Meira Warshauer, Living Breathing Earth

Meira Warshauer combines a modern orchestral vocabulary with a poetic vision of life on this planet and her Jewish heritage. Her Living Breathing Earth CD (Navona 5842) pairs her Symphony No 1 Living Breathing Earth with Tekeeyah (a call), the latter of which is a concerto for trombone, shofar and orchestra.

Throughout there is lyricism and a bit of the bite and tang of contemporary harmonic thinking. The scores are evocative, engaging and filled with associative imagery. This is music, I would hope, of broad appeal, yet sufficiently advanced to satisfy those who look for the music of our time to engage in the sounds of our time.

The performances are very good and the music is highly recommended.

Arvo Paert's Symphony No. 4: A Masterful Work in The Tradition, But Also in the Paert Tradition

The new Symphony No. 4 (Los Angeles) by Arvo Paert has the sonic epic qualities of a high romantic symphony, but with the transparency and post-Minimalist soundscaped quality that Paert creates so distinctly.

The ECM New Series (2160 B0014663-02) recording of the work by the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Esa-Pekka Salonen has great majesty along with the proper ambiance Paert's music demands. You get those highly original Paertian harmonic progressions, the spaces, the dramatic contrasts. It portrays a somber, tragic-toned mood. That has something to do with its dedication to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who has been incarcerated in a Russian prison since 2003 for reasons that may well be political.

It is an ambitious work, fully worthy of the symphonic appellation given (perhaps more so than some of his earlier symphonies). Fragments from Paert's Kanon Pokajanen round out the program.

Highly recommended.