The Crossing, Evolutionary Spirits, Donald Nally

"You've got it made, buddy!" So my dad's boss told me on the phone back in 1979, when he heard about my studies. If I had it, it was not made. Or so it turned out. Simple reality and I am not complaining. Nonetheless these many years later I do understand how things went over the last 40 years. And listening this morning to the excellent choral group The Crossing and their just out album Evolutionary Spirits (Navona 6218) I realize that the contemporary world for most is in no way about "having it made," whether it be the music our composers write, the performers and artists who realize it or the everyday slugs like you and me who live life each day and know that we must make a difference as we simultaneously hope it will make some difference, any difference. And sure, some people in the past and perhaps even now are in a difficult position to make their life. I respect all of that.

As I listen now many times to this Crossing album, I come to appreciate increasingly what a finely tuned and finely attuned ensemble is The Crossing. They are, if anybody is... they are MAKING it. That is they are making great music. They are sheer sensual vocal beauty but they are also directed nearly selflessly to the goal of every work they perform, in this case some ten generally very short pieces. There are works not of an unabashedly Modern sort. Instead they are works that relish in the SATB palette. They are written with a great sensitivity for a sensual aural result and The Crossing give each one exactly the flourish that is needed.

In all cases there is a virtually perfect synchronicity between work and performance. And that is an excellent thing.

You may not know the composer names, Edie Hill or Gregory W. Brown, James Shrader or Bruce Babcock, Jonathan Sheffer, or Christofer J. Hoh. Does that matter? If anything it serves to make the program that much more exotic and rarefied. The Crossing tackles every one of them with a kind of devotion to the Modernity in the voices and harmonic zestiness. And all that is absolutely as it should be.

So whether or not you "have it made" in life, you need music. You need music like this. Trust me. I am like you, maybe. And this music helps me feel better. So I very much do recommend you hear it.