audacity of the French courtly dances that were all the rage at Versailles and soon all of Europe for a century. With a nod to the viola da gamba and continuo repertoire translated to cello and marimba, Barnson created a new work refracted through myriad influences: the street art in Bushwick where he lived, the virtuosity of the not-so-recent avant gardes, and his recent foray into opera. He composed a work with surprising new tunefulness that emerges from his usual attention to dense textures. It is a work that questions, reinvents, is inspired by, and reacts to those ancient forms. The album also includes a short work, I Crossed the Samuel Beckett Bridge at Dusk. It was composed for two performers, a harpist and a single flute player playing piccolo, alto flute, and bass flute.