Customer Reviews

Stephen Albert: In Concordiam; TreeStone

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In the middle of a quietly productive career, Stephen Albert was killed in a car crash. While he left behind a good-sized body of work (not to mention a Pulitzer Prize), it's easy to wonder what else he might have done. I think it is fair to say that Albert was not a particularly innovative composer: still his music is worth more than a casual hearing. He was a quite capable orchestrator--indeed many aspects of his orchestration are reminiscent of Jacob Druckman (but considerably less gratuitous). His musical language is an extended tonality which was a popular coin of the realm in the middle part of the century. While his influences are often more than a little evident, his musical rhetoric is clear and well-integrated. This music makes considerably more sense than the tepid tonalism that currently passes for contemporary music in many of our halls.

Of the two pieces on this CD, the violin concerto "Concordium" is the less successful. The roles of the violin and orchestra are typically romantic in nature. The shadow of the Stravinsky violin concerto looms large in the background. There's nothing wrong with the piece, but it seems to be unaware of many other concerti in the 20th century.

"TreeStone" a song cycle for soprano and tenor (based on James Joyce) made me deeply sad that Albert didn't have a dozen operas under his belt. His writing for the voice--particularly the tenor--is knowledgeable and sympathetic. Each song setting brings out such a sense of individuality that you can easily imagine characters on stage. While the influence of Benjamin Britten is often in evidence, you could do a lot worse.

It is a pity that this CD, along with most other recordings of Albert's work, is already out of print. It is less than 20 years since his death. While nothing that changed musical history, it is worthy work that deserves to be heard.